It’s been a hell of a rough week for the iPhone App Store; at least in terms of image and PR amongst the developer community. We’ve seen two very high profile developers abandon their development efforts for the iPhone OS platform – first Joe Hewitt, who was previously the lead developer of Facebook’s iPhone app, and then Rogue Amoeba, well known and respected software publishers for Mac OS X and the iPhone.
Both have heavily criticized the App Store reviews process and cited it as a reason for turning their back on the iPhone OS platform – and have also argued strongly for developers to be given the ability to get apps into the store without any need for Apple’s approval.
Here are some of the thoughts of Paul Kafasis at Rogue Amoeba on this:
In the future, we hope that developers will be allowed to ship software without needing Apple’s approval at all, the same way we do on Mac OS X. We hope the App Store will get better, review times will be shorter, reviews will be more intelligent, and that we can all focus on making great software. Right now, however, the platform is a mess.
The chorus of disenchanted developers is growing and we’re adding our voices as well. Rogue Amoeba no longer has any plans for additional iPhone applications, and updates to our existing iPhone applications will likely be rare. The iPhone platform had great promise, but that promise is not enough, so we’re focusing on the Mac.
Joe Hewittt also supports the idea of completely removing the need for Apple approval:
I have only one major complaint with the App Store, and I can state it quite simply: the review process needs to be eliminated completely.
As much as I find a lot of the App Store reviews process ridiculous and frustrating at times (even frequently of late), I don’t feel as if entirely scrapping the process is a good idea. I tend to agree with a lot of what Joshua Schnell has written on this in his recent post titled ‘The AppStore isn’t perfect, but it’s better than an open one’.
Here’s a little bit of Joshua’s thinking on what the review process should and should not be:
Before everyone gets their panties in a bunch, my thoughts, and subsequent rant here has nothing to do with me advocating an application gate keeper. Apple should not, under any circumstance determine whose applications get published and whose gets tossed on the scrap heap. They should however be able to vet out applications that break the device. If they can expedite their current process, and eliminate developers concerns about the time it’s taking to carry out that process, then I’m all for a closed system.
I think, as Joshua was getting at, that if Apple could restrict their review process to solely looking at the ‘soundness of the code’ sort of area – that would make a lot more sense to me. In other words, keep their decisions to fairly black and white areas – does the code risk crashing other apps / hanging up the OS?, does it compromise security? and similar. Not venturing into any of the grey areas beyond that. I think that would represent a sensible level of ‘gatekeeping’ for the App Store.
I have a feeling some might question the idea that I’m arguing in favor of vetting by Apple while being jailbroken and running jailbreak apps. That’s a fair question – but I would respond that:
- I do not recommend jailbreak for all levels of users, and I consider myself an experienced and tech-savvy user.
- The %age of jailbreak apps I run is tiny in comparison to App Store apps – considerably less than 10%. So I feel that the level of risk to the stability / security / performance of my iPhone from jailbreak apps is reduced to an acceptable level (for me) by my fairly cautious approach.
Anyway, the bottom line for me right now is that as a user I would not like to see the App Store reviews process scrapped. I would absolutely like to see it improved – a great deal – but not done away with completely.
What about you all? Do you think the process should be killed off entirely? Should all apps be allowed in and reported / policed / managed later on?
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
{ 3 trackbacks }
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
I say scrap the entire review process… There should be testing to make sure the apps work on the iPhone & that's basically it!!! I did manage to get my hands on Droid over the weekend & play around with it. It is really a solid phone & some of stuff is great like the notification system. I tend to buy a phone that fits my needs, & I am telling you the Droid is getting there. The browser needs some help & I love having my IPod all in one with my phone. I have been using Google Voice for a while now and I just love the functionality. I am one of those people still pissed about Apple rejecting Google Voice and I am finding myself more & more liking this Droid phone & what Google is doing with their OS. I also love the Google Navigation for FREE!!! So basically to sum my rant up, Apple needs to start doing things to keep me using my iPhone on AT&T. I need more openness & a better app approval process. Apple, give me Google Voice!!!
Sorry, I have to disagree. Do not scrap the whole review process. Do a quality check and a legal check and beyond that, don't block anything.
My iPhone is jailbroken so I have Google Voice (not that I really use the app… I don't want to fire up and app every time I want to make a phone call) and Google Navigation is coming to the iPhone eventually. (or so I've heard).
Does Apple need to be more open? Yes. Part of what makes the iPhone a winner is the fact that it is a closed system. Developers can spend their time on the app itself without having to spend time making their app compatible for 20 different hardware setups, with 20 different screen sizes.
It's good that some developers are taking a stand though, let's just hope Apple listens.
I totally agree with you. The AppStore Review MUST be improved, not scrapped
Are you disagreeing with me / what was said in the post, or with Frank's comment above? I think it's the latter, but not positive.
With Frank. I think there still needs to be a review, but a very limited one.
Thought so – thanks for clarifying.
Hi
Both arguments are correct on their way . Apple should have authority of testing and approving the apps but at the same time they should also give some kind of freedom to developers.
mobilechamps.
The problem is not so much the approval process as it is in the crap that is in the store. I realize this may not be politically correct to assert but there is a lot of pure junk applications…one need only to read the reviews on many of these …need more useful apps….navigation is one of them…some programs that have real value in terms of its usefulness to the owners of the phone…get the junk out…
I think just about everyone would agree that there's tons of crap apps in the store, and I don't see any lack of correctness of any kind in saying so. Not sure that's something that can ever be 'dealt with' in any constructive way though,as it's always going to be so subjective as to what is and what is not worthy of being there.
I don't know if it could work, but maybe apple should make a large selection of all the apps and pick only the best in every category, so the app store would be limited but crapless. Then, it should be possible to install apps that aren't in the store, like android is actually doing.
Yikes. Why on earth would we want Apple making another set of subjective judgements in order to choose 'the best' apps? Seriously that is absolutely not the direction I'd like to see things go. I want them less involved – much less – in any area beyond safety / soundness of code.
Yeah i know it sounds stupid, but that's exactly what i need right now. I'm tired of spending hours to read iphone blogs or browsing the top whatever just to see if some cute app is released. And useful apps are becoming rare as gold. I don't wanna waste my time anymore.
In short: too much crap. iphone is becoming the new Windows, lot of crap and ultra-rare gems
I just think we would be better off to do away with the review process. I think there should be TESTING to make sure the app is compatible & will actually function. Other than that I would do away with these CRAZY guidelines for approving apps in the store. There are just too many great apps being rejected for no good reason. For instance, Google Voice, Apple claims it duplicates the Phone App functionality & it will confuse people. This is ridiculous considering there are numerous apps in the store right now which do just that, example Vonage. I know Vonage is not the same as Google Voice but they both have a phone dialer function in their apps…One got approved & one did not. There are numerous accounts of this happening everyday & I am getting tired of it. So Apple lock some smart people in a room & figure this crap out, sooner rather than later……..
I might be misunderstanding, but I think you're saying roughly the same as Joshua Schnell argues and that I agree with as said in the post. Whether you call it testing or review process, there is vetting being done as to whether code is safe / sound, and no further 'gatekeeping' beyond that. Is that right, or am I missing what you're getting at?
Yes, that is correct….I must have missed Josh's comment when reading it. Nice article Patrick, this is a problem that needs to be solved soon. Sorry to switch the topic, but you guys need to review the "Call of Duty: World at War: Zombies", which was released today. It has multiplayer!!!
You must log in to post a comment.