Software Engineers and UX/UI Designers had a code of ethics. Digital Research specifically created a code of ethics. (I think it was Gary Kildall who did it.) The code of ethics recommended companies that make OSes should stay separate from companies that make applications. It was Bill fuck-the-community-I-want-money Gates that ignored all that stuff in order to seek market domination (and monopoly power).

A combination of regulatory pressure, hackers, and enshittification from within has done a lot to keep Big Mike from seizing the whole market, but it's gotten pretty brutal multiple times in the last two-plus decades.