The iPhone and iPod Touch are very interesting platforms for enabling technology. Touch, accelerometers, portability, radio, coolness; they’ve got it all.
But the rules of program distribution are so ridiculous that I can’t imagine playing by them. I want to give my apps away. And I want to do it without some faceless technician’s approval.
After you’ve done the work to develop your App they can reject it without giving any reason.
This recent post from Riverturn illustrates the problem though I’ve heard of many more cases like this.
2 comments
I dont quite agree fully. There is a risk in everything in life… and the risk here is very minimal. If you stick by making a non-controversial app (eg. no political content / agenda, no gambling etc) then there is a LOT more potential in succeeding and its defintely worth the minimal risk … and so are 75,000 other apps out there saying the same. Apple is not a Youtube like site – and every app is monitored. Its NOT a “free and frictionless web2.0 content / social media economy” ..if you get what i am saying. you can upload any video or content onto social media sites and if it controversial the community will flag it or the content owner will send a note to the youtube folks.. but until then its regarded as 100% legit. there-in lies the problem. (a) apple would not want to get into lawsuits (b) they want to control the quality of the content – because if crappy low grade stuff gets through …then the value of their created system skyrockets down (remember commodore?). So, its in the best interest of everyone that things are monitored and checked – and i believe its a small price we developers are paying in return for a great distribution platform – where a small indie can challenge the big boys like EA and stand side by side with them in the app store… avoiding the whole mobile publishing route that was so controlled by big-deals with thousands of wireless carrier across the world … giving the indie no chance at all. This innovation is changing the market dynamics… i know because i come from this background for the past 6 years we’ve been making games and mobile apps… and now apple with its iphone and the appstore has totally turned theindustry upside down and ALL (yes ALL) other players are making KNOCK-OFF iPHONE hardware and interface as well as knock-off online App Stores (sideloading model)… and i mean *every* other player!! If you want to learn iphone apps and game development come stop by at EDUmobile.ORG
I understand what you are saying but I disagree.
The risk is months of development time wasted. You say they’ll approve any non-controversial app but folks who have gotten rejected would disagree. And when you get rejected, you get NO FEEDBACK on why. My guess is the Google Voice guys didn’t think their app was controversial.
If Apple makes some deal with a company for exclusivity in some app space (like they clearly have already) and your app touches that space, sorry, you’re out. With no explanation.
Suppose Microsoft decided to control the “quality of the content” as you say on Windows?. I’m sure they can deliver the highest quality apps in the world (in their opinion) so they’d “serve us” best by only giving us Microsoft apps.
I don’t buy that an opaque approval process is good for the market.
As to protecting us from “crappy low grade stuff”. How many high-quality “pull my finger” apps do we need?
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