App Store: I'm out • Hacker News Board

Re: App Store: I'm out

#11

Post by jmtame » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 6:39 PM UTC

benjamincanfly wrote: post #10

jmtame wrote: post #5

After the first paragraph of reading this, all I could think of was "holy crap, this person has really just written every excuse in the book NOT to write iPhone apps." There are a million excuses to not diet and exercise, to not do a startup, and to not do anything in life. Your job as an entrepreneur is to work around the obstacles. Give Apple an app that they can't afford to reject. Don't do anything stupid that wo…

You have a great go-get-'em attitude, but the issue isn't remotely similar to the question of whether or not to diet and exercise. It's more like, "Should I spend huge amounts of time and effort on diet and exercise in order to enter this bodybuilding competition, only to be disqualified at the last minute because I look too much like the competition judge's nephew?"

I would just win the bodybuilding competition. Pretty simple.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#12

Post by samwise » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 6:41 PM UTC

Their tune will change in a couple months when android comes out.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#13

Post by DenisM » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 6:42 PM UTC

jmtame wrote: post #5

After the first paragraph of reading this, all I could think of was "holy crap, this person has really just written every excuse in the book NOT to write iPhone apps." There are a million excuses to not diet and exercise, to not do a startup, and to not do anything in life. Your job as an entrepreneur is to work around the obstacles. Give Apple an app that they can't afford to reject. Don't do anything stupid that wo…

Have you read past the first paragraph though? His point is that Apple's arbirtary rejection of some applications undermines confidence and will lead to there being no serious investment undertaken by third party developer. If you don't control the outcome you might as well not start the work.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#14

Post by mattmaroon » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 6:49 PM UTC

Android FTW?

Re: App Store: I'm out

#15

Post by fallentimes » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 6:59 PM UTC

Wow - I hope Android fares better but I'm not holding my breath.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#16

Post by pmjordan » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 7:18 PM UTC

fallentimes wrote: post #15

Wow - I hope Android fares better but I'm not holding my breath.

Android (as far as I can tell) faces different hurdles, mainly operator and consumer uptake. Oh, and getting the damn thing out the door.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#17

Post by ashu » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 7:26 PM UTC

As for me, I hope somebody builds a spectacular killer app for jailbroken iPhones so that part of the economy gets opened up. I love my iPhone and programming for it way too much.

Also, this dude seems to belong to the typical "elitist" Mac people group. "crapware written by hobbyist students" -- WTF! A student won the official Apple competition for best Mac / iPhone app or something like it.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#18

Post by curiousgeorge » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 7:30 PM UTC

liscio wrote: post #6

petercooper wrote: post #2

> Loudly and conspicuously hire an App Store Evangelist I agree, but I'd be surprised if we see it happen. Evangelists are needed all over the place and yet so few companies bother to hire any or attempt any serious relationships on social media and the like. Apple are also not known for their openness in situations like this. A lack of information gives them some sort of advantage, I guess.

Apple has other evangelists on the payroll already. Some examples: User Interface, Graphics and Media, Developer Tools, Frameworks. These evangelists have often helped developers shed more light on bugs against Mac OS X which are blocking the shipping of apps. Also, they're often a great first-line contact at Apple for getting help from Apple's engineers outside of WWDC. To get an additional App Store contact that co…

I know of applications that have been rejected not because they sucked, but because they were similar to ones that already existed.

It's bad for long-term innovation, but maybe it's good for the platform by not confusing users. I personally feel it's legitimate for open platforms to arbitrarily restrict default visibility, but not for them to restrict distribution.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#19

Post by thorax » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 7:33 PM UTC

Well, Apple has already gotten some of our money. We purchased some Macs solely to develop an iPhone application for one of our endeavors. Now, though-- given the lag with even getting approval (so we can get to the stage of installing a test app on test phones), we're rapidly losing excitement about investing in the project.

And then there's this kicker-- once our team spends time developing it, there's a chance it won't even be allowed. Great!

He doesn't really mention in his post the fun fact that you've got to pay a fee so Apple can review/reject your app. Definitely not feeling warm and fuzzy about the investment so far.

Re: App Store: I'm out

#20

Post by martythemaniak » Sat, Sep 13, 2008, 7:38 PM UTC

rokhayakebe wrote: post #4

Anytime your work needs approval to be live, you are in big trouble. The problem is not Apple. The issue is the mobile industry. Everyone screams the Iphone is an open platform, but if you truly look at it, it is not significantly different. You still have to go to an approval process and your application cannot compete with any Apple applications or future applications.

You're wrong, it is Apple. And not only are you wrong, you are provably wrong.

Go ahead and write a pull-my-finger app for one of Apple's competitors (Blackberry or WinMo) and no one will stop you from releasing it on your target devices.