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Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

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Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#181

Post by chc »

tjr wrote: post #173
chc wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sucky" isn't very descriptive, but I wouldn't blame somebody used to a more advanced or coherent language for feeling frustrated with Objective-C. It is a backwards language in many ways, and I say that as somebody who's been writing it for the better part of a decade. It doesn't even have namespaces — something that has been standard in every language since the '90s. Instead, you must stick a two- or three-characte…

I've been doing a lot of Objective-C coding the past few months, and have found it surprisingly pleasant, once I got used to the syntax. Maybe I had low usability expectations for a language based on C. :-)

It's not unusable, and overall I actually prefer it to, say, C or Java. But compared to modern languages it has some glaring weaknesses.

Also, you have to be careful to distinguish between the framework and the language. Cocoa is an excellent framework that does a great job playing to Objective-C's strengths. It's the language that I'm criticizing here.

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#183

Post by tptacek »

gte910h wrote: post #174
tptacek wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is that only Apple knows why it changed the rules, but that anyone who can do a Google search can (a) read up on what antitrust means and (b) observe Apple's non-commanding share of the mobile market.

Their app sales accounted for 85% plus of the paid app market.

That's also not how antitrust works. Read:

http://www.justice.gov/atr/public/reports/236681.pdf

Read the intro to section 2, then skip to section 2 and read the first couple pages.

Long story short: the acid test for "monopoly power" is, "if Apple jacked the prices up on iPhones, would its customers be unable to acquire reasonable substitutes." Since Apple has something less than 30% of the smart-phone market (note: that same DoJ doc says that market shares under 55% are probably prima facie excluded from antitrust enforcement), it's unreasonable to argue that consumers have no substitutes for iPhones.

Apple also has a huge share of games involving catapulting birds and falling refrigerators and cars, but, well, read above.

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#184

Post by judofyr »

colomon wrote: post #148
kristofferR wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess he changed his mind when Epic showed him the Unreal Engine 3 running on an iPhone. He was so impressed by it that he presented it as the only third party app on their iPod press conference, that says a lot. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2H8hmi8yrQ

According to John Carmack ( http://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack , search for Apple), Apple asked him to also be at the conference, and he turned them down because of the conditions they wanted to put on him to do it.

Permalink: http://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/22739785428

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#185

Post by gmlk »

I don't think this actually changes anything? Apple still bans under section 1 and I think 10.1 any app that don't have a consistent iOS look and feel and behavior. The requirement to only use native widgets is still enforced.

So, either the app developer gives the app a native user experience; Or the middleware developer makes it so that any app using his middleware is always conform the guidelines? As far as I can tell this still rules out any simple use of the simple and generic cross-platform middleware layers?

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#186

Post by msbarnett »

jokermatt999 wrote: post #170
davidcann wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 20MB size limit over cell networks has been published for a long time. It used to be 10MB and they raised it last year, so nothing new on that one.

Doesn't that also rule out the majority of podcasts? 8/12 on my phone right now are over 20MB. Seems like a rather harsh restriction.

It rules out downloading any type of app or media from iTunes that is greater than 20 Megabytes over the cellular connection.

Presumably this is in place to try to keep AT&T from falling even more over under the load.

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#187

Post by ataggart »

It's 2010; is there any valid reason why a web page announcing a change to another document doesn't link to that document?

Assuming this[1] is it, what exactly counts as a "private API" per section 3.3.1. Isn't any code I write a private API, thus calls to it a are violation? And how is that compatible with the allowance in 3.3.2 to package an interpreter into the app?

[1]http://developer.apple.com/programs/terms/ios/standard/ios_s...

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#188

Post by benbeltran »

jlongster wrote: post #98
jacquesm wrote: post #21

So, how about all those people that were supporting apples' right to run their app store the way they see fit and who said that there is no point complaining about it? I think this proves that complaining about stuff like this is well worth the effort, assuming that that - and not some backroom pressure - is what caused them to back off. They mention it in their release so I figure it must have been a major factor. e…

Not sure about statement 2.9: "Apps that are "beta", "demo", "trial", or "test" versions will be rejected" Does this mean no "lite" versions of games? That would affect tons of apps... unless Apple is about to come out with a way to bundle a lite version with your app.

I think this may be because of in-app purchases. So you can distribute a free "full but locked" app, and then just add functionality with in-app purchases. Maybe they're trying to promote that?

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#189

Post by gte910h »

tptacek wrote: post #183
gte910h wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their app sales accounted for 85% plus of the paid app market.

That's also not how antitrust works. Read: http://www.justice.gov/atr/public/reports/236681.pdf Read the intro to section 2, then skip to section 2 and read the first couple pages. Long story short: the acid test for "monopoly power" is, "if Apple jacked the prices up on iPhones, would its customers be unable to acquire reasonable substitutes." Since Apple has something less than 30% of the smart-phone market (note:…

There is another store for which normal people can buy software for iOS devices?

"would its customers be unable to acquire reasonable substitutes."

If you look at the class "iOS software" which is only legitimately sold by one vendor, the very definition of a monopoly. If Apple raised the price of all iPhone apps to 200k tomorrow, there would be no reasonable substitute for software for the device.

They do not have a monopoly of "mobile phones", they have a monopoly on "iOS software". Which is all sold by them (nonwithstanding tiny jailbroken stores). They do not have a monopoly on "Games about birds", as you can develop a substitute for that on other platforms which they do not control. You cannot however say they do not have a monopoly on the distribution of games about birds which run on iOS devices, because they clearly do.

As iOS software makes up 85% or more of all paid sales, this IS a legitimate issue for Anti-trust legal system, at least good enough to get in front of a judge.

Re: Apple Relaxes iOS Restrictions On Development Tools, Publishes Review Guidelines

#190

Post by notahacker »

tptacek wrote: post #156
mattmanser wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but we're starting to live in a slightly weird world where once you buy a particular product which is a gateway to other products and services, the manufacturer is dictating in a very megalomaniac way on how you spend your money. And commanding huge sums from utterly controlling that marketplace. Like the XBox and iPhone. They may have a non-commanding share of mobiles, but they have a total monopoly on iPhone…

Under that theory of law, every platform company in the world is subject to antitrust suits as the "monopoly provider of access to that platform". Twitter could be sued. 37signals could be sued. Fortunately, this simply isn't how antitrust law works.

Microsoft's monopoly was only on Windows, which just happened to be the only viable option for most PC OEMs and browser developers.

If owning 99.4% of the mobile app sales market (Gartner figure for 2009) and imposing restrictions which hinder the development of cross-platform apps doesn't deserve antitrust scrutiny, I'm really not sure what does.

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