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The Apple Reaper

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Re: The Apple Reaper

#61

Post by spaghetti »

Steko wrote: post #49
spaghetti wrote: post #35

Honest question: why hasn't Apple fixed this fucking stupid review process? They have the resources to pay cheap reviewers who are probably better than this guy. I'm sure college kids with no job prospects would jump to "work at Apple" even if it's making $10/hour reviewing apps. Why not allow all apps into the store as long as they pass some security checks done by Apple (no downloading executables etc)? The current…

"why hasn't Apple fixed this fucking stupid review process?" Are you asking why it's not perfect? That's an impossible standard. In general app approval seems significantly ahead of where it was in past years. "They have the resources to pay cheap reviewers who are probably better than this guy." I'm going to go out on a limb and say that most large businesses have the resources to hire people better than their worst…

There's a difference between legit apps being rejected for silly reasons and spam, hate etc apps. You're right it's probably appropriate for Apple to draw some line when it comes to those apps. However my frustration comes from totally legitimate apps being rejected for non-sense reasons.

I don't expect the review process to be perfect. I'm just curious why Apple hasn't improved it beyond it's dismal state in the last four years.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#62

Post by spaghetti »

ghshephard wrote: post #56
spaghetti wrote: post #35

Honest question: why hasn't Apple fixed this fucking stupid review process? They have the resources to pay cheap reviewers who are probably better than this guy. I'm sure college kids with no job prospects would jump to "work at Apple" even if it's making $10/hour reviewing apps. Why not allow all apps into the store as long as they pass some security checks done by Apple (no downloading executables etc)? The current…

Easy answer, spaghetti; Apple didn't build their review process for developers first, they built it for their users and Apple Inc (not necessarily in that order). As a developer, I want free and easy access to the App store to upload my apps. As a user, I want a selection of the safest, highest quality, predictable and elegantly design applications. Apple Inc, as a for profitable organization, wants to ensure that th…

It's interesting to think about in terms of a rational profit-maximizing-response. Perhaps rejecting apps for silly reasons is Apple's way of trying to get rid of apps they deem crappy. This is only a problem when they label something crappy but users would enjoy quite a lot. But it might be a problem that's too small to care about when it comes to a rational response.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#63

Post by biot »

robryan wrote: post #21

I understand stripe and square if you aren't part of the SV echo chamber, but PayPal? Where does Apple find these reviewers?

There's a big difference between "I haven't heard of the PayPal app" and "I haven't heard of PayPal". I presume that when discussing reviewing apps with an app reviewer, it's not a stretch to assume that the app reviewer thinks in terms of apps.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#64

Post by eridius »

spaghetti wrote: post #40
eridius wrote: post #11

There's an app review board. I'm not sure of the exact procedure for getting in contact with them, but it's basically the procedure for appealing a rejection like this. I think there's an email address somewhere in the developer portal. Edit: This trend of running straight to social news sites (e.g. HN) whenever something goes wrong is very strange. There are processes in place for dealing with this problem, processe…

In my experience the appeal board are just as stupid as the reviewer cited in the post. It was like my app was evaluated by a random different reviewer. Something is strange about the whole app review process. It's been problematic for years. Apple could fix it if they had the incentive. IMO they do have an incentive (more developers, more sales etc) but something else is preventing the process from improving. Lately…

Are you actually complaining that the reviewer was performing some QA-like functionality? That's surprising. You may also be misinterpreting. Quickly going through an entire app (which is what I'd expect a reviewer [who's actually testing the app] to do) is necessarily going to involve lots of really quick pushes and pops of VCs and swipes and whatnot. So no, I don't think the reviewer was trying to find some pretext to reject you. That doesn't even make sense. Why would a reviewer need that?

Re: The Apple Reaper

#65

Post by jrochkind1 »

The REALLY weird thing is that "cross platform exemption."

This guy was NOT doing what that section of the ToS was meant to prohibit. But let's say someone else had an app that really was, that was doing in-app purchases without giving apple their 30% vigorish.... all you have to do is make it for Android too, and Apple will let you?

Really?

Does this really work?

Re: The Apple Reaper

#66

Post by ryannielsen »

cooldeal wrote: post #33

Well, I am just glad that Android, Windows Phone and Windows 8 store apps don't have this stupid restriction if you don't use their payment systems. Walled garden and 30% forced cut of app sales is one thing, but a forced 30% cut of every in-app sale is like erecting a toll booth on all apps. Gruber's explanation of "Apple does it because it can, and the people complaining are just jealous that Apple can and they can…

This is one of the reasons that Apple is dragging its feet on making HTML5 web apps work on par with native apps, despite Jobs' anti-Flash memo two and a half years ago.

Is it? I instead suspect it's because making HTML 5 web apps work on par with native apps would require Apple to build out dozens (if not hundreds) of new, platform-specific extensions and APIs that would bring the web stack on par with Cocoa Touch. It's going to be some time before we see HTML 5 web apps that are truly on par with native apps.

And before citing WebOS, note that they added dozens of new, platform-specific extensions and APIs to make apps running on their stack as feature rich and responsive as apps on other platforms. I don't consider WebOS apps to be "web apps", as they only work on their platform.

I also note that Apple has one of the best mobile web stacks out there. I'd say they're only bested by Chrome for Android, and not by much. That's not a sign of a company that's dragging their feet on HTML5 support.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#67

Post by gsibble »

thechut wrote: post #25

I don't understand how it is possible that Stripe is not allowed to have this functionality but Square is. Certainly Square does not give 30% to Apple for every swipe. The cross-platform bit is interesting though. This should send a clear message to developers that they should go with ANDROID FIRST.

The rule doesn't apply to either. It specifically refers to in app content and features. Accepting a credit card for a good that is not "in app" (ie. a physical good like coffee or a virtual good like consulting) is perfectly acceptable under the rules. The reviewer in this case is just being retarded.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#68

Post by gsibble »

dlokshin wrote: post #55

Wait, so if I build something on Android and iPhone, I don't have to use Apple's in app purchase? I can use Stripe directly? Am I understanding this correctly?

You can use anything you want if you are not selling in app items. Think Fandango. You are buying movie tickets. Do they use Apple's in-app purchase? Heck no. But a game with virtual goods is required to.

That's the distinction.

Re: The Apple Reaper

#69

Post by johnbender »

cooldeal wrote: post #33

Well, I am just glad that Android, Windows Phone and Windows 8 store apps don't have this stupid restriction if you don't use their payment systems. Walled garden and 30% forced cut of app sales is one thing, but a forced 30% cut of every in-app sale is like erecting a toll booth on all apps. Gruber's explanation of "Apple does it because it can, and the people complaining are just jealous that Apple can and they can…

As someone who's spent the better part of the last two years building a framework for mobile applications (jQuery Mobile) with the primary purpose of supporting as many platforms as possible I can tell you that mobile safari is hands down the best mobile browser out there today.

You could make the case that Apple's patent threats around the touch event spec are holding things back (not having a standard here is making a nightmare out of handling both click and touch events) or that turning off Nitro for the UIWebView control are a detriment to HTML "apps" but ultimately Android's browser is actually the biggest hindrance to HTML as a competitor.

I'm not an Apple fan (I don't buy their products for other reasons) but mobile safari blows every other mobile browser out of the water in terms of having sane implementations of HTML5 features and performance (css or otherwise).

Re: The Apple Reaper

#70

Post by krichman »

cooldeal wrote: post #33

Well, I am just glad that Android, Windows Phone and Windows 8 store apps don't have this stupid restriction if you don't use their payment systems. Walled garden and 30% forced cut of app sales is one thing, but a forced 30% cut of every in-app sale is like erecting a toll booth on all apps. Gruber's explanation of "Apple does it because it can, and the people complaining are just jealous that Apple can and they can…

I was very excited about Apple for about a decade now, but this walled garden is really getting to me. I doubt I'll be buying any new Apple hardware in the future, and I'll pivot to developing for the web instead of making apps as soon as I can.
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