I'm fed up with this nanny state app store model. As a hacker I feel like I have an obligation to fight this trend. I'm committed to a couple of iOS projects right now but when they wrap I'm going to take a very hard look at getting back on the open web.
Damn straight. My macbook sits unused in another state because I made the same decision a year or so ago. I don't miss it, in fact I _prefer_ my GNU/Linux netbook.
It's a lot longer than 23 days; the core issue dates back to February. I'm actually not sure what has changed about their situation since February; most of the stuff on the OP was not new.
Not exactly. Apple's guidelines state that they do not want more "apps such as fart, burp, flashlight and Kama Sutra apps". So, this issue is resolved in the sense that Apple has successfully booted this app out of the App Store. Game over.
I don't understand how Apple, with all its money, doesn't have better facilities for dealing with this sort of thing - especially when they care so much about developer retainment.
I'm not sure why you think Apple cares so much about developers. Is it the warm glow they engineer for you at WWDC?
Your question is perfectly natural, of course, given the way they flatter us developers in their keynotes. Just don't get caught in the reality distortion field. I've spent a lot of time working with Apple during good times and bad (for them), and even during bad times, the attitude toward third-party developers was that, if they weren't loyal followers, Apple didn't want them around anyway.
I was astonished to hear this kind of thing repeatedly at Apple HQ back when I thought they should have been desperately trying to woo developers to save their platform from extinction. Now that they are on top of the world, imagine what their (real) attitude must be toward third-party developers.
It's like the old Saturday Night Live parody of the phone company, when AT&T was still a monopoly: "We're the phone company. We don't care. We don't have to."
I'm not trying to be snarky, but apparently they don't care that much if they can't handle working with developers about an issue as simple as this. Even just telling them "We have decided not to reinstate your app, sorry" would be better than what they are doing.
> Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s chief financial officer, added that the company runs its App Store and iTunes store “just a little over break-even,” to counter claims that the company is trying to use apps to drive up its profits.
> ...despite their massive volume, Apple's App Store makes sufficiently little profit that they don't even break it out as a separate line item on their 10-Q (instead lumping it under "music related products and services", the same category that handles both iTunes and iBooks)
Are Apple employee's forbidden to release their own apps?
How easy would it be for some person in the loop to just rip off an app and have their competition kickbanned? There's probably no law against insider-"apping"
Perhaps they meant to block Kama Sutra App™, Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana, Kama Sutra! - Manual of Sex, Kama Sutra: Manual of Sex, Kamasutra™, Kamasutra 3D, Kamasutra by Vatsyayana, Kamasutra for iPad, Kamasutra fun, Kamasutra Museum 3D, Kamasutra Museum 3D HD, KamaSutra Posiciones, Kamasutra The Game, Kamazootra, Kamazootra Lite, 101 Positions of KamaSutra, Kamasutra (Deutsch), Kamasutra - Sex Positions Guide and Kama Sutra, KamaSwami, or KamaSwami for iPad.
Perhaps it was only through confusion that they blocked iKamasutra.
