the thing is, most us people are using iphone and it doesn't have sideloading(there are chances for sideload in eu but not in other places), so instant kill for that demographic(iphone is status symbol and most people have it so they'll not switch to android). For Android - your analogy is not quite good. A better analogy would be prohibiting a mark of alcohol (tiktok) when there is another legalized mark(instagram/shorts) but which tastes a bit worse-> people will continue to drink, but extra hassle will stimulate the switch to the legal type. Both factors will effectively kill the growth effect for tiktok so us userbase will switch (and since eu can have something similar, all western userbase will be cut)
> so instant kill for that demographic(iphone is status symbol and most people have it so they'll not switch to android)
I'd wager that if TikTok got banned in the US and Apple did not immediately follow with allowing sideloading, iPhone would quickly lose its status value in the teenage demographics. After all, status matters most when comparing equivalent goods - it's what justifies spending more for the same thing. In the scenario above, iPhone would immediately become painfully inferior to Android phones, along the dimension that matters a lot for the teenage cohort.
