I don't disagree with you at all; I just think that in the appliance-computing future where your computer is basically a toaster, the vast majority of users (ie, potential software customers) won't care about the "missing" apps at all. It's not a coincidence that most of the apps running up against sandboxing are tools aimed at power users -- third-party email clients, application launchers, BBEdit, backup tools, etc. These are specialized apps for users on the thin end of the bell curve. I don't think Apple cares much if they lose all the people who care about third-party text editors if they're able to start selling computers to millions of other ordinary people who have heretofore been terrified of installing software on their computers.

I'm not happy about it either; I guess I just understand what Apple's trying to do, and why Microsoft seems so eager to follow suit by setting up its own store. The "you have to be a computer guy to use computers" era is almost over.