Apple: Make a desktop, your iPad app is toast

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/perlow/apple-make-a-desktop-your-ipad-app-is-toast/13149

by ukdm • 16 years ago

71 87 16 years ago

ukdm2• 16 years ago

I can't help but wonder why this keeps happening. Rejecting this app seems a bit ludicrous to me. But I have to wonder if this has anything to do with Steve Jobs and Apple policies, or just some of the people who work at Apple enforcing the "Apple-way".

There are quite a few Apple fanatics out there. The ones who say Apple can do no wrong and the Apple way is the right way. They would do most things to make Steve Jobs happy. So it's not a giant leap to think some of those people have made it on to Apple's payroll and possibly hold senior positions at Apple.

So is this a case of Apple being a bit ridiculous with its policies, or people within Apple following the Apple-way and policies a little too closely? This might just be a staffing problem.

leviathant• 16 years ago

The developers sent an email to Steve Jobs about the removal of the app, and he replied "We are not allowing apps that create their own desktops. Sorry." If you think that's a staffing problem, the problem staff is Jobs.

ukdm2• 16 years ago

True. But do you think Jobs took the time to look into this, or just read the review comments from review process?

martythemaniak• 16 years ago

Someone suggested that the reason they banned it is because they are preparing their own widgety release, but have a look at the app:

http://www.groundhog.com.au/myframe/

I think its as simple as someone at Apple seeing that and thinking "I don't want our iPad to be used like a picture frame". And if Apple doesn't like how you use their product in your house, they'll do something about it.

glhaynes• 16 years ago

Apple puts a button for 'picture frame mode' right on the lock screen of the iPad. So, no, it's not because they're offended that people might use it as a picture frame.

tvon2• 16 years ago

It seems to me that a widget app, if popular, would become a new target for 3rd party applications, and I can't see why Apple would want that.

stcredzero4• 16 years ago

Doesn't seem like a widget app to me. More like a picture frame with lots of features. Where is there a 3rd party widget feature?

tvon2• 16 years ago

True, I thought it had features similar to the Dashboard app, but apparently not.

JoeAltmaier4• 16 years ago

I don't see how I can responsibly spend effort on developing an iPad app. The "approval" process is chaotic and arbitrary - witness intelligent cooperative people having their whole business shot down seemingly at random. I will develop for other platforms - the market leader Android for instance - which operate on the oldfashioned principle of "free market".

pavlov2• 16 years ago

Technically, Symbian is still the market leader by a comfortable margin.

(The development options are fairly confusing though. For C/C++ development, the only Symbian dev avenue worth considering nowadays is "Nokia Qt SDK", which is surprisingly nice. Java seems to be essentially deprecated, but higher-level options like Python and JavaScript through Web Runtime are available.)

blub3• 16 years ago

Buying Qt was a brilliant move by Nokia. Qt fans like myself have naturally drifted toward Nokia phone development.

Google should support this guy: http://groups.google.com/group/android-ndk/browse_thread/thr... and be more open with development options in general. Official support for Mono or Qt would attract a lot of interest.

somebear• 16 years ago

The preferred development avenues for Nokia smartphones (Symbian & Maemo/Meego) is either the Qt SDK [http://www.forum.nokia.com/Tools_Docs_and_Code/Tools/IDEs/No...] or WRT (Web RunTime) [http://www.forum.nokia.com/Technology_Topics/Web_Technologie...].

I agree that Qt is "surprisingly nice". Personally, I enjoy the iPhone UIKit framework, but the Qt SDK is almost as good (and in some areas better). I don't have much experience with the WRT, but in the N8 the demos I have seen are quite impressive performance-wise.

[disclaimer: I work for Nokia, take all I say (on this matter) with a grain of salt.]

Edit: Minor spelling.

blub3• 16 years ago

The market research puts Android in fourth place, after Nokia, RIM and Apple.

Even so, I can't even sell on Android market because I don't live in one of the approved countries.

JoeAltmaier4• 16 years ago

If the market is the US, and we consider just current sales, then Android beat Apple this month.

jrockway4• 16 years ago

So? You can just sell your app on your webpage. The market is not that compelling; it's hard to search and it's hard to read real reviews on your phone, so most people that actually need some software are just going to Google for what they need. The market mostly benefits developers of paid fart apps.

derefr• 16 years ago

Another way to look at it, though, is that they're avoiding optimization by proxy, by allowing human discretion in all their decisions. http://lesswrong.com/lw/28r/is_google_paperclipping_the_web_...

Humans are fallible, and so you'll get false positives (and negatives) for what, in retrospect, seem like very bad reasons. However, the one thing you won't get are superstimuli—apps that the approval "algorithm" loves but people hate—because there are people inside the algorithm.

blhack• 16 years ago

Does apple not see how this will end up badly for them?

Apple, you're scaring off talented developers; soon the only people who will be left are people who can afford to have gobs and gobs of apps rejected.

stcredzero4• 16 years ago

Mindshare is The foundation. Apple squanders it. Google gets this part right.

steveklabnik5• 16 years ago

There are lots of complaints about how Android version incompatibilities makes it a pain for developers. The iPhone is a joy to program for, but the app store policy sucks. Android is a bitch to program for, but the app story policy is great.

I'd say they're about neck and neck.

Timmy_C2• 16 years ago

I don't think these types of stories are scaring off anybody since we've been reading about App Store rejections for the last two years and it seems that companies and developers continue to want to make apps for iPad/iPod/iPhone.

It sounds to me like these developers didn't read the app store guidelines. Don't make apps that do what Apple devices can already do natively. They made an app that was too much like a desktop and got rejected. That seems entirely reasonable.

alex_c4• 16 years ago

Trying hard not to downvote just because I disagree so strongly, I don't even know if it's possible to find some common ground for discussion.

It sounds to me like these developers didn't read the app store guidelines.

I'm getting really sick of that defense for Apple. How exactly do you logically go from "Don't make apps that do what Apple devices can already do natively" to "Thou shalt not make a cool picture frame app"?

Yes, it's entirely the app developers' fault, and Apple can never be mistaken. The allmighty App Store Guidelines CLEARLY spell out for developers what they can and cannot do. They are immutable, all-encompassing, never vague, and impossible to misinterpret. If only developers would READ, we would never see any of these stories.

Argh.

(Have I just been trolled? On HN?)

DougBTX• 16 years ago

It sounds to me like these developers didn't read the app store guidelines.

The app was accepted, and for sale in the store, and only then did it get pulled - so says the article. Not even the unnamed app store reviewers spotted that this app went against the guidlines.

steveklabnik5• 16 years ago

Apple's thesis is that supply-side economics don't work. Get a ton of buyers in one place, and the supply will work itself out.

We'll see how it ends up.

xexers• 16 years ago

Ebay uses this tactic too. Ebay is very good to their buyers but can be ruthless with their sellers. If you google "ebay VERO" you will find thousands of sellers complaining.

chc3• 16 years ago

Sounds like they took a page from Microsoft's playbook. I guess they'd know best how well it works.

gte910h7• 16 years ago

Honestly, I'd love too see android be a viable competitor, but until it is, Apple is going to continue reigning.

Android is still ultrafragmented, and none of the tablets are out yet (nor will necessarily be that good when they come).

Half the iPad development I'm seeing looked for is for B2B apps, not consumer apps.

Raphael• 16 years ago

And how will business apps be viable if you aren't allowed to install your own software?

chmike• 16 years ago

The most amazing is that developpers have to pay to develop for Apple. I won't.

hboon2• 16 years ago

That's just a cost of business. Minute in the grand scheme of things.

Unless you are arguing about freedom to put apps on your own device. That's a different discussion

RyanMcGreal• 16 years ago

Perhaps Apple has been taken over by foreign insurgents following the Simple Sabotage Field Manual.

hga• 16 years ago

Nah, I think the iJuche explanation/analogy is best: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/perlow/ipad-isolationism/12031

Note WRT to the self-reliance theme of Juche that the above was written before the section 3.3.1 change. "Spirit of self-reliance" indeed.

jrockway4• 16 years ago

What’s next, Apple kills off birds which live on its campus that wet their nests?

Yeah, that sounds like the logical next step...

...?

BrandonM• 16 years ago

Did you actually read the Monty Python reference farther down the page that explained that metaphor?

jrockway4• 16 years ago

Nope. Bad writing, boring story.

Batsu• 16 years ago

Quite frankly, I'm not even surprised anymore. Every month a developer uncovers a new piece of the mysterious approval puzzle.

k_shehadeh• 16 years ago

Right. For me, it's not that they're instituting restrictive policies (which I can sort of understand in some cases). The problem is that it seems to be a moving target. If I was an iPhone developer I would feel like I was being toyed with.

pstevensza• 16 years ago

Some viable arguments lost in a tirade of hysteria. I've never written an app for the iPhone/iPad, so I have no first hand experience with the approval/rejection nonsense. I do however own an iPhone, and I love the fact that I can expect a certain level of quality in the applications I buy. One thing that makes me snicker about the article in question is the purpose of the app. Why the hell would you want to waste an iPad on using it as a picture frame? With Twitter overlays? Anyway, each to their own. My main point is that so long as the people bitching publicly are gibbering loons like the idiot-in-charge at the linked blog, very few folk will pay attention.

mcav• 16 years ago

> Why the hell would you want to waste an iPad on using it as a picture frame? With Twitter overlays?

When you're at your laptop/desktop computer on your desk. It's handy to have a dedicated display for twitter/other dashboards, if you like keeping up on that stuff while you work.

DeusExMachina• 16 years ago

Why the hell would you want to waste an iPad on using it as a picture frame?

Why the hell would you want to use an iPhone to make farts? But the app store is full of them.

I, as an iPhone developer (reconsidering the thing every time I read news like this one) don't see all that quality in the app store. Sure, there are a lot of high quality apps, but there is a lot of garbage that just piles up hiding worthy applications.

gte910h7• 16 years ago

And the iPad appstore app is hideous for browsing, so you have to wade through all the crappy apps to see anything, and whenever you look at an app, you get put back to the beginning of the category.

iron_ball• 16 years ago

What does your opinion of this app have to do with the app store approval process?

How does rejecting this app help Apple ensure overall quality?

CWuestefeld• 16 years ago

Downvoted. This article (and the one from the developer that was posted yesterday) indicate that this isn't about quality. By all accounts it was a well-done app. Rather, the problem was that Apple dislikes its functionality -- but in a way that they refuse to define, so the developer has no way to "fix" it.

Tichy• 16 years ago

"Why the hell would you want to waste an iPad on using it as a picture frame?"

Camouflage, perhaps - if thieves enter the house, they might leave the "crappy picture frame" behind.

korch• 16 years ago

Apple hypocrisy at it's finest!

So it's okay to make VNC, Citrix and other kinds of apps that can connect you to remote Windows and Linux desktops, but any app that looks too different from or too similar to Apple's Springboard faces automatic bannination? At this rate, Apple is going to need to start employing teams of Theologians and Talmudic scholars to interpret and administer the Kafkaesque Laws of the App Store. Never mind the fact that Apple, nor any software company should ever be in the position of censoring the content of any software that runs on their machines.

What did Steve say on the D8 video yesterday—"companies don't have to be rude to other companies" That's the Apple we want, not the Sith Inquisition.

Big corporations bend the rules all the time to help other big corporations—everyone knows and accepts this. But when big corporations make the rules secret, and then use them to help each other while hurting the little guy, well, that's just as rude and arrogant as it gets from a company!

jodrellblank• 16 years ago

Never mind the fact that Apple, nor any software company should ever be in the position of censoring the content of any software that runs on their machines.

In what sense is this "a fact"?

Maro• 16 years ago

I've already decided I'm waiting for the Android hardware/software platform to stabilize before buying a smartphone, due to Apple's policies, but I was really looking forward to buying an iPad this summer. Yes, the policies are the same, but it's got no reasonable alternative and it looks so sexy and useful.

However, reading this article outraged me so much I changed my mind. As a developer I don't want other developers to have to put up with Apple's 1984 policies, so I'll wait for an Android based device on the tablet front too.

bsaunder• 16 years ago

It's beginning to seem like Apple is treating all their third party developers as employees that they don't have to directly compensate.

ra88it2• 16 years ago

The picture of the app on the dev's website doesn't look like a 'desktop'. Surely there is some other component in the UI that does resemble a desktop. Anybody have a link to a better screenshot?

ra88it2• 16 years ago

Hmmmmm. Or maybe Apple thinks it resembles a desktop simply because there are UI components on top of a background image?

Apple: Make a desktop, your iPad app is toast

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