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Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

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Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#291

Post by michaelbuckbee »

exikyut wrote: post #115
yarcob wrote: post #5

Oh my god, they don't even bother implementing the app any more... It reminds me of my first App Store experience. I made an app that was somewhat successful (about 2000€ a month, enough to pay for a students living expenses). Within short time, a chinese speaking developer cloned it. They copied the icon (slighlty different color), they copied the UI, they even copied all the text in the dialog boxes. They released…

[Posting here on the assumption the parent comment will likely stay at the top] What about... a service, that helps walk you through these kinds of situations, handles country-specific implementation details, can help figure out the best approach for a given scenario, and give you the best chance of getting things sorted out... ...and... ...is NOT a "welcome, welcome, one and all" type of environment, and requires Tw…

Intellectual property lawyers do this (for big bucks) and Reputation Management services kind of do this (for smaller bucks).

I think what you're describing is interesting as it is sort of a different ground to tread, like a specialized version of the above.

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#292

Post by Groxx »

SeanLuke wrote: post #231
risyachka wrote: post #44

Google does exactly the same. My apps have been cloned or copied many times, with my exact icon or screenshots. It's cute that they have a report button that doesn't work. You can send a billion reports - they not ones have taken the app down.

Doesn't this mean that Google has violated the DMCA and you can sue/fine them?

The report button doesn't file a valid DMCA takedown request, so probably not.

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#293

Post by stevehawk »

valuearb wrote: post #136
mrighele wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> App stores can't spend too many hours on each app because there's tons of them, In this specific case it seems they didn't even spend one minute, since the app is not working. If at Apple they don't have the resource to at least try to open every app (I doubt it, they are swimming in cash), they could at least find a way to decide which apps to test first, like complaints from other developers, reviews telling that…

The app was working, during review. Then once approved its behavior changed and the scam started. This is trivial to implement and done by many developers.

Apple doesn't approve each release of an app?

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#294

Post by MikeDelta »

chrischen wrote: post #290
yarcob wrote: post #5

Oh my god, they don't even bother implementing the app any more... It reminds me of my first App Store experience. I made an app that was somewhat successful (about 2000€ a month, enough to pay for a students living expenses). Within short time, a chinese speaking developer cloned it. They copied the icon (slighlty different color), they copied the UI, they even copied all the text in the dialog boxes. They released…

Wow something similar happened to my business. A fly-by-night business launched under my trademark, bought Google search ads against my domain searches, copied verbatim content from my website including my terms of service which has my address and company name in it, and then also sent me a cease an desist on my own trademark to top it off. Despite such egregious infractions it's incredibly difficult to stop them bec…

Horrible. How did that end or is it still ongoing?

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#295

Post by coldtea »

_qulr wrote: post #112
coldtea wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, so? It's still a 100 billion market they've built, for devices, OSes, and SDKs they build. And it still has better paying customers than the Play store, and 1/50+ less malware (according to stats), so more customer trust. Is it perfect? No.

You speak as though app developers are swimming in money, but the fact is that the App Store market is very top heavy. As usual, "the 1%" are doing extremely well, but the vast majority of app developers are not making a lot of money. Apple's recent small business program is tacit acknowledgement from Apple that many developers are struggling financially and cannot afford even the 30% cut. In comparison, the so-calle…

>You speak as though app developers are swimming in money, but the fact is that the App Store market is very top heavy. As usual, "the 1%" are doing extremely well, but the vast majority of app developers are not making a lot of money.

Society is very "top heavy", the 1% has most of the wealth too, the popular artists is a power-law distribution, and so on. That's not up to the App Store though.

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#296

Post by cratermoon »

nanidin wrote: post #242
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes, that is doing it for good, the morally compromised part is that the DMCA is a solution created to allow big content owners to shut down whoever they want without any culpability. Most often things are morally neutral, and can be used for good or bad, some things are morally bad and it is difficult to use them for morally good things, and some things are morally good and it is difficult to use for morally bad. Bu…

The DMCA was created to allow websites like Youtube to exist without existential threat from rights holders due to users uploading content that they do not hold the rights to. Your view is Stallman-esque, but the world is not so clear cut in terms of good/evil. At best, I would say the abuse of the DMCA by large entities is an unintended consequence of the existence of the DMCA, and it could be patched up by lawmaker…

> existential threat from rights holders due to users uploading content that they do not hold the rights to

Said threat only comes from big content owners, and they don't even bother to check if they have the rights to the content before issuing a DMCA challenge. A small-fry content owner doesn't have the resources to find copyright infringement, while big content providers simply scrape everything with automation and issue a claim on even the flimsiest match.

At YouTube, big content doesn't even have to do the work, they've pushed the work off to YouTube's content ID system which automatically demonetizes (or, better yet, gives the revenue to the claimant).

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#297

Post by chrischen »

MikeDelta wrote: post #294
chrischen wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow something similar happened to my business. A fly-by-night business launched under my trademark, bought Google search ads against my domain searches, copied verbatim content from my website including my terms of service which has my address and company name in it, and then also sent me a cease an desist on my own trademark to top it off. Despite such egregious infractions it's incredibly difficult to stop them bec…

Horrible. How did that end or is it still ongoing?

Not sure if these things can be permanently stopped as in this example the scam didn't even bother to implement a full app. Anyone can just launch something over the internet these days with just a .com domain.

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#298

Post by yoz-y »

parasubvert wrote: post #257
yoz-y wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I studied (france) a 2000€/month would leave me with about 1400€ after discouting housing, 3 meals a day and tuition fees. It's a ginormous amount of money for a student. Dunno about MBA out of school salaries but in tech in most of europe they are quite a lot lower than €90k. In France it's around 38-45k (pre-tax) depending on location (it can go upwards a bit if you are one of the chosen ones coming out of to…

Tuition in France is relatively low if you’re native, (which is one awesome feature of the French state)... if you’re an international student it’s a lot more, and other countries also are a lot more. University of Cambridge in the UK for example estimates on their webpage £22k tuition for an undergraduate arts degree (double for medicine!) and £11k living expenses annually. With GBP/WUR exchange rate that’s €1550 on…

I wasn’t French when I studied here. The tuition was still pretty low, roughly 800€ year including insurance afaik my school did not distinguish between local and foreign students. More known schools like ISEN or EPITA took roughly 5k€/year afaik but I may be wrong.

Granted, I didn’t go to a prestigious grande école, rather just a “pretty good” engineering school. Also business schools are indeed more expensive than technical degrees. Not to mention that Paris region is way more expensive than the rest of the country.

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#299

Post by spc476 »

fxtentacle wrote: post #31

FYI, in situations like this the best way is to: 1. Register your videos and images with the USCO. It'll cost 2. You can now file DMCA takedowns. Send one to Apple with the USCO registration ID and a copy of the image and a link to the app in question. 3. Apple will either immediately remove that fake app, or be liable for up to $350k in punitive damages for wilful infringement and lose all DMCA protection. 4. If App…

Yes, Apple can take the offending app down upon receiving a DMCA takedown. Then the offender can, depending on how profitable the app is, send in a counter-DMCA notice, forcing Apple to put the app back up in two weeks and now Apple is off the hook for infringing, and they're back to making money. Your only recourse is to sue to offending party (not Apple).

Re: Apple watch keyboard developer put off by app store scammers

#300

Post by nanidin »

cratermoon wrote: post #296
nanidin wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DMCA was created to allow websites like Youtube to exist without existential threat from rights holders due to users uploading content that they do not hold the rights to. Your view is Stallman-esque, but the world is not so clear cut in terms of good/evil. At best, I would say the abuse of the DMCA by large entities is an unintended consequence of the existence of the DMCA, and it could be patched up by lawmaker…

> existential threat from rights holders due to users uploading content that they do not hold the rights to Said threat only comes from big content owners, and they don't even bother to check if they have the rights to the content before issuing a DMCA challenge. A small-fry content owner doesn't have the resources to find copyright infringement, while big content providers simply scrape everything with automation an…

> A small-fry content owner doesn't have the resources to find copyright infringement

Again, DMCA works out in favor of the small-fry content owner who more than likely has the resources to find copyright infringement (Google searches are free), but that certainly doesn't have the resources to take every case of copyright violation to court for injunction or other remedy.

Pre-DMCA, if someone posted content that I created to a website, my main recourse would be to ask the website nicely to remove said content and hope they didn't immediately delete my request. I could try to sue the website for violating my copyright by distributing my content without my permission.

Post-DMCA, if someone posts content that I created to a website, I can file an un-ignorable DMCA complaint with the website, and there are defined timelines and processes that must be followed if the website does not want to take on liability for distributing my content.

It's unfortunate that big content owners abuse the system, but it's unfair to say that there are no benefits for small content owners.

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