Of course it impacts the user... And if Epic was found doing something illegal and was shut down or bankrupted, that would also impact the user. Your over-simplification that it's a "business disagreement" is disingenuous and incomplete. The signature revocation system you're claiming is simply to "protect their business model" is the same system that allows Apple to immediately shut down any malware that makes its way into the App Store inadvertently. It's the same system that's been used in the past to protect users from private key leaks.

The only anti-consumer behavior in your situation came from Epic who knowingly violated the rules as a PR stunt.

> The only anti-consumer behavior in your situation came from Epic who knowingly violated the rules as a PR stunt.

Exactly. Never forget, it was Epic who threw their users under the bus, not Apple.

Epic expected you to be a soldier in their fight. They expected you to make a sacrifice you were not willing to make.

That's entirely on Epic.

I was not claiming the revocation system only has the purpose of protecting Apple's business model, but its one of the purposes.

Even though I agree that in the Epic case, most of the blame lies with Epic, I still have a problem with Apple: the signature revocation system is used for more things than removing malware. I think it is user hostile and anti consumer to disable installed apps on other grounds, because the users might be dependent on them.

I'd like to be able to run programs and apps on my machine that are not Apple-approved.

> I'd like to be able to run programs and apps on my machine that are not Apple-approved.

I thought you could anyway. You would right-click the app in Finder and choose Open — from then on, it would continue to open.

Or is that a different mechanism?