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Apple Refusing Any BitTorrent Related Apps?
jamie pointed out what appears to be an unfortunate policy for Apple's app store that is refusing anything to do with BitTorrent. The example is a remote control app that allows a user to interface with their Transmission BitTorrent client. This certainly isn't the first complaint over app store policy. Issues from the return policy to the "objectionable content" of Nine Inch Nails have some developers concerned over what Apple is doing to the market. Of course, many are quick to remind that it is Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
If you want torrent you can always jailbreak it.
Say NO to unpaid Internships!
From what I hear, it's Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
NetInfo connection failed for server 127.0.0.1/local
Isn't this what web UIs are for?
I think ittl be a few years before people realize that bittorrent is perfectly legal, and a great distribution method.
Is it really stealing if the media conglomerates refuse to sell it in other countries?
And second, stealing means depriving someone of something. We're not in their archives stealing the original reels or something.
Apple is free to do whatever they want. Of course they are free to annoy their customers too.
I am admittedly an apple fanboy... And I am now at wits end with how they operate to tightly over there apps and even the Mac itself. I still refuse to use Windows, but come on Apple, get your fucking head out of your pompous asses and wake up.. Its not all about 'YOU' you fucking fucks. listen to the Users and MAYBE you will win more market share.
Freaky Schitt always happens to me... WHY God WHY!!
The purpose of these stories, involving Apple refusing to sell apps, is not to debate the rights of Apple to do so. Everyone recognizes that Apple has a right to sell or not sell anything it so desires.
The purpose of these stories is to warn people to stay away from Apple, because Apple does not have your best interests in mind, only its bottom line.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Looking at the Transmission control interface through Safari on my iPhone right now. I guess now that Safari might be used to facilitate "this category of application" Apple will be pulling it from the OS?
I'm as much of a fanboy as the next guy, but Apple really need to get the house in order over the app store.
It's all fun and games until a 200' robot dinosaur shows up and trashes Neo-Tokyo... Again
I stopped using Azureus once it disappeared from portage and I could only get Vuze. Since then I switched to rTorrent. Its awesome and command line based which means you can ssh into another machine and kick it off.
I've been meaning, but have yet to try out wTorrent which is a web interface to the same libtorrent that rTorrent uses.
This way you could just use safari to control your torrent downloads.
We wouldn't put up with that situation almost anywhere else.
If Apple wants to let other stores exist then they can censor their own all they want but as long as they prevent other stores from existing they really are acting pretty evil
"Of course, many are quick to remind that it is Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it."
By the same token isn't it my iPhone that I am free to do what I want with it? Sure that means I can jailbreak it, but why should I be forced to just to use an app that Apple doesn't want to sell on their store?
No, actually, you're the one being stupid.
This is about controlling the bittorrent client on your home machine, not using bittorrent locally on the phone. RTFS.
It was an app to remotely control your desktop client. In other words the main utility was in starting your download again once you're on the bus and realise you forgot to unpause it.
It's all fun and games until a 200' robot dinosaur shows up and trashes Neo-Tokyo... Again
Seriously. If Apple wants to engage in practices that result in a chilling effect on your target market why the fuck are you going to support them?
Because it's [LOVE]Apple{/LOVE]? Puh-leeze!
Because it enables you to reach a large market of consumers? Oh wait, they're denying those customers access to your products!
I'm sure Apple is great and wonderful and really really nice. I'm sure their app platform is the greatest thing since sliced stupid-people. But if they're going to actively interfere with your ability to reach customers FUCK THEM!
And yes, it's Apple's store. They can sell or not sell whatever they feel like.
However, it's not JUST Apple's store. It's the sole "legitimate" gateway into the devices you're writing apps for. That's part of the problem.
To use a baseball-related metaphor. You're a beer-hawker at a ballgame. Heaven help you if you try to sell booze in OTHER than the approved manner or brand.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
RTFA
</anti/.>
from 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
to 45 2F 6E 40 3C DF 10 71 4E 41 DF AA 25 7D 31 3F
Like the sign says, "No shirt, No shoes, No Pants, No Service!"
Need I actually point out there's legitimate uses of bittorrent? The first of which most people would cite is the distribution of *nix versions, so as to prevent bandwidth hammering on release days.
Canada: The US's more awesome sibling.
If you don't like the way Apple runs its store, don't buy from it.
If you don't like gay marriage, don't do it.
If you don't like murder, don't commit it.
If you don't like France, don't go there.
If you don't like math, don't learn it.
If you don't care for Enron, don't buy the stock.
If you don't like subprime, don't take one out.
-- And in any case, don't talk any more about it.
Why am I starting to wonder if there might not be something a little bit wrong with this form of argument?
It was an app to remotely control your desktop client. In other words the main utility was in starting your download again once you're on the bus and realise you forgot to unpause it.
Isn't that what VNC is for?
Yup, it is Apple's store, and they are free to run it as they like. Of course, they also want to encourage people like me to buy Apple products (oooh, so shiny!) Apple does just enough of this stuff to remind me that I'd rather not do business with them.
Oh get off your high horse. Apple sells music. they need a cooperative music industry. Why would the want to jeapordize that? Your crazy and petty to penalize them for acting rationally. Arguably they have done more to reduce DRM than all the negligible force of the whiners combined. Fairplay has always been speedbump not uncrackable DRM and now they sell DRM free tunes.
If you were honest in your claim of taking your custom to stores that support your preference you would be rewarding apple not avoiding them. In truth you will never shop at apple, thus marginalizing yourself and your leverage in the process.
get some perspective.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Given the fact that a non jail broken iPhone/touch has no file handling abilities.
In what way? A developer can write whatever files they like to the device. There are more limits around reading other system or app files, but you can read and write files all day long.
If the iPhone had a mass storage drive that was readily accessble from the interface with a file manger
There are a number of WebDAV client apps already on the store.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I'm I the only nerd who actually use it for mostly downloading ubuntu and feroda and for WoW patches? Who has time for movies anyway?
This information is relevant because one of Apple's selling point for the iPhone is that it is a good software platform. If you're attracted to the iPhone because of this reason, Apple's restrictions on what software they allow the platform to run is a very important piece of information, whether you're interested on buying a phone or developing for it. This is the reason why this is important news: it's relevant to deciding whether to buy into the iPhone.
Quite frankly, I think that Apple's restrictiveness in this regard makes me absolutely unwilling to develop software for that platform; they just simply would have too much control over the software, like dictating to me the distribution terms, or cancelling it arbitrarily.
Are you adequate?
It's Apple's store but it's the only store
Another Apple Hater being willfully ignorant of reality.
There is Cydia you know. Only a few million Jailbroken phones but that's nothing to sneeze at.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
VNC is a little overkill for that.
You are all a bunch of idots.
Is it really stealing if the media conglomerates refuse to sell it in other countries?
Yes it is, if you dont buy it from the sellers how they want to sell. But this has been debated forever already, and you must be a retard not to understand it.
...and we've been dancing it for decades. Big software corps, particularly ones that make the hardware and the software, have an incentive to make their stuff proprietary and to make it difficult to interoperate with anybody else's stuff. They lock you in, then lock you down. Apple is one of the worst offenders, here.
I'd like to say that when a truly open competitor comes along and offers competition, people will flock to it. But they won't because that's not how it works. Normal people buy the stuff that "just works" and apple's stuff is pretty good at that. The only way around it is for hackers to do what they do so well.
Hats off to you, hackers of the world.
People who don't play WoW?
Of course, many are quick to remind that it is Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
Hey, it's Microsoft's OS and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
legitimate uses of bittorrent
If you mean the 0.01% of all bittorrent traffic that is deemed legitimate, then yes.
Of course, many are quick to remind that it is Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it
Yeah, ask Microsoft about doing whatever they want with their own products (IE and Media Player in Windows). Making/Owning the best selling or most used of something and then putting rules around it, usually is asking for trouble from a government agency of some sort.
You can use logmein or other vnc apps to control torrent programs on your computer. Better ban that. You could control it through a webui using safari. Better ban that too. Wait, you could set up a script to control it with a phone call or email! Better ban the phone and mail apps, just to be sure.
Rediculous.
No, actually, you're the one being stupid.
This is about controlling the bittorrent client on your home machine, not using bittorrent locally on the phone. RTFS.
Yup, and there is good chance the reviewer didn't pick up on the difference (I cynically put them in the same category as phone agents). Also, you need to remember that Apple also has a policy of preventing any application that does not make the difference between cellular data and wi-fi data transfers.
At the same time when you consider Transmission has a web based GUI, then the only thing that really needs doing is to get it to have an optimised view.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Of course, many are quick to remind that it is Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
Kind of like it is Microsoft's operating system, and they are free do anything they like with it. Except, it seems, provide a web browser.
obviously not about control because you can get apps by other means
Are you referring to the DMCA violation known as "jailbreaking"? How deliciously absurd.
God iPhone Ill do anything for you.
God Apple just tell me what you want me to.
God iPhone nail me up against the wall.
God Apple dont want everything he wants it all.
No you cant take it
No you cant take it
No you cant take that iPhone away from me
No you cant take it
No you cant take it
No you cant take that iPhone away from me
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give up my iPhone.
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give up my iPhone.
Bow down before the Jobs you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Bow down before the Jobs you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
God Apple's not looking for the cure.
God Apple's not concerned with the sick among the pure.
God Apple lets go dancing on the backs of the bruised.
God Apple is the one to choose
No you cant take it
No you cant take it
No you cant take that iPhone away from me
No you cant take it
No you cant take it
No you cant take that iPhone away from me
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give up my iPhone.
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give up my iPhone.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give you control.
Head like a hole.
Black as your soul.
Id rather die than give you control.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
Bow down before the one you serve.
Youre going to get what you deserve.
You know who you are.
I think we (Slashdot readers) get it by now what Apple's application development policies are. We don't need a weekly refresher of why Apple's policies suck. Please don't feed the trolls because this article much like the few before it contains contains nothing new that we shouldn't have known already. Someone makes a yes/no decision and you have to live with it.
Either two things will happen: Apple doesn't change their policies and we can assume as always that most applications that are perfectly legitimate but against Apple's corporate objectives will be canned, or that Apple decided that their policies are causing more harm than good and decide to change them. If the second case happens then please be my guess and post it.
This constant rhetoric over what should and what shouldn't be allowed is just fuelling a fire of debate that is ultimately as subjective as Apple's corporate policies.
Bye!
There are actually a fair number of iPhone apps on the store that provide DAV or HTTP servers for downloading files from the phone, so a BitTorrent client isn't exactly infeasible. It wouldn't be particularly useful given the limited amount of storage on the device, of course.... And as others have noted, this is basically just a native UI skin for a web interface to a BitTorrent client on another machine, not an actual client. Still, I'd probably be worried about contributory infringement claims if somebody tried to host such an app on a site I ran, so I can see why Apple would shy away from it.
That said, I'm left wondering why the developers of this application didn't just write it as a web app. If you take advantage of the HTML5 offline application cache to allow it to be cached on disk (flash), there's really not much benefit to writing a native app for something this trivial. That would avoid the whole question of whether Apple would allow it on the app store.
Just my $0.02.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Why all that fuss about the iPhone and its apps store? It's a good computer-phone with a sleek interface, but nothing more. And Apple certainly didn't invent the concept of selling online apps. In a few months/years there will be better,sleekier (and cheaper) phones out there from companies that won't abuse their customers like Apple always did and still does. The best way to encourage fair companies is to do business with them. Therefore, dear Apple customers, instead of complaining about Apple being an ass of a company, just stop buyin their stuff.
Yes it is, if you dont buy it from the sellers how they want to sell. But this has been debated forever already, and you must be a retard not to understand it.
And you must be a retard not to understand that it's not "theft" or "stealing", it's copyright infringement and it has nothing to do with theft. And if they won't sell it to me in the first place, that means they don't want my money. So I am not depriving them of anything if I download it. If they wanted my money they should have offered to sell it to me, or at the very least not _refused_ to sell it to me because of where I happen to live.
They may be closeted but you are in pathological denial. You want everyone to admit they are gay so you don't feel bad for jerking off six times a day to that picture you love to link here so much.
Yes, Apple is free to do what they wish with their store, and we are free not to pay for their overpriced and overhyped products when saddled in this manner.
Don't bother replying Apple fanbois, I'm not interested. It's just another corporation acting in its own best interest.
Option A) Apple products.
Option B) The freedom to do what you want with the stuff you buy.
Pick one and stop complaining.
STFU about slashdot bias.
Sorry i disagree.
I don't have the BBC, nor do i want to shell out for a satellite dish.
I love their programming, particularly Top Gear.
I've long downloaded each series ONLY BECAUSE they are not offered on DVD, besides Series 10 (Which i have purchased)
IF the BBC would release series 1-9, 11 and 12, i would happily buy each release.
Until the BBC gets their act together and puts them on DVD, VIVA LA BitTorrent.
Seeing this story elsewhere today prompted me to check the Android Market for a similar app.
Yup, found one and downloaded it immediately.
Works with Transmission (like the rejected app in the story) and uTorrent, making it great for users of any platform (i think mac users have one or the other, and Transmission is great on linux, uTorrent rocks on windows).
Gotta setup my new computer with DYNDNS again, but It looks like a nice app just from the setup options.
I have started developing a bit (a tiny bit) for Android, and I am really starting to appreciate the platform a lot.
I switched from windows mobile to the iphone a year ago, and then from the iphone to a G1 a few months ago, and I love my G1, it's the best phone I've ever had, and knowing now that I can develop apps for it easily (and on any platform, no less) for free (if I don't want to distribute them, or for just $25 one time developer's fee if I do) makes me REALLY like the platform.
Android rocks.
-Taylor
Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
It is scandalous that they try to prevent you from using getting debian on you iphone by removing bittorrent. It is not even usefull since you can get it by http...
> From what I hear, it's Apple's store and they are free to do whatever they want with it.
You know, it IS Apple's store. But why is it I only hear this when novel approach to property rights when it is Apple that must be defended from the latest otherwise indefensible idiocy they have gotten up to. Why not "It's Comcast's wires, they can do whatever they want with them." Or AIG signed contracts, Congress even put in a rider to allow it so why doesn't everyone shut the hell up about those bonuses.
No, even if Apple does have the 'right' is no reason for people not to take em to task and/or laugh at them when they are acting like idiots. Because we also have the right to speak, or at least I do since I haven't bought any Apple products... who knows, perhaps their absolute rights include a rider in their EULA saying no Apple owner may criticize The Company.
No, nobody ELSE seems to have such an absolute property right as Apple Inc. They even have an absolute right to dictate whether you can install their software on 3rd party hardware and whether/what 3rd party software is to be permitted to run on their operating systems. They have an absolute right to control products they manufacture from the day they build it until the day it is recycled, customer be damned.
Democrat delenda est
Are you referring to the DMCA violation known as "jailbreaking"? How deliciously absurd.
The DMCA does not cover jailbreaking. There are well north of a million devices jailbroken now...
Your saying Jailbreaking does not count is like saying no-one speeds on the highway because it is "illegal". Talk about absurd!
I'm sure in your tiny black Apple-Hating heart you sure wish Jailbreaking could not be done because of some silly law so you could rightfully act all snobbish towards the supposedly snobby Apple users, but in reality here on Earth people Jailbreak if they want alternate apps. Just like some apps you can't get on the Android store and have to go elsewhere for as well - there's just one extra step for the iPhone, but it's so easy to do anyone can who cares to. You see unlike yourself, Apple users generally tend to be practical people who use whatever tools that work, whoever makes them.
It's not even like an app on a Cydia store would get tons less exposure because there are so many apps on the iPhone store now it's hard to get noticed no matter where you are.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apple's CEO is on the board of a major content provider. I'd say that's another reason to think they might not sell a way to control transmission in the app store. Yes I know that we can torrent stuff that is entirely legal, but that isn't Big Content's view, is it?
Well now, you can just use torrentflux, supporting an open source project, and still use your iphone. :P
http://www.torrentflux.com/
Citation needed
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
No for the billionth time you needn't point that out.
Why bother
You must be one of those people who read Playboy for the articles.
And, to continue the same argument, there's plenty of movies you can download legally via torrents. For example, my own. So to say that this ipso facto abetting piracy is a mistake. My prediction: this decision gets quietly reversed. Now, if only we could get an Azureus version of this app...
eMule allows you to control your torrents web based. I realize Transmission is also Mac capable, and eMule is not. Perhaps Transmission needs a web based control like eMule has?
I just like watching the progress bars. I don't have time for movies either.
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
At least Microsoft (so frequent target on this site) does not tell me what to run. All these discussions sounded like bunch of corporate lawyers preparing for the court debate. Just amazing how the inhabitants of the free land are happy with "Big Brother"-like companies. Google reads my email - great innovative company (oh, yes, it does it using software, for advertisement only, so what). Apple tells me - "you buy only from me, and only good things" - hooray! What can be better then talented(sorry, pure genius) hip and nice CEO, leading crowd of ignoramuses through the wild (and dangerous) world of technology. People, this wonder guy in jeans and sneakers just another rich dude - keep enjoying his i(F)Mac infomercials and listen to music his flock of result-oriented salespeople want you to listen. RIP Apple. iGod is here.
There is more to life than WOW. Show me after I finish running this dungeon to get my heroic armor k?
It's also legal for a main stream book store to openly sell hardcore pornography and sex toys.
Wow. I'd shop at that store every day of the week!
Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
There, fixed that for you.
I know what Apple thinks. But Apple is wrong in this case. No harm in Apple trying though (apart from spending a lot of money to get nowhere which basically applies to any serious attempt at DRM).
Jailbreaking is as the EFF says in the article you linked to a Fair Use case, and it seems pretty clear to me they are correct. It's irrelevant in the end though as people will keep doing so, so from a practical sense it the DMCA is not pertinent to the main argument.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apple is evil. They just bribe you with pretty bangles to not notice it too much.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
The trick might be to smuggle it in as part of another app - like a plug-in/add-on to Safari. Anybody for Firefox on your iPhone?
And btw, even if they won't sell it for the iPhone because AT&T told them not to (it's my phone, not Apple's, not AT&T's), why can't you have a torrent app for your iPod Touch? Don't tell me that AT&T owns that too!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Bad news, you forgot to put a cross on your forehead and flushed yourself away asshole.
Reminds me of how the paid jailbreak apps are simply just apps that it is simply impossible for anyone to do with the restrictions that apple applies.
Sometimes Apple can be a real bunch of f'in jerks, control freak bastard corporate-flunky, idiot whackjob control-freaks. F U Apple. F U Real good.
Bring on the Iphone killer and iStore replacement. It's not just this incident, it's all contributory, screw'em.
Actually they do. They just came out with their own 12 Prohibited Application Types for Microsoft's Windows MarketPlace for Mobile store. You just haven't been paying attention.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
if only we could get an Azureus version of this app...
Here's one.
And I wish Apple the best of luck should they ever wish to block it.
"Why are you watching the washing machine?"
"I love entertainment, as long as it's clean"
is it "stealing"???? the problem is that the word has lost meaning. The real question is: "if a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there to hear it.... who gives a fuck?". The answer is YOU.
You're off by a shade and nearly 70 years. FDR stole our future. Next time read a history book before you disparage an entire race. Idiot.
;-)
(don't read this part. it's only here because slashdot doesn't understand smiley-only posts)
The difference with WM is that you can go to any website on a non hacked phone and download and install and run any program you want. Try doing that on a iPhone. So MS 'telling you what to run' doesn't mean jack squat.
This space for rent.
One way to get option B is to use something like an Android phone.
Sure, Google/T-Mobile still control the 'Market Place' and have banned some applications (eg: tethering), but you can still install applications that you download over or copy to the memory card. It might even be possible to write another store application to get applications from other locations.
Hopefully, negative press/reviews/articles like this will encourage people to buy more open platforms, like Android and Open Moko, and put pressure on the more restrictive platforms to become more open. Power to the press ;)
Signatures are a waste of bandwi (buffering...)
Microsoft probably won't let them sell one the many Windows Mobile bittorrent clients on its itunes-wannabe store, but you can install them on your phone without having to work around corporate boneheadedness using exploits.
Windows Mobile may be butt ugly (without customising it with a good skin and finger touch UI) but it's basically a blank canvas upon which to write apps. Android might get there in a few years.
Da Blog
If you haven't seen the great Sita Sings the Blues be sure to download it and watch it today. Yes it's legal to do so.
And Apple, and all of you superfans who have gladly bent over for every offering of Apple's no matter how shitty and overpriced (Apple Mini?) convincing Apple that they can do whatever they want and fuck over their customers because they're too drunk on their own visions of how cool they look sitting in an overpriced coffee franchise with their black MacBook can suck my turgid, non-proprietary hardware.
You are welcome on my lawn.
"You wouldn't steal a car."
That said, if all the plans to a 2009 model Audi, Subaru, Porche or Lamborghini were leaked on to a torrent site I would most probably download them. If I had the necessary funds I would probably use them too. By all I was meaning everything, from design sketches and CAD of the steering wheel to the engine.
signature is pants
You can always distribute an app ad-hoc to several hundred people and bypass the app store, though you need the Phone's serial to encode the binary
ok, switching back to hum radio:) (oops, isn't it in FCC hands?) Thank you for pointing out.
AW, yeah. It was one of the point point of the response. I do not consider person with the apple in his hand (or mouse) an ignoramuse. I just hate people screaming "freeeee" and not being able to see that its not even as in "beer" anymore but rather like in "shit" (hm, who cares about spelliGN anymmore).
I find it pretty hilarious that there is a market need for this. I'd just read a book on the bus, and start the torrent when I got home. But I guess some people have the need to START IT RIGHT NOW, or perhaps they are just so impressed with the capability of doing this that they never considered if it was of much benefit.
Yes it is, if you dont buy it from the sellers how they want to sell. But this has been debated forever already, and you must be a retard not to understand it.
Imagine a shop where every item has two price tags: one says "for Whites only", the other says "for Coloreds". Prices on the former are significantly lower than prices on the latter.
If an African uses a mask to pretend to be White, and buy stuff for lower prices in such a shop, is he stealing?
Or is the owner of the shop simply an asshole, deserving to be treated as such?
They still allow you to run any application you want though.
> Imagine a shop where every item has two price tags:
Oh stop dragging race into everything. Besides we all know that in this case it would be one price for gays and a higher price for heterosexuals. Of course the very act of buying an Apple product involves bending over and taking it up the pooper (over both the EULA and pricetag) I guess nobody would ever pay the higher price.
Democrat delenda est
Oh stop dragging race into everything.
It is an example that is supposed to be immediately understandable to everyone. If you want, you can swap "black" and "white" in my post, or substitute them for "short" and "tall"... it doesn't really change anything. Point is, deliberate availability or price discrimination based on any external factor (including region) is plain evil.
I'm generally pro-copyright (though I do support reduction of terms to reasonable limits), but when the store refuses to sell you something just because your valid CC does not have a U.S. billing address, I say the buyer has full moral right to say "screw you, go fuck yourself", and head towards Pirate Bay, or any other convenient way to obtain what he desires. It's called "globalization", and I don't see why companies get to enjoy all benefits of it (including outsourcing etc - and I say that as a guy working on a time-limited working visa in a first world country), but then try to prevent their customers from doing the same.
You can also hunt animals with an AK47 if you really wanted to. And your point is?
Apple's policy is no secret. They make it quite clear to developers that they can accept or deny submissions as they see fit. If you don't like it, then don't support it with your money for the hardware. This is a business, so that's what it's all about.
Idiots keep complaining, but it doesn't stop them from forking money over to Apple. Developers act shocked when their app gets turned down despite Apple's clearly stated policy of selection at whim. Just like any other kind of retailer, you can't force them to carry your product. It's a risk of development which is known from the start.
> but when the store refuses to sell you something just because your valid CC does not have a U.S. billing address
That is a complex issue. I don't have any answers and if you thought about it a bit I seriously doubt you do either. Or are you just too shy to step forward, enlighten us all and claim a Nobel in economics?
The problem is copyright is a totally artificial construct and almost every country does it a little different. And the licenses the distributers have tend not to cross borders. And it just has to be that way for now. I don't like it either but until I can propose a better solution I won't bitch too loudly that nobody else has solved the problem. Just one example. Imagine the DVD. Now imagine one sold in India. It sells for a buck or two, because there that is all they can pay. If it were legal for copyrighted material to freely cross borders they would be selling for close to that here in the USA. At which point one of two things happens, profits on DVDs evaporate or prices in India rise enough (to prices they CAN'T PAY) to make exporting them into the US unprofitable. So somebody gets screwed. When somebody brings a few books or DVDs across a border in their luggage we all ignore it because we have to for practical reasons, but crates of the stuff would simply wreck the carefully managed artificial scarcity that copyright is based on.
Any legal construct that lets iTunes sell into every international territory at US prices on the date of US availability would pretty much have to include the same sort of thing for everyone else. Now consider that every film or song sold here in the US has some sort of legal setup in each foreign market where a local company has the legal rights to that material inside their territory. How are they going to like Apple (or Amazon, etc. This thread is about Apple but no need to just pick on them.) suddenly competing with their 'exclusive right' to sell that material? An exclusive right they paid a pretty penny to get by the way.
Democrat delenda est
"You wouldn't steal a car."
That said, if all the plans to a 2009 model Audi, Subaru, Porche or Lamborghini were leaked on to a torrent site I would most probably download them. If I had the necessary funds I would probably use them too. By all I was meaning everything, from design sketches and CAD of the steering wheel to the engine.
http://asset.soup.io/asset/0279/2254_6775.jpeg
is feroda a new fork of deadrat?
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing. Emo Philips
Drivetrain (the rejected app) "has a built-in web browser to allow you to find and add torrents when on the go."
Can't do that with Mobile Safari and a web interface.
I only use it for Japanese tv shows, anime, music, av, out-of-print jrpgs and eroge that I have no other way of obtaining.
I would have gladly paid for them if they were on sale here.
GENERATION 25: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Well... it's more like you can get the .cab for any prohibited application types just not through MarketPlace.
Hell, the developers/publisher could still sell it to you on a MicroSD card/DVD/whatever medium they choose. (How do you think Garmin is able to sell their GPS map product w/o an App Store to window mobile users?)
Unlike the iPhone where you need to jailbreak the phone...
But if I'd planned on downloading, it's /., let's assume it's the newest Debian build, to install when I got home from work, that wouldn't really be an answer if I'd neglected to hit the go button before walking out the door.
It's all fun and games until a 200' robot dinosaur shows up and trashes Neo-Tokyo... Again
I'm I the only nerd who actually use it for mostly downloading ubuntu and feroda and for WoW patches? Who has time for movies anyway?
I'm I the only nerd who actually use it for mostly downloading ubuntu and feroda and for WoW patches? Who has time for movies anyway?
I get all my KDE snaps with it...
I take it up the pooper, you insensitive clod, but I would never buy an Apple product.
I download movies because I'm too cheap to buy DVDs.
Transmission even has an iPhone-friendly web interface built right in. Turn it on, pick your port and point mobile safari at it. Save it as a bookmark to your homescreen called "Transmission" and you have a remote control for it. Doesn't work outside your LAN unless you forward the port at your router, which is a bit iffy without a password but I use it all the time on my LAN. I use LogMeIn Ignition for everything else - the most expensive app on my phone, but absolutely great given it can control a seemly-unlimited number of PCs, Macs and Linux boxes without paying anything else - being able to fix your dad's PC from miles away is very useful.
If the simpletons are still making the "bittorrent -> piracy" assertion, then yes, it does apparently still need pointing out.
;-)
(don't read this part. it's only here because slashdot doesn't understand smiley-only posts)
Don't you know that the filter is there to prevent the dreaded three caricature virus?
Some days I get the sinking feeling Orwell was an optimist.
Yes but the legitimate uses of bittorrent are similar to the legitimate uses of heroine.
And endlessly pointing them out is useless.
The damage done by the illegal use do not necessarily outweigh the legal uses.
Why bother
Actually they do. They just came out with their own 12 Prohibited Application Types for Microsoft's Windows MarketPlace for Mobile store. You just haven't been paying attention.
MS has rules about what kind of applications they'll put in their own store. The difference is that Apple's store is the only way to get apps without jailbreaking your iPhone, and that they're usually not very forthcoming with information about why an app was rejected.
There was a big discussion about the difference on an article here, but I can't seem to find it. But /. actually more or less agreed with MS's stance in this case - they're controlling the store, not locking down the product.
I don't think you've been paying attention.
Yes but the legitimate uses of bittorrent are similar to the legitimate uses of heroine.
Not at all.
Some "legitimate" uses of bittorrent
Some "legitimate" uses of heroine
The damage done by the illegal use do not necessarily outweigh the legal uses.
Whether that's true or not (I've not seen any evidence either way), to accept that as a valid reason to ban something is an unacceptable forfeiture of freedom and self-determination.
The difference is with Windows Mobile, you can load applications on without going through the store. With Apple, there is no legitimate way to do so (jailbreaking is illegal according to Apple)
Thats what RSS is for, tell it to send it to your torrent client voiala