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Developers Looking to Set Up Alternatives To Apple's App Store
TechDirt is reporting that in response to the frustrations with Apple's app store dictatorship, a few developers are looking to set up their own alternative app stores. Alternate app stores would only work on jailbroken phones, making their adoption scope limited, so the question is whether Apple will go after these start ups on the legal battlefield. "Apple, which collects a 30% commission from sellers on its store, doesn't break out the site's revenue. Brokerage firm Piper Jaffray estimates the site generated about $150 million in sales last year and projects total sales will grow to $800 million this year. Apple did not respond to requests for comment. But it has said in the past that with the iPhone it was trying to strike a balance between a closed device like the iPod and an open device like the PC."
That argument doesn't work. eBay was not the only online auction system on the Internet, but they got done like a dinner for third-line forcing when they tried to make everyone in Australia only use PayPal.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
"If Apple allowed jail broken phones to use the app store..." They do - I frequent the Apple App Store and Cydia on my jailbroken iPhone 3G. The issue is about developers being able to sell apps that aren't permitted on the Apple App Store because they use undocumented APIs, compete with Apple apps, etc...
Apple is not UP Front with their application denial policy. It has never been explicitly publicized, and it is enforced with whimsy and capacious inconsistency. They disallow one app but allow another that does the exact same thing. They disallow competent email apps because they would "compete" with the built in Email app. Compete? (They mean "show up".)
Some apps they refuse to give because Steve Jobs says NO. No other reason. The Iphone Camera can take movies. (Most cell cameras can). Steve says NO. If you jailbreak you can take movies.
If you live in Apple's world, have a Mac at home, you probably think this is just the way it is. But if you come from a Linux or Windows environment you can not conceive of why one Fart app is denied while another is approved. Why you can't send MMS on the device.
And because you are from the Mac world this is ok by you, you are so used to being told exactly what you can and can't do by Apple you know no other way.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.