Slashdot Mirror
Apple Rejects iPhone App As Competitive To iTunes
DaveyJJ sends news of yet another rejection of an iPhone app by Apple, with perhaps a chilling twist for potential developers of productivity or utility apps. John Gruber of Daring Fireball writes: "Let's be clear: forbidding 'duplication of functionality' is forbidding competition. The point of competition is to do the same thing, but better." Paul Kafasis (co-founder of Rogue Amoeba Software) makes the point that this action by Apple will scare talented developers away from the iPhone platform. And Dave Weiner argues that the iPhone isn't a "platform" at all: "The idea that it's a platform should mean no individual or company has the power to turn you off."
WHY APPLE, WHY?!
Maybe it is a ploy to make the iphone a little crappier. It was too good. They think they need to bring it down a little..
I just "upgraded" my phone today and had to spend the next two hours restoring the phone due to a crash in the upgrade.
now this?!
``Paul Kafasis (co-founder of Rogue Amoeba Software) makes the point that this action by Apple will scare talented developers away from the iPhone platform.''
I hope it will, but I doubt it. I hope the talented developers will favor open platforms over closed ones, help create and improve open platforms, and help making the world more open.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
The last comment clearly has it right. The iPhone is not a platform, it's Apple's toy that you're allowed to use. Is anybody really surprised?
You're never going to be allowed to use alternative hardware, obviously, and with the subscription status and deals with phone companies, you're going to be seriously restricted when it comes to software. How long did it take them to allow any third party programs on their phone?
So, hopefully iPhone devs do something about it. Ars's John Siracusa proposes boycotting the iPhone category at the Apple Design Awards. Makes sense to me; like he says, it'll cause a blemish on Apple's reputation without damaging the pocketbooks of those devs who have invested in this platform. (And for Chrissake, yes it's a platform, just a badly restricted one at the moment.)
OMG! Wau!
This reminds me, in one single way (and only that way; cue replies that ignore this line) of religious people who want to use law to force their beliefs on others -- such people do not believe in the power of their own message. When a company goes out of its way to forbid competition, they are saying that they don't believe their own sanctioned offerings are good enough to compete. Otherwise they would welcome competition and allow it to lead to a superior experience for their customers.
For the knee-jerk types out there (I can see it now: "but its theirs and they can do that if they want so nyaa!"), I will point out that whether Apple has the right to behave in this way is an entirely separate question; my post here is assuming that they do.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
From a business standpoint, why should they allow it?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I hope this trend ends soon. The screening of apps started not long ago and I think was a result of the amount of crap that Apple allowed to sell on the store. Between the numerous "flash light" apps and the infamous "I am Rich" app a lot of people were annoyed at the signal to noise ratio. Then there was "Netshare" which was pulled because it violated ATTs terms of service (luckily I got my copy early.)
My guess is that Apple responded to all this by making it some middle manager's responsibility to come up with a set of ground rules to "improve" the situation. He/she/the committe or whatever obviously went way overboard. As a potential iPhone developer it gives me the chills that you could spend months on a project just to have it rejected for a rediculous reason like the one here.
I have stated multiple times on Slashdot and have multiple times be called a troll...
THIS is EXACTLY the same behavior Apple exhibited with the Apple and their token program!
Ah, but this is so old news (over 20 years ago) that people tend to have forgotten!
Now Apple is all good and dandy! BS!
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
Linux did it.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Apple has created an embedded device and is choosing to tightly control the available applications for it. If you think this is a bad thing, don't develop for it and don't buy an iphone, it's that simple. Things like the gameboy and xbox live tightly control the available content, and I don't see nearly as much bitching about them as I do about the iphone. People jailbreak/develop home brew apps for the devices and don't expect to be embraced by the hardware creators. If you want to develop for an open platform develop for the PC or another device which actually wants and maintains good relationships with independent developers.
Tell me again why this phone is so cool?
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
Here's what's going to happen. It'll happen because it always happens.
Apple gets caught with its pants down. Everyone condemns Apple while its PR teams huddle together to find a way to deal with the issue. Finally, Apple announces that the issue was to do with an oversight caused by a miscommunication caused by an unrelated issue that actually was a case of the application not being approved yet, not that it was really rejected.
People outside of Apple circles will laugh, but then be flamed endlessly for laughing to the point that we no longer want to talk about it any more.
Happened when Apple was using cheap third world labour to build iPods. Happened when Apple stopped releasing source code to Darwin. And it's going to happen again. Apple will, as with those issues, completely reverse itself, while making it sound like it was its policy all along.
So I'm not even going to bother. Here's the thing though: this is Apple's mentality. They will try to lock down iPhone if they can. They do in many areas already, and they will continue to do so. I can swap out a SIM in an iPhone and tether my laptop to a real cellphone instead, and it'll work, but Apple bans applications that allows you to use iPhone for this. I can install any application I want on my Motorola V635 - which isn't even something most people would describe as a "smartphone" but is, thanks to J2ME, completely programmable and has oodles of storage space thanks to microSD - but I can only install "approved" applications on an "smart" iPhone.
So yes, Apple will reverse itself on this issue, and all of you criticizing it now will be criticized as lying Apple haters who misrepresented what Apple was doing. But iPhone will always be a locked down platform. And as long as it is, there will be many of us who will just steer clear of it.
And if what you want is a locked down platform, don't start whining when you hear some app developer has been screwed over because of it.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Apple has noted that people who want to distribute apps to a small group are directed as to how to go about it.
What's being done here is that Apple is stating they will not aid in the proliferation of a competitive piece of software by marketing, promoting and distributing it through THEIR store... which is not the only possible channel of distribution, strictly speaking, but certainly the most convenient.
Do we talk, however, about the flipside of this? Where is the integrity in a developer knowingly creating an application to do something a product already does? You mean to tell me that in the marketplace of ideas that developers are so bereft of creativity that they cannot think of something unique?
I know that even Apple doesn't originate ideas... but it's a bit different when you go buy a company making something you think you can integrate better versus simply writing an app that does roughly what another one does and then pissing and moaning that the distributor refuses to help you cannibalize their own apps.
Are we complaining that Bose stores refuse to sell anything but Bose, or that Dell stores refuse to sell computers other than Dells, or that Ford opts not to distribute Daewoo parts at its stores?
Apple will scare talented developers? If they were truly talented would they have attempted less than surreptitiously to ask a distributor to promote a competing product rather than writing any number of applications that haven't been thought of yet?
Who wants to bet that Apple will add this feature in the next release and doesn't want to deal with thousands of people demanding their money back when they realize they just paid for something they were about to get for free?
This sort of problem points to a clear need for a way to getting app concepts preapproved by Apple prior to development. Apple should never reject a useful app after it has been written. If Apple is going to reject lots of useful apps for reasons outside the scope of the developer agreement, the burden rests squarely on them to provide another way for app writers to obtain guidance so apps never get written if they have little chance of being approved.
If Apple needs a good reason to solve this problem, here's one: in the absence of such a concept approval program, an individual (non-corporate) developer would have to be an idiot to risk months of development time only to have Apple reject it arbitrarily. Thus, individual iPhone developers are better off releasing quick, half-assed products that take a week to develop and suck massively, then fix the bugs after Apple has approved the first version. If Apple wants the quality of 1.0 versions in the store to be utter bollocks, don't worry--it will get there soon enough if they don't improve their developer relations. And, of course, every time an app developer does that, it costs Apple bandwidth.
By the way, I've cut and paste what I found to be relevant to this topic, two paragraphs of the Terms and Conditions of the iPhone SDK download Agreement and the first paragraph of the iPhone Application Submission Agreement.
SDK Terms and Conditions
1. Relationship With Apple Inc. ("Apple"). You understand and agree by becoming a Registered iPhone Developer, no legal partnership or agency relationship is created between you and Apple. Neither you nor Apple is a partner, an agent or has any authority to bind the other. You agree not to represent otherwise. You also certify that you are of the legal age of majority in the jurisdiction in which you reside (at least 18 years of age in many countries) and you represent that you are legally permitted to become a Registered iPhone Developer. This Agreement is void where prohibited by law, and the right to become a Registered iPhone Developer is not granted in such jurisdictions.
9. Apple Independent Development. Nothing in this Agreement will impair Apple's right to develop, acquire, license, market, promote or distribute products, software or technologies that perform the same or similar functions as, or otherwise compete with any other products, software or technologies that you may develop, produce, market, or distribute. In the absence of a separate written agreement to the contrary, Apple will be free to use any information, suggestions or recommendations you provide to Apple for any purpose, subject to any applicable patents or copyrights.
iPhone App Submission Agreement
1. iPhone GTM Programs. The web applications you submit will be considered for inclusion in Apple's iPhone product pages, ADC web pages, Apple eNews programs and other related Apple developer and marketing web pages and programs (collectively "iPhone GTM Programs"). You understand and agree that Apple has complete discretion over whether to include your web applications in any iPhone GTM Program. You also understand and agree that Apple reserves the right, at its complete discretion and without prior notice to you, to remove your web applications from any and/or all iPhone GTM Programs. Should Apple decide to include your web application in one or more iPhone GTM Programs, you agree that Apple shall have the right, and you hereby grant Apple a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive right and license, to use, reproduce, publicly display, reference, link to, and distribute in connection with such iPhone GTM Programs, your web application URL and all related information and materials (including without limitation images, trademarks, and logos) you provide with your submission to Apple (collectively, the "Submitted Materials").
End Result
Apple covered themselves very well on this topic and basically, if you are going to develop an app for the iPhone, you should be well aware of the risks and they are fairly, clearly stated.
As a developer, I just can't imagine developing for the iPhone fiefdom. I'm not going to spend weeks building an application that then gets pulled because Apple shake their magic 8-ball and decide that they want another shrubbery before they'll put it on there. What if you wrote a cool app, had some decent income, then Apple release a new app in some firmware that copies your functionality and then rule that your product is competitive?
I can write for Symbian and release it. I can try and sell it through my cell operator's store. If they reject it, that might be a setback, but the point is that I can bypass that and sell direct or through another store.
Come on in, the water's fine in the Openmoko pool! A truly free platform, and anything compiled for Linux on an ARM CPU will run (assuming the dependencies are also present).
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
It is just one guy who is being over cautious and denying the apps. There's a few instances of this person at Apple denying perfectly legitimate apps. Normally they will go through and review the decision, and allow it into their store.
Windows Mobile is offered on a LOT of devices these days and is gaining in popularity. If Apple isn't offering a level playing field for 3rd party developers, then use your talent to write applications for other mobile platforms.
I own a tmobile Wing and I have had no problems using the Amazon mp3 service to download songs on the go, and then I have the music DRM free and can use it however I like.
Amazon could certainly stand to make a streamlined interface for use with the Windows Mobile Internet Explorer, since it's very handy to hear a song on the radio and then simply go and get it when I'm out and about. Then I can put it on my stereo when I get home or play immediately.
With Iphone you're paying for something that supposedly works flawlessly within Apple's strictly proscribed domain, while with a Windows Mobile platform you're paying for something you can do anything you want with.
Some people don't find Windows Mobile worth the trouble, but then again I'm the kind of person that prefers stick shift to automatic.
bend like the reed
Arggh!! This is frustrating!
I don't sync up my iPhone unless I'm udating the firmware because 1) it takes way too long, and 2) I've got to boot back into windows to even run iTunes.
I don't listen to music and the ipod section of my iPhone is empty.
I DO listen to a lot of podcasts. Up to this point, I have been using Safari to navigate to the home pages of the podcasts that I am interested in and then I download the podcasts directly. This works very well, but is a bit hard to do while I'm driving.
I've been hoping that someone would make this exact app because apple is not providing this functionality themselves like they should. And now that someone has, I can't get it. I would totally pay $10 today for this functionality.
Anyway, hopefully this means that apple is going to open up and allow the iPhone's music store the ability to do this.
It seems so dumb that you can't open the iphone itunes music store app from the iphone unless you are connected to wifi. Hello! That is what 3G is for!
Arg. Hopefully they will either add this functionality themselves, or reconsider and let this app through. From looking at the video of the app in action, it looks like one of the most thoughtful iPhone apps in existance.
Anyonewho uses Apple products has no right to complain abount overt anti-competitive practices.
Where is the integrity in a developer knowingly creating an application to do something a product already does? You mean to tell me that in the marketplace of ideas that developers are so bereft of creativity that they cannot think of something unique?
You're either not serious, or out of your mind.
Are you seriously trying to say that a developer should never develop an application that does something another application already does? Even if it does that something much better than the original?
In that case, we don't need Firefox or Opera because we have Safari; we don't need Adium because we have iChat; we don't need VLC because we have Quicktime.
Screw competition! Right?
Perl - $Just @when->$you ${thought} s/yn/tax/ &couldn\'t %get $worse;
., ..
I'm a fan of Apple hardware. I've got an iPod Touch. I'd never use the app in question because I'm happy with the way iTunes handles my podcasts.
But I don't see why Apple should care about this app. I assumed the Slashdot summary was way off base, which more often than not is the case nowadays - but it's pretty accurate in this instance. So why is Apple doing this? As far as I know they don't make money off of podcasts - heck, most of them are free. So why should they care? Are they worried that, somehow, this will be used to move other files onto the iPod/iPhone? I just can't figure it out (and yeah, I'm discounting with prejudice the conspiracy theories that seem to be rampant here today - those don't really stand up to any sort of analysis either).
It just doesn't make sense.
#DeleteChrome
you're getting a lawsuit.
is the future. Thats exactly right that nobody should be able to reject or shut you off. You should also not have to build somebody else's future. You should be able to build your own. Services like Force.com are iPhone are today. www.sullivansoftwaresystems.com ModBox are the future of the "Platform".
If you're looking for software for a non-closed smartphone, check out http://www.handango.com/
Handango sells all kinds of third party content for Blackberries, Palms, Windows Mobile devices, Symbian, even Tablet PCs.
And there's no draconian limitation on selling podcast software.
I lump Apple, Microsoft and Google together these days. Same business practices and callousness to their customers and the public.
Well, who will be the next up and coming company that we can love and rely upon? - that is, until the lust for money drives them into the same above category.
They rejected an iPhone app because it COMPETES with the iTunes service?
Hello, antitrust lawsuit. Welcome to Microsoft's shoes, Apple.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
"And Dave Weiner argues that the iPhone isn't a "platform" at all: "The idea that it's a platform should mean no individual or company has the power to turn you off.""
I disagree. All of the modern game consoles are clearly platforms, yet you must have approval in order to develop and sell software for them. You have to submit your game to MS, Sony or Nintendo and they have to approve it. They can (and will) refuse authoring and certification of your game if you fail to meet their criteria. Granted, I don't think they've ever refused a game due to competition (only technical issues) but they can still refuse. The iPhone is a de facto platform. Whining about how it isn't open enough won't change that.
This is Apple after all, they've been locking people into developing software *their* way for as long as I can remember. Apple stopped being about openness a long time ago.
"They told me it was impossible. I replied with maniacal laughter." http://www.mydailyrant.com/
... there's freedom, for developers, and users as well:
"Our license gives developers and users freedom to cosmetically customize their device or radically remix it; change the wallpaper or rebuild the entire house! It grants them the freedom, for example, to transform a phone into a medical device or point of sale device or the freedom to simply install their own favourite software. Beyond freeing the software on our devices we have also released our CAD files under Creative Commons. And at Linux world 2008, we announced the release of the schematics for our products."
http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Main_Page
OK, so Apple is taking a note from the playbook of the dinosaur mainframe corporations? Proprietary systems, closed systems, fully integrated from top to bottom. Not to mention the complete lack of class.
This is no different than if Microsoft were to only allow IE as a browser on their OS. Sound familiar?
You overlook something critical. Apple does not have a monopoly. Rules are different for monopolies, pure and simple.
You're also comparing a phone to an operating system, which is a stretch. I can install Firefox and VNC on OSX any time I want.
Now it seems that Apple can't compete when it comes to applications on their hardware...
I see a pattern here...
Potentially visionary ideas, incompetent execution... It's almost funny, yet sad in a way...
Don't bother trying to defend Apple on this one Fan-boys...
Who is general failure, and why is he reading my hard drive?
You overlook something critical. Apple does not have a monopoly. Rules are different for monopolies, pure and simple.
This used to be the case, but not anymore. In the world of (legal) digital music distribution, Apple has nowadays at least as much marketshare and influence, as MS ever had for desktop OSs. And whereas MS steadily loses its market share every day, Apple keeps gaining more and more, with hardly any end in sight.
I can install Firefox and VNC on OSX any time I want.
Your statement reminds me of the old Soviet joke "I too can go to the Red Square and say that Reagan is an idiot, and nothing will happen to me". VLC (thats what I meant to say, was a typo) and FF are not competitors to Apple's business model, just like iTunes isn't a competitor to Windows. The bottom line is that Apple blocks what it percieves to hurt its business in an uncompetitive way. Music competitors to Apple is as Firefox/VLC is to MS. If we wouldn't tolerate MS blocking Firefox on Windows, we shouldn't tolerate Apple blocking a competitor to iTunes on iPhone/Pod.
Up to this point, I have been using Safari to navigate to the home pages of the podcasts that I am interested in and then I download the podcasts directly. This works very well, but is a bit hard to do while I'm driving.
(!)
... and then they built the supercollider.
Apple has nowadays at least as much marketshare and influence, as MS ever had for desktop OSs
Microsoft market share: 95% at time of conviction
Apple market share for "digital music distribution": 88% prior to launch of Amazon MP3
And whereas MS steadily loses its market share every day, Apple keeps gaining more and more, with hardly any end in sight.
Apple market share after launch of Amazon MP3: ~80%. It hasn't collapsed, but it certainly hasn't made any gains.
If we wouldn't tolerate MS blocking Firefox on Windows, we shouldn't tolerate Apple blocking a competitor to iTunes on iPhone/Pod.
Except that content competitors can still supply podcasts however they want. This is about management and hooking into the iPod database on the iPhone. It has potential to impact syncing on the platform and the stability of operations of other products.
It's a fine line, but it is no more evil than it is good. A person could fully replace iTunes as a sync manager with some other product, but "duplication of functionality" is just as likely a PC way of saying "we don't trust you mucking around at lower levels".
In other words, don't disagree with you or you'll be labeled and ridiculed.
What a great debating technique.
Wow! I'm gonna run right out and buy a Neo Freerunner right now! Oh wait, I can't because it's not available.
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - humorist/novelist David Foster Wallace was found dead in his Claremont, CA home this morning. The coroner reported that he hanged himself. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.
...is all it is. Not to say I disagree with attention like this being given to any and all platforms.
Oddly to me though this kinda takes the focus off of Microsoft who has done the same thing only worse on their main platform with both their Vista kill switch (black screen cum nag) and WGA.
-Matt
Actually MS would do the same thing if they could, and probably will if we let them keep DRMing up Windows.
The difference is mostly that Apple was smart enough to design the phone in such away that they could lock it down.
Microsoft doesn't have the security sense to have done this in Windows, and their first try on the XBox didn't last long. Admittedly the XB360 has done much better. And in case you haven't noticed, Windows does have some of the same basic things in it, they just aren't enforced as strongly as on the iPhone ... yet.
Signed binaries have been a requirement for ActiveX for a while, arguably for a different reason... MAYBE, they very will could have seen that as the place to start the DRM inclusion into Windows, it was a natural fit to help mitigate an existing problem.
I'm not disagreeing with your point, I just think that you over estimate Microsofts ability to come up with a way to build this into their existing monopoly products, but its certainly coming. They may just be avoiding the negative PR for the moment, letting people like Apple and EA take the heat for now, and they'll come into it after its an accepted practice. I'm just saying ...
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
It's imaginable that the reason they reject another media player is that they simply don't want people to get confused; my work consists of usability-related stuff and trust me, this is exactly the kind of thinking Apple would be having there.
With their paranoid usability perfectionism, it's odd enough that they allow any third party apps under OS X or the iPhone at all.
Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.
OMG it's not a 'platform' for denvelopers who want to write better software and make some profit for themselfs, it's an Apple asset made to make money for Apple, selling little specific apps that they won't put coders on. Apple can decide what can be installed and what not, and takes a profit on each app sold: if you write an app for one of those i-thing and it's good for Apple business you may get something back, as long as Apple is good with it, then if the tide changes at Cupertino you are screwed, and you knew it.
"Potentially visionary ideas, incompetent execution..."
Or, to put it a bit more bluntly, bullshit pieces of hardware and substandard software bundled and dished out to the techno-wannabe-geeks that get turned on by stupid commercials with idiots making fools of themselves BUT THEY HAVE LITTLE WHITE CORDS.
I have a friend with an IPhone. She brought it over to show me how cool it was. I showed her my HTC pocketPC phone. I can do MORE on mine than she can do on hers. Mine was cheaper. Mine has a lower monthly rate plan. All around, I have a better phone (doesn't have to be jailbroken to be useful), still has a warantee (doesn't have to be jailbroken to be useful), can be tethered (doesn't have to be jailbroken to be useful)... I see a pattern here.
My 'friend' only bought the IPhone because her "work" commped her for it. Because her boss HAD to have one. He has a Blackberry now, and her IPhone that was SO FUCKING WONDERFUL, now sits gracing the bottom of her purse more often than not.
--Toll_Free
in the IPhone's defense, it does do fairly well as a phone. Always a clear connection, and rarely does she state she drops calls. Still a piece o sh1t, though.
This used to be the case, but not anymore. In the world of (legal) digital music distribution, Apple has nowadays at least as much marketshare and influence, as MS ever had for desktop OSs.
I disagree. Apple has about 80% of the market, which is substantial, but nowhere near monopoly status. Example: I own two Macs, an iPod, and an iPhone, and I buy every single song from Amazon MP3, not through iTunes.
And whereas MS steadily loses its market share every day, Apple keeps gaining more and more, with hardly any end in sight.
Again, I disagree. I used to buy music on iTunes, and then go through the hassle to strip the DRM. When Amazon started offering MP3s, I switched immediately. I don't believe I'm alone.
The bottom line is that Apple blocks what it percieves to hurt its business in an uncompetitive way. Music competitors to Apple is as Firefox/VLC is to MS. If we wouldn't tolerate MS blocking Firefox on Windows, we shouldn't tolerate Apple blocking a competitor to iTunes on iPhone/Pod.
I still take issue with comparing phones to PCs. And I'm absolutely positive that Apple holds a minority stake in the phone market. There are several good alternatives (just listen to all the "iPhone sucks, use such-and-such-it-is-a-better-product" comments that crop up every time iPhone gets mentioned). Apple's anti-competitive behavior is perfectly acceptable because the market has the ability to respond. It's only when there are no alternatives that we have to regulate business activities.
No one can compete against a comparable product sold at a lower price, not even Microsoft.
OS X is gaining ground against Windows. Its the closest thing to a comparable product in existence.
There isn't a monopoly on automobiles for the same reason, as they companies get too big, someone comes along and does it more efficiently so they sell it at a lower price and the large companies have to become more effcient, or in some cases go away.
iTunes is an example of how they use their size to produce a monopoly. No one else gets the deal that Apple gets to distribute music. If other companies could get the same deal or a better one from the *AA.org's, there would likely be more competition. If someone else could, they may be able to sell the music for a lower price and compete and Apple would have the same problem.
If you can't compete, take your competition out of the picture. This is the way of war, and business at competition with each other are at war.
Microsoft Windows/Office will no longer be a monopoly when someone comes up with a comparable product to Windows or Office.
iTunes will no longer be a monopoly when someone creates a comparable store for digital media.
Apple gave up when it realized that clones were something it couldn't compete with.
Is it fair or morale? Meh, its not 'right', I know that much, but evolution never favors the one that is morally correct since it isn't bound by our arbitrary rules and views everything as an equal oppertunity when it comes to life and death.
On that note, one could argue that the common man is being out-evolved by the *AA.org executives and lawyers. If you aren't religious, you should probably do more to keep yourself on the better evolutionary path than those guys or, like it or not, you will go extinct. I have several ideas for staying on the better evolutionary path, unfortunately the rest of society doesn't seem to agree with the methods I would use to deter the *AAs and I'd probably end up in GitMo :/ Since the likelyhood of anyone else joining me in my crusade against them is nil, then I see no reason to make the stand alone. The question is, will society see whats coming soon enough that we can still win by our numbers, or will we already be doomed?
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
That's a nonsensical argument. Apple has explicitly allowed third parties into their device and convinced thousands of developers to invest an enormous amount of time. And now they're showing that if you make the wrong moves, that enormous investment can be completely destroyed by an arbitrary decision on Apple's part. Nothing that any of these guys have done comes anywhere close.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
The situation's different: Apple is the distributor of these apps, and simply choosing not to sell a product doesn't exactly a monopoly make. Just because your local Ford dealership doesn't sell Chevys doesn't open it up for a lawsuit, and voiding your warranty if you put a competitor's part on your Ford doesn't either.
Yes, it's a car analogy, I apologize.
Some places are sold out, but yes you can get one.
Try the Canadian site.
Seriously, how many people are going to waste time developing apps for the iPhone anyway? The SDK only works on OS X, so Windows and Linux users are out of luck. Does Apple really expect people to develop apps for their locked down platform that can be blocked at Apple's discretion?
I recently tried to dual boot OS X on a PC of mine so that I could use the SDK, but in the end I just gave up. It was too much effort to even get the system ready for development, let alone trying to learn the language and APIs.
I wouldn't be surprised if Apple's revenue from the Apps Store starts to drop off very quickly - what self-respecting developer would want their name on that weak excuse for a platfrom?
Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
Agreed. Feature wise, the iPhone is probably the best phone on the market now.
Freedom wise? It's not the worst, but pretty close. The phone can only be purchased locked from certain providers. Your limited with what you can do with it. Developers have to follow a strict platform toolset, and applications can ONLY be downloaded (legitimately: jailbreaking phones doesn't count for non-slashdot readers) through iTunes.
Take most Windows Mobile phones on the other hand, and you have all the developer toys, loads of applications, and the ability to upgrade (in some cases even to the truly open Android as it matures)
By the way, this is not the first publicized instance of Apple banning an iPhone app (ie:that rich-person ruby screensaver), just the first with a legitimate purpose (that we know of).
Flash on mobile devices is a joke, especially flash video. Flash audio would work, but would probably give you about an hour of battery life while doing so.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
actually ACTIVELY BLOCKING competitors from using their platform
Yup, Microsoft never tried to do that...
I saw the multiple spam-posts of this on digg and reddit, and what struck me was that the developers' website was riddled with spelling mistakes. Makes me wonder if this app, which I haven't seen, didn't get rejected for the reason he claims, but maybe just because it was a totally shit app?
If, at least, developers act in a way that maximizes their self-interest. In practise, that is probably only partially the case. At best, they will act in a way that they _think_ maximizes their self interest ... but their thinking can be affected, say, by a clever marketing campaign.
Only if you are a fool. And fools do not stay in business long.
Perhaps developers drawn to the iPhone are there more because there are millions of potential customers who can buy your app directly any second of the day. Perhaps said developers realize that in combination with marketing to give the users the magic keyword they need to reach your app quickly with one search, decent sales may be achieved.
If a developer is doing iPhone development exclusively, no amount of marketing will affect the real choices they make other that to judge what the marketing impact is on their own applications.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
iTunes will no longer be a monopoly when someone creates a comparable store for digital media.
www.amazon.com
Seriously folks, why in god's name would a company help you take away business from them? Why?
As a society, we value a free market and competition. But those are anathema to businesses. They don't want competition, because they're not in a friendly little game of "who can make the coolest stuff;" they are in the game of "who continues to have food on the table." Individually, there is probably not a single person at Apple who doesn't understand the importance of competition to innovation. But at the business level, it's not about innovation; it's about making money.
The only reason we are lucky enough to have a modicum of competition, ladies and gentlemen, is that our governments require it. We break up monopolies and we put regulations on companies so they don't end up enslaving people like they did before the New Deal. It is not those companies' responsibility to make sure that someone can undercut their profits; it's their responsibility to make as much money as they possibly can for their shareholders and employees. It is government's job to step in every once in awhile to set some ground rules if it would be in everyone's best interest to do so.
If you want to force every company to actually expend time and energy making sure they create ways for other companies to compete with them, then you're going to have to get some legislation written up and passed to do that, because no company on earth wants to spend their money on making sure other people make money. But we all know such a bill would never even be written, let alone passed. Because it is patently insane.
Apple's product is its smooth user experience. It creates this by severely limiting options. You want to do X, Y or Z? Well, according to Apple's market research, you're in a tiny minority and your demographic isn't worth enough to justify opening this, that, or the other, which may end up allowing other companies to gobble some of their profits. That's business. If they find that enough people are finding restrictions frustrating, and the experience is therefore not smooth, and this seems to be losing them sales, then the economics of the situation will change, and so will Apple's policy. As it is now, their number-crunchers have (rightly, I suspect) determined that the danger to the bottom line of opening the platform is greater than the potential benefit of all 4,000 people in the world who wouldn't buy the product otherwise going down to the Apple Store and picking one up.
This isn't a free-market calamity, folks. Apple does not have a monopoly on smart phones, just on the iPhone. I think if you'll be honest with yourself, the real problem is that you want one, but the closed platform bugs you, and that makes you blather on about freedom and standards instead of just shrugging your shoulders and buying something else.
In short, suck it up. Apple is a company and they can do whatever the hell they want. They want their phone to be linked to the whole iTunes/iTMS service package so they can deliver a complete experience at the cost of choice? Fine; it's their product. They don't want to sell competing products through their service? Of course they don't; that's their prerogative. You don't like it? Then don't buy one, or buy one and jailbreak it. But don't whine and complain. It's a luxury product, for chrissakes.
Apple isn't being the "bad guy" here; they're just doing their jobs.
Right from day 1, Bill Gates knows that it's 3rd party developers who make his OS successful. That's why Ballmer goes around shouting "developers, developers".
They should allow it, and sell zunes in the apple store.
Damn them for not selling or giving out competing products in their store. Tomorrow I shall trundle down to the local Lexus dealership and give them what ho! My desire to buy a BMW there should be paramount! Why no I don't own any stock in BMW's parent company! Gracious! Seriously, since when did coattail riders get to play the free speech righteous card? No one is stopping anyone from going out and making a better product for another device. Go use your tools to build a bridge and get over it.
Yeah? Tell that to those 4 out of 3,000 :)
As for what you get for that $99+30% of every sale...
Unlimited distribution
not really. It's limited to whoever can buy from the iPhone App Store. You can't -also- distribute it via a third party vendor, or on your own website. Now if you could, then it's unlimited.
Completely flexible pricing
I would hope so.. it's your app. Or did I miss strong-arming by some mysterious industry when it comes to pricing of Windows Mobile / Symbian apps somewhere?
international markets
it's on the web; how much less international can you get, unless you decide to sell the thing on floppies out of your garage?
hosting
I'll give you that - although if you're serious about your app, then I'm sure the 30% you'd save would go a long way towards hosting your app; these aren't exactly apps that need to be distributed as ISOs.
updates
'll give you that as well - although it's not exactly difficult to send your registered users an e-mail, or include automatic update checking (if the platform allows it), or for somebody to write an app for the platform that automatically checks installed apps' versions online.
top 100 list + featured apps
Ah, now we get to the crux of the matter. As there -is- only one store for iPhone apps, that store is hugely popular - it could suck ass and it would still be hugely popular, as it is the -only- place you can get (without jailbreaking and so forth and so on) your iPhone apps. So if you were to choose to post your iPhone app on your own site - besides risking getting booted from the iPhoone dev bits - you're not going to be included in the most popular (and only) iPhone app store's rankings.. and people (buyers and sellers alike) looooove them some rankings.
Unlimited distribution
not really. It's limited to whoever can buy from the iPhone App Store. You can't -also- distribute it via a third party vendor, or on your own website. Now if you could, then it's unlimited.
You have a mistaken notion of distribution. Just because you cannot physically put the binary on your website and have them download it from you, does not mean you cannot virtually distribute it through your own website, or through an aggregator.
After all, if a user clicks on a link, and gets an application - what difference is it to them if the binary came from Apple or your website? I can place a link on my website that takes them directly to the purchasing page on the phone. I can place advertisements in magazines or online that do the same.
Completely flexible pricing
I would hope so.. it's your app. Or did I miss strong-arming by some mysterious industry when it comes to pricing of Windows Mobile / Symbian apps somewhere?
Do various cell phone companies all allow free apps or do they have a minimum - since after all the phone company gets a cut...
With Windows Mobile you indeed have the freedom to set whatever price you like. After all, only a handful of people will ever even know your app exists. Truly a superior situation, which is why WWDC was full of Windows Mobile developers....
international markets
it's on the web; how much less international can you get
Spoken from someone who has never handled international payments before, or tried to market and distribute internationally. How english centric can you be to declare that simply putting something up on a website is the same as marketing AND DISTRIBUTING internationally. How well is your app going to sell if the web page with the overview is slow as molasses, or even a tiny binary takes a while to get?
hosting
I'll give you that - although if you're serious about your app, then I'm sure the 30% you'd save would go a long way towards hosting your app; these aren't exactly apps that need to be distributed as ISOs.
Hosting is more than just size and bandwidth. It's also availability and redundancy, all of which are expensive. And again we aren't just talking about hosting and distribution but also a channel where the user can easily find your application.
updates
'll give you that as well - although it's not exactly difficult to send your registered users an e-mail, or include automatic update checking (if the platform allows it), or for somebody to write an app for the platform that automatically checks installed apps' versions online.
Users hate marketing email and I hate sending it out (also being a user myself of other apps). Like you say you can work in updating mechanisms, but again this comes down to extra time and effort and more distribution issues.
top 100 list + featured apps
Ah, now we get to the crux of the matter. As there -is- only one store for iPhone apps, that store is hugely popular - it could suck ass and it would still be hugely popular, as it is the -only- place you can get (without jailbreaking and so forth and so on) your iPhone apps. So if you were to choose to post your iPhone app on your own site - besides risking getting booted from the iPhoone dev bits - you're not going to be included in the most popular (and only) iPhone app store's rankings.. and people (buyers and sellers alike) looooove them some rankings.
Both of those things are huge sales boosts, but simply like winning the lottery. That is to say, in the practical lives of day to day application developers they are irrelevant. What really matters again is all the infrastructure that Apple is taking care of, and a clear and direct channel to and from the user to your application.
Marketing is much easier if the user has an easier path to act on your message. And that is where Apple has really made things great, by creating what I think is just about the least amount of distance between a user and your application.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Did anyone else giggle when they seen the name Dave Weiner?
Since I have a large enough plan and I already get free long distance, I haven't been wanting to get skype to avoid paying cellular charges. There are just some people that are easier to catch at their computers than their phones and there are some locations with multiple computers and only one phone line. Also skype has a video mode using webcams that is cool. There are people I communicate with in the middle of the night that would flip out if I woke their wives by ringing the phone. So skype has its uses.
For what I saw with the emulator, OpenMoko is hurting open-source and open-platform by being strickly unusable and ugly. Android is another thing, and I would definitely buy an "google phone". But please, stop with openmoko. This is a caricature of what "people" hates with open-source software: Fucked-up ergonomic and ugly interfaces.
All the more reason for me to stick to my BlackBerry (not that there ever was an issue of me going over to the iPhone). It is better in every respect I have a use for.
> Flash on mobile devices is a joke, especially flash video
Works just fine on Symbian, in my experience. I wish it didn't or there were a Flashblocker or something, but it has worked the times I've tried.
Of course, it still breaks the web, so I go elsewhere when I find it, if I have a choice.
Max.
Where has Apple advertised a wide open, do anything application environment. Additionally, I think characterizing any development time on iphone software as enormous is a bit silly. The SDK has been out what, six months?
Sorry. I just don't see how anyone can miss the dissonance in hoarders bitching about people hoarding.
Consumer goods like phones "do not have platforms" in spite of the best intentions of Apple, Google, etc. They are like refrigerators and come with Brand, Features and Price differentiators.
Third parties can sell some add-ons but the core features will be protected by the brand. And in any case the sales of phones are not determined by availability of third party apps. Unlike computers, which are almost useless without third party applications.
O this learning! What a thing it is - William Shakespeare
...is one of the key tongues up Apple's ass. When he bites the bullet and admits their behavior is problematic, you just know you should have sunk your time into reading other Apple-centric blogs instead.
Glad to see this has been posted. I submitted one of the articles on this topic to the Firehose and have been anti-evangelising Apple for too much of yesterday on various news sites to get the word out.
As I see it, the way the developer agreement is set up means that few people are going to take real risks - whether that means new ideas or much time spent - because they can't afford to have Apple turn round and simply reject/ban their software. So the store ends up with hundreds of toy apps which are bought simply because they're cheap and easy to obtain.
Meanwhile Apple can boast about 100,000,000 downloads of what comprises mostly such apps in the 0-99 cents range, ignoring that download does not correspond to continued usage, and that volume does not correspond to quality.
It's just another Internet goldrush, where the guy who sells shovels - Apple - is the only one guaranteed to make money (30%), and perhaps a small proportion of developers will get significantly rich. But this goldrush contains a particularly ugly element of risk and control that makes it not worth participating in.
I have an iPod Touch, and the podcasting support sucks. The idea that I need to synchronize with my desktop application in order to receive a podcast when I have a perfectly good WiFi network connection built into my phone is ridiculous. Ditto for iTunes purchases; why the hell do I need to maintain my own music file server just in order to play music on my WiFi connected player? Why can't I download the stuff whenever and wherever I want to?
If Apple doesn't get rid of the desktop iTunes application quickly and offer MobileMe for free to iPod and iPhone owners, other companies and platforms are going to eat their lunch. The iPhone/OS X desktop/MobileMe setup is bordering on a Rube Goldberg contraption in its bizarre complexity and it's even beyond Microsoft on the nickle-and-diming.
Apple is getting more and more out of touch with reality.
... but a "walled garden with land mines." Speaking as a developer, with Apple's terms of service, you not only can't see the land mines in the garden, but you can't even see the walls.
Speaking as a developer, it won't be possible to treat the iPhone as a viable platform for building and running a business until Apple comes clean with its real terms of service and requirements. Right now you have no idea if the app you're working on will ever be allowed to see the light of day.
It's reminiscent of what's happened with eBay over the last few years. Literally thousands of people quit their day jobs to build their businesses around eBay, and now they're finding themselves elbowed aside. eBay altered their deal, and all a small-time seller can do is pray that they don't alter it further. Right now, iPhone developers are in the exact same boat: completely at the mercy of a company whose interests are only coincidentally aligned with the "sharecroppers" who bring the real value to the table.
I knew I made the right decision when I decided not to participate in these silly iphone thingys. This is a fad that will ultimately pass along with other fads. It's a neat gadget but for some to refer to these things as a "platform" is absolutely silly. If someone ultimately did make them a "platform" then adopting companies would have to provide them to employees, and like many companies, most of the features such as listening to music and such would be crippled--because your not supposed to be listening to music, your supposed to be working!
I wasted $70 on a silly little iPod shuffle, and have already had to have it replaced just as the warranty was expiring, and I suspect it will once again fail at the end of year 2. No more Apple products like this. Their computers however are great!
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although I'm not saying the interface it 'nice'. For some reason I got it in my head a while back that I'd replace my HTC Polaris with an iPhone - I then decided I'd wait for the 3G version and picked up a touch to replace my dead ipod.
Now the touch has good points - screen is lovely, safari is best mobile browser.. but the music stuff was taken a step back - and I'd f'in sick of how it's shacked to iTunes. I listen to podcasts and like them when I'm abroad. Why can't I just sych my podcasts over the any old wifi? Why can't I plug the ipod into my work laptop, without it attempting to nuke all my music?
WiMo whilst ugly as sin and chunky doesn't every try to prevent me doing stuff - now it might not do everything smoothly - but you at least feel it's trying.
Best thing iphone's done is at least open the market again for smartphones - normal people actually buy them. Like the rest I'm just looking forward to WM7 or Android.
When the app store was opened, I was hoping for a better music player than the one that ships with the iTouch. I bought the device to be a music player first, and a way to sync my calendar secondly.
The problems with the music player stem from the fact that you can play your music from beginning to end but when you want to seek to a specific location, you cannot. The fast forward and rewind buttons are laughable. Incremental jumps in direction starting with a very small jump period (basically speeding up the playing) means if I want to move ahead a few minutes, I have to sit around for a while. The reason I need that to work better, is that the seek bar is too imprecise. Say I want to start listening to my trance track at exactly 5:15 minutes in, can't do it. If I am lucky, I will get close but most of the time I get somewhere around 3 minutes or 8 minutes in (on 2 hour tracks, this is a problem. Normal 4 minute tunes is not so much an issue).
I try very hard to precisely move the knob to no avail.
What I want from a music application is as follows:
Now with Apple showing that they don't want their applications overshadowed, I may never see this functionality.
What I don't understand is why everyone thinks that Apple should be obligated to allow other companies to put their software on the iPhone. The iPhone is an Apple product and they should be allowed 100% say over what it does and who contributes. It's not anti-competitive, it's Apple's product. If someone else thinks they can do better, they are free to develop their own competing product.
Why don't we all sue Microsoft for not allowing Playstation games to play on the XBox? Isn't that anti-competitive? Or should we sue Playstation for not allowing XBox games? Or,hey, why not both?
Why should Apple be legally or even ethically obligated to allow Joe Schmoe to make a profit off of an Apple product? All of this complaining about openness is just selfish jabbering about self-entitlement.
Contrary to what our good friend Goofy always said, the world does not owe you a living.
I was thinking of this while writing the original post, but I've yet to find anything I want on Amazon. Mind you, I don't look real hard, typically I find what I want on iTunes and remove the DRM after I've bought it.
I've recently began to look at Amazon before purchasing because the machine I use to purchase and remove the DRM from iTunes purchases has been retasked and so doing all the work of swaping the drive back so I can use an older version of iTunes to purchase the content so I can remove the DRM (unless someone can point me at an updated qtfairuse) is not something I enjoy doing. Since the machine is actually a VMWare server, I should probably just turn the old drive into a virtual machine and be done with it.
I'd love for Amazon to become the market leader as I will be happy to pay a fair price for mp3's rather than encrypted AACs. And I DO NOT distribute my purchases which have had the DRM removed outside of my home. Technically, its illegal since I'm ripping out the DRM and I let my GF use my music as well, but our tastes in music aren't really aligned so its doubtful that we even have the same songs on our iPods, although there are probably some duplication since we have several gigs of music.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
The last great truly innovative and OPEN product Apple made was the 12 inch G4 Powerbook IMO. Yes I have an ipod touch and a G5 tower but I won't be getting any more Apple products if they become an entirely closed mainly consumer electronics focused company.
Dual booting XP and Ubuntu isn't THAT bad that I'm not wiling to put up with more of this crap on a computer which is supposed to be a UNIVERSAL Turing machine. It's getting worse than Microsoft who I left to get a Mac in the first place.
Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
The current model is the GTA02
Camera and EDGE support are planned for the GTA03 later this year.
3G is planned for GTA04 at some point later in time.
more info...
And for those who asks : yes, the openmoko can make phone calls, both using the older and now deprecated gtk-based apps from the 2007.2 distribution and the newer QTopia apps from the current 2008.8 distro.
It's not a product that you could recommand yet to anyone, but it's usable enough for geeks to buy as an experimenting platform - not necessarily as their main phone, though. Not without an old phone and a second SIM as a backup plan.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Hate to break it to you, but just about any decent shop could 'do iTunes better'. Let's see, what do we have?
1. Integrates with iPod technology seamlessly
Can be copied. Perfected. Specs would be nice.
2. Can handle playlists
So can winamp and all of its clones.
Actually, the winamp and clones tend to be a lot better in many ways. For example, in Winamp when the song can't be found or played it just skips to the next song. It doesn't compulsively delete the song data - including where the song is located.
Every loaded some songs into iTunes from a network drive.. and then played the list to find that it's blown away the song info. To get it back you need to go into each and every single song and 'find' the source again. *sigh* Useless.
3. Can handle standard database functions
What's at the back end of iTunes? Right! A DATABASE!
Wow. So, what can we do? Fund the duplicates? Yes! Delete any absolute duplicates? NO. Um. Why not?
Can we prevent exact duplicates from being added? YES! Wait! No! Apparently we can't. We absolutely positively have to add each and every single song instance, and copy them in as version 1,2,3,4 in the folder.
Can we have a STAGING area to load songs to while we muck around with the file names, play lists, etc? Ah. No, apparently we can't.
How about an UNDO function? You know.. the one where you've loaded in 20 songs and iTunes has automatically sucked all of the information missing from the net.. and blown away the names. *sigh* okay. Apparently not.
Can we have a local name for songs held on a share? NO. YOU NEED TO HAVE YOUR OWN LOCAL COPY FOR ME ME ME TO CONTROL!!! MUHAHAHAHA YOUR SONGS ARE MINE! MINE! MINE!
I'm not allowing my iTunes anymore freedon, I think.
Okay. Let's make this simple: Can you export everything out in such a way in which 3rd party tools.. like a spreadsheet program or word type program can manipulate, do name updates and other functions which iTunes patently does not want to support? No.
So, What use is it? Ah. Right. iPod connectivity and simple playlists. Gotcha.
Go for a google. People have been talking about missing 'basic' functionality in iTunes for years; since around 2004 actually.
I'm going to stop now, and go away for a cry somewhere. But, thanks for listening. If you know of a decent program that does the 'basic' itunes functions.. and the other expected functions.. let me know. Until then, I load the ipod via itunes and suffer through and use winamp for.. everything else.
But it's not a phone, it's a Internet Communications Thingy Device(tm), at least that's what these gentlemen in black turtle necks frothing at the mouth keep telling me.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
If I want to send images, I use email. MMS needs to die, and was a stupid anachronism before the iPhone even was delivered.
As for the other things, good design of applications has made them nice to have, but not crucial features that you cannot live without (I know people have trouble understanding that with cut & paste, but it is true).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
We know the iPhone isn't an open platform, already. The only people who think it's open are in denial.
Hell, Windows Mobile is more open than the iPhone, let alone poor doomed Palm... who have maintained a compatible open API longer than anyone in the handheld business but Nokia. Maybe.
I don't know about Nokia, I haven't paid attention to their handheld platform because the cheapest phone that runs their smartphone OS is out of my price range, and Nokia doesn't have a fanboy contingent on Slashdot to push it in everyone's face all the time. Can you still run Symbian-or-whatever-it's-called-this-week apps from 1998 on a Nokia phone today?
The jury's still out on Android. By making the API Java-only they are giving the carriers the option of locking Android phones. Which is why it's attracting more interest from the carriers than OpenMoko.
OpenMoko? Where's that at now?
When Microsoft's got one of the more open smartphone platforms, and the most open one is committing suicide, something's messed up in the phone market (in the US, anyway).
Oh, yeh, the carriers. Right...
Anyway, the iPhone isn't an open platform. Don't let yourself into thinking otherwise.