In a recent article on Engadget.com, former Engadget editor-at-large and gdgt co-founder Ryan Block contributes his thoughts about Apple’s App Store, and how they can turn things around today, for the future of tomorrow.
Ryan Block lays out a heartfelt letter at Engadget.com, pretty much pleading with Apple Inc., to relinquish the hellish control they maintain over the applications sold in their App Store.
… Apple, if you’re having trouble getting buy-in from passionate developers with a serious creative vision for iPhone apps beyond the dozens of me-too calculators and to-do lists — and you know you are — the writing’s on the wall, and you’re the one who put it there.
But it’s not just about the draconian SDK agreement (which we’ll get to in a minute), or the uncertainty that runs through every developer — large and small — as they wonder whether you’ll will give the all-important thumbs-up to the app they’ve just invested all that blood / sweat / tears / money into (we’ll get to that, too). What seems to the rest of us like nefarious intent may simply be Apple coming to grips with its own successes by reacting with the same kneejerk response it plies to most everything else: control and micromanagement.
…kind of an unsettling conclusion we’re beginning to arrive at: not only are there no known hard and fast rules to abide by when writing a program for the App Store, there’s quite likely to a largely subjective smell-test for apps towards the end of the review process. It’s not just about playing by all the rules, it might also be a crap shoot — developers had better hope they get assigned an App Store reviewer who’s feeling generous that day.
So it seems to me, you have two possible courses of action to clean up this mess, Apple: one, the bare minimum of courtesy and respect for its developers, and the other, full-on-righteous. If absolutely nothing else, you need to post some very clear, very easily interpreted guidelines as to what will and will not fly in the App Store. No more mystery, no more concern as to whether the investment associated with developing a program will be for naught if some faceless App Store approval technician semi-arbitrarily decides to hit reject. Just lay it out for all to bear and follow. Sure, there will be a lot of hating going on when Apple says in explicit terms that Mozilla has zero hope of ever getting Firefox on the iPhone, but at least the crippling uncertainty is removed from the equation. You shouldn’t have to be one of the hallowed few approved by the iFund to be certain before you start work on your app that it will be approved.
Now, if you want to do the right thing — the thing that may ultimately keep you out of some grumpy developer’s class-action lawsuit, the thing that will take away Android’s biggest consumer appeal right now — you’ll will simply stop filtering apps based on content, and only look for the kind of code Steve specifically promised to protect users against in the first place: grossly buggy and broken, malicious, or otherwise evil. I’m not exactly convinced of the latter’s likelihood, but closed market or open, at a certain point this whole thing becomes about consistency and reliability, and right now you’ve got neither to wave in your defense, Apple.
Read - Full Column “Engadget Cares”
2 Comments to “Engadget’s Ryan Block: Come On Apple, The App Store’s In Serious Trouble”
“Engadget Cares”?? Really?? “Ryan Block lays out a heartfelt letter”
What a load of crap.
Ryan Block works for Microsoft. The “heartfelt” BS is propaganda.
Anti-iPhone propaganda, written to sustain the internet-wide
hate campaign being waged since the 3G intro.
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Definitely a MASSIVE LOAD OF SHITE !!!
HE SOLD OUT !!! ENGADGET might as well sell each post to an advertiser.
Either way, Ryan Block’s article has probably been read by a pretty massive amount of people. There’s no denying that his article is a lot of “bullsh*t” — but it god read either way, and some of his points… Are dead on.
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