You misunderstood the comparison with gambling. It's obvious bad software usually isn't gonna be too successful, no matter the platform and its policies. But the way Apple is letting you know only AFTER you are done with development whether you'll be even allowed (!) to sell it, that is definitely NOT the conventional risk you take when you decide to develop an application or not. And there are numerous hints at Apple not approving an application citing a certain policy that is in no way related to the actual reason for not approving the app. A developer is, by definition, unable to make 100% sure that his app will be approved by Apple. _That_ is the actual reference to gambling.
You can say a similar thing when government legislates your business as illegal. Large amount of regulators can be very opaque, and you only find out after the fact a month or two after you've started business.
Android is gonna have to fight the old war of OpenSource platforms that go commercial (a fight that has been won only very seldom in the past). If it succeeds at that, its future is going to be very bright.
Cydia will never be as popular and/or successful as the AppStore. But then again, it never was supposed to be. Cydia is supposed to be an open platform welcomming any kind of developer without restrictions and/or fees. The idea itself is meant for an outsider-position. Saurik is doing an awesome job at maintaining the Cydia store, but his much more important work consists in bringing *nix software to the iPhone platform. Cydia is only one of these advantages ;-)
"Android is gonna have to fight the old war of OpenSource platforms that go commercial (a fight that has been won only very seldom in the past). If it succeeds at that, its future is going to be very bright."
Care to explain that? Google does not intend to make money directly out of Android sales and just about all the applications users buy are proprietary. It's more or less the same as someone buying Oracle to run on Linux - the OS is open-source, but the application is not.
