I don't see why you'd be astonished here. The Play Store downloads the APK and installs the APK. If you've downloaded it already (eg with a browser), you just install the APK.
How is that comparable to compiling from scratch and setting the registry entries yourself?
About five clicks more(than a single click) and a scary safety setting to turn off. But I didn't mean that installing an apk was as involved as my windows example. That was meant to illustrate that there are two completely different lines of action, two completely different levels of user competence at play.
Installing from the play store involves exactly zero knowledge of what an apk even is.
I want to flip the question around and ask you: How are you not seeing that there is a distinction?
