Live data from Hacker News

A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

sreegs.tumblr.com

71–80 of 165 posts

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#71
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They will go to the search bar and type in “milf” or “butts” (I wish I were joking). They’ll try to search for drugs on your marketplace. I don’t understand why you think that’s dumb. This is what people who download the app will do, so they’re trying out real scenarios that will happen. They don’t want to have there be a segment on the nightly news saying, “App Store Full of Porn!” Which is what will happen in the…

Why not just stick on an NSFW warning and restrict downloads for minors, and maybe treat your adult users as adults?

13-18 is a major spender age category. I'd really like to say a breakdown but I think most of app store revenue comes from games.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#72

> In the case of Tumblr, this would be a reviewer going to search, typing in something like 'tits’ and finding porn. Just want to emphasize this part. App Store Reviewers are completely asinine. Like, dumb as a rock. It’d almost be funny if their stupidity didn’t block your app approval. To be explicitly clear: if your app contains UGC, they will explicitly go and search for things to ding you on, and then fault you…

> App Store Reviewers are completely asinine I recently had an interaction with a food delivery customer care executive (many like this; of other businesses as well) and the kind of conversation I had with them it seemed to me that someone must have flattened the brain matter with a rock before stuffing it back inside their skulls. Then it dawned upon me. Nope. They just are as much a victim of these huge corps and t…

At this point it's really better to automatize support. They can't do anything a policy rule-based bot couldn't do.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#73

It's appalling to me that iOS developers still exist after all the hoops you have to jump through to get an iOS app out. I'm a web developer that got roped into developing and then publishing a react native app for android and iOS. The android process was relatively painless compared to the crap Apple has you do. For starters, you can't even produce an app build without running on iOS, so the company had to procure a…

[deleted]

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#74
post #10

so true. we submitted an app that had “Sign In With Apple” in a localized version. One reviewer rejected saying it should be “Continuar com a Apple”, we submitted and, on a later review, reviewer rejected saying it should be “Conectar com Apple” which it already was the first time. That is extremely frustrating and arbitrary.

Well, the Sign in/Sign up with apple button automatically does the localisation. My guess is that you designed your own button and used your own localisation for Portuguese. On the first instance you found a Portuguese reviewer, and on the second a Brazilian.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#76

> In the case of Tumblr, this would be a reviewer going to search, typing in something like 'tits’ and finding porn. Just want to emphasize this part. App Store Reviewers are completely asinine. Like, dumb as a rock. It’d almost be funny if their stupidity didn’t block your app approval. To be explicitly clear: if your app contains UGC, they will explicitly go and search for things to ding you on, and then fault you…

> They will go to the search bar and type in “milf” or “butts” (I wish I were joking). They’ll try to search for drugs on your marketplace. If your app runs scripts, they’ll try downloading something and then yell at you for letting them do it

This is all just fictional garbage, which you totally made-up.

I’ve been through hundreds of app reviews, and if a problem is ever found (rarely) the reviews are always polite, and carefully worded, erring on the cautious, and with absolutely zero chance that anyone from Apple is ever “yelling”.

Incredibly sad indictment of HN that these glaring untruths are given any credence at all.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do Reddit and Twitter pass the App Store review process? I'm pretty sure you can trivially find porn by searching for it.

Can you? Reddit makes you change a setting, save it, reload the page, uncheck a couple more settings, save, before you can see adult content these days. per-account quick test logged out: search "butts" -> no nsfw results on first page search "tits" -> a couple unlabeled nsfw posts (against reddit rules.)

It is enough to search for a pornstar's name to find porn in the Reddit app. This works even if you don't have an account and NSFW content is disabled. While it's not as "simple" as a porn keyword, it is almost certain people do this. Reddit relies on people tagging their content as NSFW, but of course this is not something they can enforce 100%. And once you find an account posting NSFW, you can access all their NSFW posts even if they were made on subreddits that are hidden to you if you search for them explicitly in the search bar.

By the way, when I typed the actress' first name, I was already being suggested a subreddit dedicated to sharing nude pictures of another woman with the same name. Again, I used the app as it comes straight out of the App Store without logging in or changing anything.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#78
Interesting article, basically it boils down to "if your business model requires you to have an App in an App Store, your decades worth of work are at the whim of Big Tech". Same with Google banning accounts etc.

Divesting from Big Tech is the only solution. Don't write Apps, don't use AWS, etc.

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#79

> In the case of Tumblr, this would be a reviewer going to search, typing in something like 'tits’ and finding porn. Just want to emphasize this part. App Store Reviewers are completely asinine. Like, dumb as a rock. It’d almost be funny if their stupidity didn’t block your app approval. To be explicitly clear: if your app contains UGC, they will explicitly go and search for things to ding you on, and then fault you…

> They will go to the search bar and type in “milf” or “butts” (I wish I were joking). They’ll try to search for drugs on your marketplace. If your app runs scripts, they’ll try downloading something and then yell at you for letting them do it This is all just fictional garbage, which you totally made-up. I’ve been through hundreds of app reviews, and if a problem is ever found (rarely) the reviews are always polite,…

op mentions it largely happens for UGC content apps

so no surprise you haven't found any such reviews if you're doing completely different apps

Re: A Tumblr developer on the App Store approval process

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They will go to the search bar and type in “milf” or “butts” (I wish I were joking). They’ll try to search for drugs on your marketplace. I don’t understand why you think that’s dumb. This is what people who download the app will do, so they’re trying out real scenarios that will happen. They don’t want to have there be a segment on the nightly news saying, “App Store Full of Porn!” Which is what will happen in the…

That doesn't make sense to me. The iPhone comes with a web browser. If a user wants milfs and butts they can put that in the address bar.

> The iPhone comes with a web browser.

The iPhone comes with a web browser that has parental controls. A parent can have some degree of control over what their kids see when they use Safari. A parent does not have that choice with typical applications.

Post reply on HN