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Why AppGratis Was Pulled From the App Store

Posted by Soulskill on from the stories-that-will-fit-your-preconceived-notions dept.

RougeFemme writes "By now, you may know that AppGratis, a popular app discovery app, was recently pulled from the App store. Apple listed violations of the following guidelines: '2.25 Apps that display Apps other than your own for purchase or promotion in a manner similar to or confusing with the App Store will be rejected. ... 5.6 Apps cannot use Push Notifications to send advertising, promotions, or direct marketing of any kind.' Now, the company's CEO, Simon Dawlat, has made a blog post with 'the rest of the story.'" As it turns out, AppGratis had been cleared by Apple for guideline 2.25 as recently as October, and its iPad version was approved less than a week ago. The brand new Apple review team member who contacted the company isn't able to explain what went into the decision to ban it now. Dalwat says the complaint about guideline 5.6 was 'another surprise for us since we only send one "system notification" a day to our users, coming in the form of a generic, opt-in only "Today’s deal is here!" message, which is precisely how Apple recommends developers to use its push notification service.'" However, the AllThingsD article cites sources claiming Apple was "more than a little troubled that AppGratis was pushing a business model that appeared to favor developers with the financial means to pay for exposure." Dalwat does not address this in his post.

26 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Live by the walled garden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Die by the walled garden.

    Develop open source if you don't want your hard work to live entirely at the whims of someone else, whose interests probably don't align with yours. All the worse if you put all your proverbial eggs in this basket, grew a bit, and had the carpet pulled out from under you (a 45-person company in this case).

    I feel sorry for these guys, but the problem is the walled-garden ecosystems which are - unfortunately - proliferating instead of dying out.

    They'll all die out eventually.

    1. Re:Live by the walled garden... by IronMagnus · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, I believe it should come as a surprise when you've been working with Apple Representatives, had an update approved by their review process, then have it pulled less than a week later. If apple wants quality apps in their store, they need to act in a predictable manner that businesses can work with.

    2. Re:Live by the walled garden... by Minter92 · · Score: 2

      Closed systems are bad um ok

    3. Re:Live by the walled garden... by MrEricSir · · Score: 2

      "Develop open source if you don't want your hard work to live entirely at the whims of someone else..."

      That advice is all well and good until you want to actually get paid for your work.

      --
      There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
    4. Re:Live by the walled garden... by Minter92 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Closed systems are bad um ok

      So if open is so much better for developers, then why are iOS developers making 75% of the revenues from mobile app downloads?

      http://www.canalys.com/newsroom/11-quarterly-growth-downloads-leading-app-stores

      Money != morality

    5. Re:Live by the walled garden... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

      Feeding my clones == Immortality

    6. Re:Live by the walled garden... by BitZtream · · Score: 5, Insightful

      AppGratis is an app where developers pay money for getting their app in the Top 100 rankings and such. You pay them somewhere between 4k and tens of thousands of dollars, then you set your app to FREE for a day they tell you and the send a message to a certain number of users in order to get you pushed to the ranking you paid for on Apple's lists. Some of these users aren't actual users, just accounts used to inflate the rankings.

      This is the absolute scummiest type of 'marketing' in existence without flat out lying. Its manipulation of the system for financial gain based on bribes. Apple banning them is a GOOD THING. Might as well be Payola. Apple doesn't want their rankings or their users tainted by scummy advertising scams.

      Walled garden or not, you don't want this type of app or system to exist. Put down your apple pitch fork long enough to see the bigger picture.

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    7. Re:Live by the walled garden... by femtobyte · · Score: 2

      Letting families starve if family members refuse to perform acts which they would, were their family's lives not held hostage, consider immoral == Immorality == Capitalism.

    8. Re:Live by the walled garden... by BitZtream · · Score: 2

      It would be a surprise if you weren't trying to skirt the lines of the rules already, but they KNEW they were riding the line already. They've been rejected more than once before. It shouldn't really be a surprise when they ban it again, especially if it happens to be for reasons they may not have noticed in testing ... like say, notifications that weren't during the 'testing' phase?

      This isn't a quality app so this isn't an issue in that respect, no one is going to miss an app that recommends purchases based on who pays them the most. Do you know what payola is?

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    9. Re:Live by the walled garden... by BitZtream · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What world do you live in that makes sense?

      You're arguing that Apple is petty for telling you that throwing a petty temper tantrum in public won't help you?

      Seriously?

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    10. Re:Live by the walled garden... by Vintermann · · Score: 3, Informative

      You got to see this in context of Apple's policies. They've been known to exclude journalists from events because they've said things Apple didn't like.

      It's not just that Apple has a reputation for being petty and vindictive. Apple wants that reputation in the industry, so people dependent on them (or dependent on writing about them) talk them up on their own initiative, or at least abstain from criticism.

      In that light "complaining about a rejection in public doesn't improve your chances of getting allowed back" must be understood as what it is: a threat. If the app approval process was merely a matter of objectively interpreting the rules, the converse statement ("complaining about a rejection in public doesn't hurt your chances of getting allowed back") would be just as true, and why would they bother to say it then?

      But the converse isn't true. The app store guidelines aren't interpreted objectively or fairly, they're interpreted with the customary Apple vindictiveness and jealousy. And they want app developers to know.

      --
      xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
  2. As opposed to Apple's model? by TWX · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Apple was "more than a little troubled that AppGratis was pushing a business model that appeared to favor developers with the financial means to pay for exposure.

    As opposed to their somehow having managed to con local news into covering every stinking Apple Store opening even though retailers and service centers throughout Apple's history have provided the exact same services that the Apple Store provides, for the same price?

    --
    Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
  3. Money that Apple wanted by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It is really simple to see what the problem was, if developers had money to pay to AppGratis to promote their app, they should instead be giving that money to Apple.

    --
    The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
  4. Plain-text EULA by girlintraining · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've decrypted the Apple EULA. It says this:

    "Apple must make the majority of any profit to be had. Developers will be paid only a fraction of what their efforts are worth. Loyalty to the Furo--er, Brand is absolute. Apps which go against our brandalist(tm) propaganda are to be banned with immediate effect using one of the dozen or so vaguely-defined rules outlined below. Ka-Pla!"

    But more seriously guys... if you're developing for Apple, prepare to be raped. They don't give a flying fuck through a rolling doughnut about you, the developer. You should feel privileged to develop for the legacy of the Great Man Jobs. How dare you ask for a fair share of the profit! If you want that, go slink off and develop for (spits) that Anderzoid platform or whatever it's called. Apple is the future. Suck it up, cupcake.

    --
    #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    1. Re:Plain-text EULA by jo_ham · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've decrypted the Apple EULA. It says this:

      "Apple must make the majority of any profit to be had. Developers will be paid only a fraction of what their efforts are worth. Loyalty to the Furo--er, Brand is absolute. Apps which go against our brandalist(tm) propaganda are to be banned with immediate effect using one of the dozen or so vaguely-defined rules outlined below. Ka-Pla!"

      But more seriously guys... if you're developing for Apple, prepare to be raped. They don't give a flying fuck through a rolling doughnut about you, the developer. You should feel privileged to develop for the legacy of the Great Man Jobs. How dare you ask for a fair share of the profit! If you want that, go slink off and develop for (spits) that Anderzoid platform or whatever it's called. Apple is the future. Suck it up, cupcake.

      Interesting, given that the split on revenue is 70:30 in favour of the developer and for that 30% they handle all of the hosting, distribution, updates, credit card payments and billing etc and just give you the money, greatly simplifying the process of online distribution involving small transactions.

      The App Store itself has been an enormous cash cow for developers, large and small alike.

      Apple's financial statements tell you exactly how much profit they make on the store (hint: it's extremely low, but it is above zero), and if you think they're lying about that as has been often suggested then file a complaint over fraudulent financial reporting - it's a very serious crime.

      Developers, on the other hand, are making hay on the store. I'd be interested to see how you justify Apple making "the majority of any profit to be had" with some actual numbers, or if it's just more rampant, ill-informed Apple bashing as usual.

    2. Re:Plain-text EULA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      A) You'll be surprised how you can mislead or completely lie. I mean, how many companies are saying most of their money from outside America for lower taxes? It's not illegal, but certainly "fraudulent"

      B) Hosting and distribution (on an electronic medium, this is the same): You can get 500GB for $100 from Dropbox, and this is a customer facing website (not a B2B). The cost of hosting a 100MB file (which is unusual for an application to be this large) would be about 2 cents. (2% of 99 cent application). -- https://www.dropbox.com/upgrade

      C) Purchasing a product and using PayPal to pay results in a less than 4% fee (less than 3% if you exclude international purchases) -- and they also handle payments, billing (isn't that the same thing?), etc -- https://www.paypal.com/webapps/mpp/paypal-fees

      D) Every single advertisement and / or press release has lied or mislead. (See class action lawsuit regarding their voice assistant). Antennagate (our phones are just like everyone elses! except nobody else has an external, shortable antenna?) I would not be surprised if you found creative accounting that's perfectly legal.

      Add that up, and you get ... 6%? What are they doing with the remaining 24%?

    3. Re:Plain-text EULA by girlintraining · · Score: 2

      The App Store itself has been an enormous cash cow for developers, large and small alike.

      Let's test that theory. First up, who's making the big bucks? corporations. In fact, over half make Less than $3,000. There are other stories showing the lack of millionaires pouring out of Apple's "enormous cash cow" as you put it. I mean, besides Apple.

      Apple's financial statements tell you exactly how much profit they make on the store (hint: it's extremely low, but it is above zero), and if you think they're lying about that as has been often suggested then file a complaint over fraudulent financial reporting - it's a very serious crime.

      And as we all know, fraudulent financial reporting, because it's such a serious crime, doesn't happen very often. Like Enron, the subprime mortgage crisis, the "too big to fail" financial institutions, that debacle with Lloyds of London, and oh the list goes on. There isn't a week that goes by where fraudulent financial reporting doesn't make the news.

      I'd be interested to see how you justify Apple making "the majority of any profit to be had" with some actual numbers, or if it's just more rampant, ill-informed Apple bashing as usual.

      As opposed to blind fan-boy support? Well, regardless of your religious preferences, let's look at a similar business model and then discuss it: record companies. They also have made their profit by acting as middlemen in the distribution of apps. Essentially, the same business model Apple uses, except the percentages are different. Apple doesn't offer marketing support to its customers, whereas the record labels do. That's where a lot of that difference goes; And here's the thing... if you ever want your app to succeed, you're going to have to do more than just code it up and submit it. You'll need to market it. And marketing, my friend, is not cheap. There's also hidden startup fees. For example, did you know that Apple charges $99 a year to app developers for an 'iTunes connect account'? Now, when most app developers have made less than $3,000 for their entire portfolio, that "30%" starts looking more like "33%"... and when you add in marketing and advertising costs to get an "app of the day" or whatever, push that number higher. How much? Well, that's up to Apple. It's a "per customer" sale.

      Now that we've discussed how many different ways you're screwed as a developer, let's look at the overhead costs for Apple: App approval. Distribution infrastructure. So basically, you hire a couple dozen people to evaluate apps and you need to rent space in a data center. For an $8 billion dollar a year service, I'm guessing this amounts to... uhh... dick.

      So there you have it: Apple's making money hand over fist, and the developers... well... not so much. Did you really expect a different conclusion? That Apple is somehow different from every other publicly-traded company on the Earth? They have the largest market capitalization of any country on Earth. They didn't get there by being generous.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    4. Re:Plain-text EULA by girlintraining · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And now, GirlinTraining Eats an Apple Fanboy, Except For The Core Of Course ...

      Wow, I can see you simply don't live in the real world, and you accuse Apple users of being affected by the RDF.

      I accused them of adhering to their mission statement, as filed with the Securities Exchange Commission.

      I see you left of payment processing and support, but those are zero costs of course.

      Considering that the developers only get paid when their balance reaches a certain threshold or a certain amount of time has elapsed, yeah, practically zero.

      It doesn't cost you anything to support your customers or handle payments.

      One of these things is not like the other. Can you spot it?

      As to "renting space in a data center", I imagine you know Apple's needs better than them, but they decided to actually *build* data centres of their own.

      Actually, I don't. But I do know them better than you apparently do. The app store alone brings in six billion a year. Go look it up, I'll wait. The data center, equipment, land, everything, cost 1/6th of that. New. From scratch. Obviously, day to day costs would be lower. A lot lower. You may remember another company that has a very large data center: It's called Google, and as I understand it, they're one of the biggest companies on the planet and they don't charge or take a cut of your website's fees to operate. Their profit margins aren't exactly... tiny. So margins for Apple here are huge. Massively huge. Triple digit huge. And with a six billion dollar market, we're talking holy-fuck I just won the lottery huge payout. Which of course, I know, and Apple knows, but you apparently, did not know. I ascribe this to the fact that you only read about technology on forum websites like slashdot, instead of busying yourself with inventing them, as I do. And possibly having not taken macroeconomics yet.

      My point about Apple's financial statements was not that fraud never happens../

      Back pedal any harder and you may solve the energy crisis. No, you said fraud is a serious crime and implied that any alleged impropriety that Apple could be accused of was likely false, because said fraud is rare. I responded with common-knowledge news events that stamped this with a giant "Bullshit" in 9 foot tall lettering.

      Also, I find it amusing that you consider the $99 annual fee to not only be "hidden" (seriously, wtf?) but that it is somehow crippling.

      Well, if your math skills didn't suck so hard they were in danger of creating an event horizon from which no clue can escape, you'd realize that $100 from a developer that's making less than $3,000 in the majority of the cases means Apple's cut from this alone is over 3%. That "Apple only takes 30%" is white-washed Grade A marketing bullshit. It takes more. In fact, when you add it all up, they take about as much as the recording industries do from their artists. Which, big surprise, since it's the same business model, but just has a trendy hipster icon plastered across the front.

      - the clear indication here is that hobbyist developers are actually finding success on the store.

      Your definition of success would be "made more than nothing." My definition of success is somewhat more mature, and reasonable: Makes enough to live on. When you get out of mom's basement, I suspect your definition of success will be less based on the brand of toys you own and more on your ability to get food into your mouth.

      What are the earnings of those same group of sub-3k developers on Android, for example? Or simply those releasing software for any platform via their own distribution method.

      We weren't discussing

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    5. Re:Plain-text EULA by girlintraining · · Score: 2

      Maybe there was more coherence in the rest of the post, but it doesn't look likely. Sorry.

      That's okay. I felt the same way about your childish rantings, but it's a slow night at work...

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
  5. Disturbed by the concept of Advertising? by Quantus347 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Apple was "more than a little troubled that AppGratis was pushing a business model that appeared to favor developers with the financial means to pay for exposure."

    In other words they are disturbed by an advertising App whose business model is based on that of every other advertising firm on the planet?

    --
    Common Sense isn't as Common as people think...
    1. Re:Disturbed by the concept of Advertising? by BitZtream · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The app basically allows you to pay between $4k and tens of thousands of dollars to 'buy' a slot in the apple top downloads rankings for a day.

      You give AppGratis 10K, and they tell you to put your app to $0 on next tuesday. Come tuesday you do your part, they notify a bunch of accounts (some real, some fake) about your app, these accounts then go download your free app, you climb up to number 80 on Apples charts for the day. The next day you put your price back up to something non-zero and hope that word of mouth and visibility give you an increased sales rate.

      THAT is the problem. Its manipulating the market numbers based on who pays the most. It's buying a spot on the rankings that people think are generated by some form of actual popularity. Its a lie.

      You would be pissed if Apple said '$100k gets you #1 app for a day, sign up here!' wouldn't you?

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
  6. Old Ben by stewsters · · Score: 2

    "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."
    - Benjamin Franklin, writing an angry notice when his app was rejected by Apple.

  7. Re:Hate to be cynical .. by DougOtto · · Score: 3, Funny

    Bull shit. You clearly enjoy being cynical.

    --
    Solving Unix problems since 1989...
  8. So... by DenaliPrime · · Score: 2

    I realize that consistency is highly overrated... but is the CEO's last name Dalwat or Dawlat?

    --
    I! Tego Arcana Dei.
  9. Android apps tend to use ads more often by tepples · · Score: 3, Insightful

    then why are iOS developers making 75% of the revenues from mobile app downloads?

    The article you linked states that though Apple had the lion's share of revenue from priced applications, Google Play Store had more total downloads, paid and free, than downloads from Apple, Microsoft, and RIM stores combined. (Conspicuous by its absence from the article is Amazon, but that's beside my point.)

    Let me take a guess as to why Google wins downloads while Apple wins revenue. Apple never launched the iPod touch, iPhone, or iPad in a given country without support for iTunes payment. Google, on the other hand, chose to allow sales of devices with Android Market (now Play) in some countries to which it hadn't yet launched Checkout (now Wallet). To reach customers in those countries, developers had to make their applications available without charge and recoup their expenses through advertising. This set up an expectation among Android users that applications would have an ad-supported version. Didn't Rovio claim to earn more from advertisements in ad-supported versions of Angry Birds than from sale of priced versions?

    1. Re:Android apps tend to use ads more often by Karlt1 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The article you linked states that though Apple had the lion's share of revenue from priced applications, Google Play Store had more total downloads, paid and free, than downloads from Apple, Microsoft, and RIM stores combined. (Conspicuous by its absence from the article is Amazon, but that's beside my point.)

      Let me take a guess as to why Google wins downloads while Apple wins revenue. Apple never launched the iPod touch, iPhone, or iPad in a given country without support for iTunes payment. Google, on the other hand, chose to allow sales of devices with Android Market (now Play) in some countries to which it hadn't yet launched Checkout (now Wallet). To reach customers in those countries, developers had to make their applications available without charge and recoup their expenses through advertising. This set up an expectation among Android users that applications would have an ad-supported version.

      Or another guess is that Android users are cheap....

      http://allthingsd.com/20110527/android-users-like-apps-but-dont-like-paying-for-them/

      http://gigaom.com/2012/11/26/why-are-android-users-less-engaged-than-ios-users/

      Didn't Rovio claim to earn more from advertisements in ad-supported versions of Angry Birds than from sale of priced versions?

      Rovio:

      http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/angry-birds-exec-calls-android-too-complex-iphone-no-1-125769

      Why? Apple has "gotten so many things right. And they know what they are doing and they call the shots."

      Android, too, is growing, he said, "But it's also growing complexity at the same time."

      "While there are many devices and carriers that use Android, "device fragmentation (is) not the issue," Vesterbacka said, "but rather the fragmentation of the ecosystem. So many different shops, so many different models. The carriers messing with the experience again. Open but not really open, a very Google-centric ecosystem. And paid content just doesnâ(TM)t work on Android.""