No one is forced to work with apple. I've been developing software for 15 years and never once touched xcode or iOS. Working with apple is a choice you make.
Yes well good for you. I'm not sure what kind of software you're developing but it obviously isn't consumer facing mobile apps. So perhaps your anecdata is irrelevant in this case, yes?
Apple is a gatekeeper that no one who is buying their phones cares about. People buy iPhones because their friends have iPhones, that's it. But Apple treats developing for Apple as a special privilege and locks down their massive ecosystem. It should be illegal at the scale Apple has, but it isn't.
So yes, we are forced to work with Apple in order to be competitive in industries that Apple has no business controlling. You don't have that problem with whatever you develop because (presumably) Microsoft doesn't exploit Windows' market advantage in the way Apple does.
I write consumer facing software among many other things. I do not and will not write iPhone software. Apple users can access a (single, Apple-provided) web browser.
If you want to sell mobile apps that you cannot run from a browser, then choosing not to enter Apple's ecosystem will keep you from a very large user base.
It is a choice you make, but with significant business consequences.
Apple is a gatekeeper that no one who is buying their phones cares about. People buy iPhones because their friends have iPhones, that's it. But Apple treats developing for Apple as a special privilege and locks down their massive ecosystem. It should be illegal at the scale Apple has, but it isn't.
So yes, we are forced to work with Apple in order to be competitive in industries that Apple has no business controlling. You don't have that problem with whatever you develop because (presumably) Microsoft doesn't exploit Windows' market advantage in the way Apple does.