macxpress
Maybe Apple doesn't have a say in what a specific store does with your information, but Apple should still be able to make it so developers have to go through Apple with a paid developer account and submit the app to Apple for inspection/verification regardless of what store(s) it's submitted to.
In the end, I think most people will just keep using Apple's App Store and those who want to have a separate store will see what Apple is doing and how expensive it is to do it successfully. I wouldn't be surprised to see a few stores open and then slowly fade away as they cannot afford to remain open. Also, not every developer will use a 3rd party store and I don't think it's imperative for them to do so in order to remain in business. It would have to be a situation where a 3rd party App Store would get an exclusive to some popular apps in order for things to majority change and I doubt any 3rd party store has the funding to do that on a large scale.
