Just like how Apple killed Tumblr for porn problems but gave Twitter a pass
Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
21–30 of 182 posts
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#22If WeChat was not permitted on iPhones, iPhones would not sell in China.
And would not be purchased by many people around the world.
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#23Much like Adobe did to Macs in the 1990s, WeChat has become so powerful they control the platform. Apple can’t remove WeChat because most consumers would rather change device hardware than lose access to WeChat.
Is it really the power of WeChat or the chinese government though?
In this scenario it doesn’t really matter. They’re interchangeable.
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#24Much like Adobe did to Macs in the 1990s, WeChat has become so powerful they control the platform. Apple can’t remove WeChat because most consumers would rather change device hardware than lose access to WeChat.
> Much like Adobe did to Macs in the 1990s, WeChat has become so powerful they control the platform. I'd enjoy listening to the story here, spacebanana.
Adobe almost killed Apple by developing Windows-first and sometimes Windows-only products in the 1990s. Many professionals cared about Adobe software more than their hardware device, so moved platforms.
Adobe’s motivation was largely revenge against Apple for opening up printing standards. Previously Adobe had a de facto monopoly license on these.
Steve Jobs was extremely pissed off by seeing Apple get hurt for making a pro consumer decision that was good for the wider industry, and held the grudge for a long time. Even though he wasn’t CEO for much of this period.
This article has more detail if you’re interested [1]
[1] https://www.alphr.com/blogs/2010/05/05/apple-adobe-history/
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#25When the west opened trade to China, policy experts assumed China would become more liberal like the west. Instead, the west is becoming more like China. [1, 2, 3]
[1] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrit...
[2] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/07/ready-for-your-e...
[3] (countless more examples, especially recently...)
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#26This rules inconsistency (alongside unpredictable (dis-)approvals and double standards for WeChat, Roblox, and (at times) Amazon and others) came up as one of a dozen reasons that, as a solo casual game developer, _launching_ in the App Store is not necessarily the no-brainer decision it seemed to be a decade ago (despite its enormous market power) I lay out in a separate post here https://keydiscussions.com/2023/07/…
surely twitter also had the double standard, since i’ve never seen anything done to twitter despite the massive amount of nsfw on the app
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
>> I mean Drafts has the ability to download actions (not sure if that is the right term) which are JS that run inside the app. I think this is fine and doesn't skirt any rules, I'm not familiar with that particular app but if that happens it's not fine and it seems to get a pass from Apple. The apps are not allowed to download executable code. You have to bundle it all in the app.
That's not exclusive to that app. Being able to update the app without going through the App Store was one of the big selling points of React Native a few years back. Apps are not allowed to download native code, however.
That's ...not a feature of React Native. It's possible to reload the app's content on code change, but this very clearly intended for development only.
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#28Much like Adobe did to Macs in the 1990s, WeChat has become so powerful they control the platform. Apple can’t remove WeChat because most consumers would rather change device hardware than lose access to WeChat.
> Much like Adobe did to Macs in the 1990s, WeChat has become so powerful they control the platform. I'd enjoy listening to the story here, spacebanana.
The story with Adobe on Mac in the 1990s is that their apps were so important to the platform that they practically had a veto on the API for Apple’s next-gen OS.
When Apple acquired NeXT, the original plan was for the NeXT API (now called Cocoa) to become the only way to build apps on the new Mac OS. But Adobe made it clear they were not going to port everything to Objective-C. In response Apple came up with Carbon, which was a port of essential plain-C APIs from Classic Mac OS to the new environment.
Apple retaliated pretty hard in 2007-2010 by first knifing 64-bit Carbon when it had already shipped in Leopard betas, and later strangling Flash.
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not exclusive to that app. Being able to update the app without going through the App Store was one of the big selling points of React Native a few years back. Apps are not allowed to download native code, however.
That's ...not a feature of React Native. It's possible to reload the app's content on code change, but this very clearly intended for development only.
You’re describing fast refresh, the parent is talking about codepush. The whole point of CodePush is definitely to update the app without going through the store. It downloads a JS bundle (which is usually most of the app functionalities) and executes it.
Re: Apple’s strict on App Store rules but gives WeChat a free pass (2020)
#30I'm not sure this article has the slam dunk it thinks it does. Those aren't "apps" they are at best "web apps". They use a JS framework and some special markup from what I can tell. In this sense WeChat is more akin to a web browser than having multiple "apps" inside it. > Since these are “apps within an app”, many of these mini-programs are flouting the App Store rules since they were not downloaded from the App Sto…
Apple bans alternative web browsers too... so..