I haven't side loaded anything in years. In decades past I played around with custom roms and at some point I may look into the pixel roms for my older phones.

Aside from the usual issues that popup with any os for any device, I've had very few problems and none that stopped me from using my device.

I refuse to touch apple with someone's else pole. I like being able to install apps that aren't from the store and I can do that without having to hack my phone.

I equate apple to AOL. When you are new to tech apple just works but when you learn that there is more out there than apples walled garden you look at android that let's you do so much more and has so much more choice for hardware. Not to mention cost.