Yet again I get to use the term douchebaggery in a post. And yet again, it relates directly to APPLE, the APP STORE, and the absolute drool on yourself stupidity that is plauging the entire setup. Yes, I’m a fanboy and yes, if Steve Jobs was here with me right now I’d be making sure […]
" />

RANT: Apple, GV Mobile and you.

Jul 27th 2009 by

GV Mobile

GV Mobile

Yet again I get to use the term douchebaggery in a post. And yet again, it relates directly to APPLE, the APP STORE, and the absolute drool on yourself stupidity that is plauging the entire setup. Yes, I’m a fanboy and yes, if Steve Jobs was here with me right now I’d be making sure he was checking my punctuation.

Amazon made a mistake the other day. We all make mistakes. But Amazon owned up to the mistake, heck the King of Amazon stood up and admitted it was stupid and they’ll do what they can to make sure it doesn’t happen again. What does Apple do? They make sure that Amazon doesn’t spend too much time in the limelight, and without much of any warning or common sense decides to just pull 2 applications from the iTunes App Store. Why?

Good question. They didn’t show porn. They didn’t show as close to porn as you can get without being porn, they didn’t show zombie school children getting shot on the playground, they didn’t fart, snot or shoot goo with a “jacking motion”. They actually did something useful – They let you use the newly released (beta) Google Voice.

So no killing, murder, drugs, sex, or any other famously taboo yet still allowed in the store antics – just good old fashioned useful. Again we ask why?

Richard Chipman from Apple just called – he told me they ‘re removing GV Mobile from the App Store due to it duplicating features that the iPhone comes with (Dialer, SMS, etc). He didn ‘t actually specify which features, although I assume the whole app in general.

Bullshit. Pardon-ey-moi – Bullshite. This reeks of two things – Google and AT&T. Google has Google Voice apps on other platforms and is rumoured (so I’ve read) to be producing their own Google Voice app. AT&T as we all know doesn’t want the competition and make no mistake Google Voice is competition. Who’s really to blame? I don’t know. I frankly at this point don’t care. I’m 100% putting Apple on the hook for this. FOR TOO LONG APPLE THIS CRAP HAS BEEN PULLED ON HARD WORKING DEVELOPERS. TOO LONG YOU HAVE NOT TOLD US WHAT THE DAMMED RULES ARE.

So – I’m putting here what I put on Sean’s Blog:

If that ‘s the logic they want to use – duplicating functionality – then you need to make sure they are also pulling all applications that have a primary function of sending an email or sending/receiving SMS, and all Dialer apps. Send them screenshots of other apps that perform those functions, along with screenshots of your application showing similar functions. If they want to play the ‘duplicate functionality ‘ game – make them really play it.

We all know this is crap, they know its crap – call them on it. Force their hand. They ‘re taking food off your table for no good reason.

TUAW says: “I hope these are growing pains that Apple and the App Store will leave behind.” NO. NO. NO. The time for growing pains was LAST YEAR. Apple has had time to nail down the rules, and present common sense guidelines. They’ve had time to say this is and isn’t acceptable. They’ve had time to FIRE THE DUMBASSES. They haven’t. Now’s the time for EVERYONE ELSE who has a vested interest in the appstore – developers and users alike – to get the message to Apple and make sure they realize that this crap needs to stop. Make no bones about it – Apple just stole money from this guy’s bank account. And the more this continues to happen the less likely people like Sean, @PolarBearFarms, and thousands of other developers are to keep putting their lives on hold to create killer apps – And that is something we all suffer for.

EDIT: This is showing more and more stink of just plain Apple turning brown in the summer heat (and AT&T is the sunshine). According to this post at TechCrunch:

A Google Spokesperson has told us the following:

We work hard to bring Google applications to a number of mobile platforms, including the iPhone. Apple did not approve the Google Voice application we submitted six weeks ago to the Apple App Store.

Apple – Fix This Now. And by “this” I mean all of it. The stupid non-published “we felt like it” policies, the bad hair day policies, and the bow down before the deathstar policies. FIX IT.

Continue reading:

TAGS: