[pengaru]

You can have those things while still being given an opportunity to generate your own executable signing key upon first boot of your device.

It's not increasing the surface area in terms of system complexity; the OS is already checking signatures to create this barrier to general purpose computing in the first place.

If you don't want the additional key, you skip the step, to be never asked again until you factory wipe+reset the device.

Your listed wants and the freedom to run your own software are not mutually exclusive.

[jrumbut]

Or how about accept a key associated with the iCloud account linked to the phone?

This basically prevents any user friendly third party app store, but also allows users to, you know, use the device like they own it.

But I thought there was some ability to load apps without a developer account? Am I wrong? I've always just purchased the account because I was getting paid and wanted to show some professionalism but I thought there was a workaround.