Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
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Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#2I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is:
1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes
2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews
3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated.
4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make his own app available anymore without making a false confession and harming his own reputation.
This sort of heavy-handed-but-uncareful approach to "curation" is consistent with my experience publishing to the iOS app store.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#3I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is: 1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes 2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews 3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated. 4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make h…
What actually happened:
1. Guy publishes good paid app and gets a tonne of good reviews
2. He helps out a relative by buying an apple developer account for them, giving them a machine to test with
3. Relative also uses same "com.kapeli.*" bundle ID
4. Relative decides to buy 1000 fraudulent reviews
5. Apple tells the relative to stop posting fraud reviews, who refuses
6. Apple terminates both developers accounts since they are all the same information (they look like the same person, same credit card, bank account, test machine, and bundle ID)
https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/56uque/apple_dash_de...
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#4This guy has shown quite a talent for self-sabotage. Apple was willing to reinstate him if he'd undo some of the PR damage he'd created by spelling out that he shared the credit card with someone, and that maybe that's not the best idea.
Instead, he was enjoying the spotlight so much, he used the opportunity to escalate further, even publishing his phone call with Apple (illegal on one side of that conversation at least).
And that narrative includes a healthy dose of goodwill, considering how close to "the dog ate it" that story about the family friend is. A friend who apparently also didn't own any Apple hardware, so they shared that as well.
But open sourcing the useless iOS app is apparently a bad idea because his customers don't know how to work XCode, which strikes me as counterintuitive, considering every single one of his customers bought programmer-centric software for Mac.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#5I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is: 1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes 2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews 3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated. 4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make h…
What actually happened: 1. Guy publishes good paid app and gets a tonne of good reviews 2. He helps out a relative by buying an apple developer account for them, giving them a machine to test with 3. Relative also uses same "com.kapeli.*" bundle ID 4. Relative decides to buy 1000 fraudulent reviews 5. Apple tells the relative to stop posting fraud reviews, who refuses 6. Apple terminates both developers accounts sinc…
Don't forget:
7. Apple offers to reinstate the developer account, iff the user makes a post pointing out how this wasn't Apple's fault.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#6I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is: 1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes 2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews 3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated. 4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make h…
What actually happened: 1. Guy publishes good paid app and gets a tonne of good reviews 2. He helps out a relative by buying an apple developer account for them, giving them a machine to test with 3. Relative also uses same "com.kapeli.*" bundle ID 4. Relative decides to buy 1000 fraudulent reviews 5. Apple tells the relative to stop posting fraud reviews, who refuses 6. Apple terminates both developers accounts sinc…
I find it hard to believe that this happened without his knowledge. It was his credit card. It was his identifier. I can not imagine he never searched the store for lookalikes or his identifier, etc.
See https://software.com/publisher/kapeli
Just to clarify: On Friday my position was "I have no reason to believe Kapeli is lying and every reason to believe that Apple made a mistake". But after reading and listening to various sources I can not defend this position any more. It makes me sad.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
What actually happened: 1. Guy publishes good paid app and gets a tonne of good reviews 2. He helps out a relative by buying an apple developer account for them, giving them a machine to test with 3. Relative also uses same "com.kapeli.*" bundle ID 4. Relative decides to buy 1000 fraudulent reviews 5. Apple tells the relative to stop posting fraud reviews, who refuses 6. Apple terminates both developers accounts sinc…
Don't forget: 7. Apple offers to reinstate the developer account, iff the user makes a post pointing out how this wasn't Apple's fault.
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Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#8I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is: 1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes 2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews 3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated. 4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make h…
What actually happened: 1. Guy publishes good paid app and gets a tonne of good reviews 2. He helps out a relative by buying an apple developer account for them, giving them a machine to test with 3. Relative also uses same "com.kapeli.*" bundle ID 4. Relative decides to buy 1000 fraudulent reviews 5. Apple tells the relative to stop posting fraud reviews, who refuses 6. Apple terminates both developers accounts sinc…
The accounts were linked (same devices, same credit card number): https://london.kapeli.com/downloads/Apple_Call.m4a (edit: direct link to the phone call with the Apple representative)
As much as they tend to piss me off for other things. I don't see any wrongdoing from them. It's like accusing them of cutting off the payments to a bakery that operates from the same bank account to that of a drug dealer.
Also that kind of blackmail: "You're sure you want that statement to become public?" is plain stupid.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#9I've only just run across this. It looks like the story here is: 1. Guy publishes paid app to iTunes 2. App is really good, gets a ton of good reviews 3. Apple decides those reviews must be fraudulent, and pulls his app from the store and tells the guy he has to publicly admit that he committed review fraud to get his app reinstated. 4. People who have bought the app can't download it, guy can't do anything to make h…
In addition to what joeberon said. After this happened Apple were prepared to welcome him back to the App Store after Apple had learnt of all the facts. Kapei had gone public about this account nuke (which at times is the only way to raise the issue, I remember the times I've had to deal with Googles Support for the play store shudder) and while he didn't know all the details on why his account was nuked the issue has gained some notable press in the dev circles. Because of this Apple had asked for him to release a blog post explaining what had happened, that Apple had correctly detected fake reviews on one account, that account was linked in a couple of ways to him so when Apple nuked the one account they nuked the other along with it and that's is why his account was terminated.
Now in my opinion that is a fair request and if I were in his shoes I would of done just that because I can see how Apple could of tied the two accounts together. Others have said that it's Apple Blackmailing him "Post a blog post if you want your account back" and I can see their logic.
Apple don't want to be seen as they made a mistake because they did detect fake reviews and took account against the account volating their polices. But they also want it known why his account was caught up in this mess.
Were Apple right in nuking both accounts that they deemed were linked together? Should Apple made contact with all parties (it seems the accounts did have at least differnt contact information as he said he got no notice off Apple, Apple say they did contact the dev who's app had the fake reviews) before terminating accounts? Should a public statement explaining the incident be a requirement of reinclusion to the App Store
These are questions I have asked myself and have yet to come to a firm decision on myself.
Re: Dear Dash Users – A message to all Dash users from the Kapeli Blog
#10This guy has shown quite a talent for self-sabotage. Apple was willing to reinstate him if he'd undo some of the PR damage he'd created by spelling out that he shared the credit card with someone, and that maybe that's not the best idea. Instead, he was enjoying the spotlight so much, he used the opportunity to escalate further, even publishing his phone call with Apple (illegal on one side of that conversation at le…
I don't know what the app is about, I have never even used an Apple product in all my live. But I admire this guy for not bowing to the demands of Apple. Sticking to your principles, even when that means you're losing money (or, as you put it, "self-sabotage") is not something you see very often nowadays.