Apple has been receiving a fair amount of negative attention lately revolving around its obscure App Store approval process. Unfortunately, the pattern continues as Angelo DiNardi’s MailWrangler, has been rejected by Apple because it “duplicates the functionality of the built-in iPhone application Mail.”
On July 17th Angelo DiNardi submitted MailWrangler to Apple’s App Store, on August 29th he finally heard back:
This is particularly disturbing because the most recent applications that have been rejected by Apple, seem very useful. Podcaster was an application that set out “to allow users the ability to not only stream podcasts but also be able to download them to listen to at a later time. The die hard podcast listener would be able to to hear their favorite podcasts without having to be near their main iTunes computer.” But Apple didn’t let that one fly either.
DiNardi breaks down the entire MailWrangler scenario in a statement from his blog: So in July I wrote a small iPhone app called MailWrangler. Basically this app enabled a user to add their GMail accounts (standard and Google Apps For Your Domain) which they could load and switch between them quickly. It embedded Webkit in to the app and logged you in to the accounts automatically. Normally to check multiple Gmail accounts in mobile Safari you would have to log in and out of all of the accounts, typing the username and password for each. Using just the Apple Mail application you aren’t able to see threaded views, your google contacts, archive (quickly), star, etc without going through the hassles that are present when using Gmail’s IMAP on the iPhone. There’s a similar app for the Mac desktop called MailPlane.
MailPlane is a great application, I use it and I love it. Gmail in a browser just isn’t the same, and never will be. MailWrangler seems like it could have delivered a lot of useful functionality that many users are looking for. Perhaps Apple didn’t want to see it’s Mail.app outdone, or maybe they are just stealing the ideas DiNardi developed into MailWrangler and we’ll see it in their Mail.app soon.
DiNardi sums up his experience saying: The number of shitty apps in the store is off the charts and yet mine that actually works is getting blocked. Oh right, deal with Apple’s messy bureaucracy. I guess I should just write another flashlight or glowstick application to actually get published. That’s the only apps Apple seems to want in the store.
We feel for DiNardi, and are genuinely aggravated that Apple isn’t putting a little more effort into shedding light onto its developer community. By releasing the iPhone SDK, Apple made a choice to open up the lines of communication. Every development project takes a great deal of communication, and the longer Apple stalls on making its approval process transparent, the worse it will get.
The iPhone is undoubtedly the most powerful mobile phone on the planet. And the App Store has already been proven to bring in solid revenue. But the developer community surrounding the device is growing bitter. Yes, the end user experience on the device is well beyond any of its competition, but what about the developer experience? DiNardi explains that it took 6 weeks for Apple to respond to his application submission, finally telling him that MailWrangler was rejected. This is 6 weeks spent twiddling his thumbs while, plus however long it took for him to develop the app, for nothing.
Apple needs to open up its lines of communications with developers. We don’t want to see development for the best mobile platform go downhill because of Apple’s tight lipped nature. The App Store application approval process needs to be defined in a clear set of rules, definitions and scenarios. And a responsive department needs to be placed in response to the entire community. The turnaround time should be 3-5 days per email, at the most (when mid-development and waiting for a response, 12 hours can seem like a lifetime). This may cost a little more money and require Apple to hire a few more employees. But some money and seemingly minimal resources like dusting off an old third floor office in Cupertino, would surely be worth a thriving developer community, and a human element to the App Store. Come on Apple, turn this around.
One Comment to “Apple Probably Stealing The Idea, Rejects MailWrangler From The App Store”
Exactly. More and more cases of rejected apps, because the “duplicate” Apple apps. What’s that? Developers get screwed for their hard work. On this point, Google already made s statement: Anyone can sell his software on their marketplace. Nice posting, and so true.
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