On Rogue Amoeba’s App Store Debacle

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First some background from the software developer Rogue Amoeba:

Our problems began back in July, when we first submitted this bug fix for Airfoil Speakers Touch to the App Store. While we generally disliked the restrictiveness of the review process, we’d never had any direct problems with it. Further, this was a mere bug fix – it just improved the way audio was received. It was functionally identical to the already-approved version 1.0.0. As such, we expected to have this update available by the end of July or early August.

Not. even. close. Today, over three and a half months after we initially submitted our bug fix update for review, it’s finally available.

[…]

After our first submission back in July, Airfoil Speakers Touch was rejected, for using “Apple Logo and Apple-owned Graphic Symbols”.

Since there are no updates in the App Store, each “update” is reviewed as a new application. In Rogue Amoeba’s case, the update was critical, as they had shipped the previous version with some bugs. Which of course, is their fault.

That be as it may, the new version of their app was rejected because the company has included images of Apple products, which is strictly forbidden by the iPhone SDK:

You may not use the Apple Logo or any other Apple-owned graphic symbol, logo, or icon on or in connection with web sites, products, packaging, manuals, promotional/advertising materials, or for any other purpose except pursuant to an express written trademark license from Apple, such as a reseller agreement.

The developer was in clear violation of this rule, but Apple approved the app the first time without raising the issue. But when approving the updated version, Apple raised the red flag.

This isn’t a new thing — Apple has been known to enforce this rule in the past. Most recently, with Macworld’s Superguide iPhone app, which included the name “iPhone” in it’s title.

But the Macworld app was a brand-new app. It hadn’t been approved before, so it was a far easier rejection to swallow.

The case of Convertbot is very similar to Airfoil Speakers Touch — the app already existed, and was rejected for something that had been there all along. To reject an app for some artwork that hasn’t been changed from what already is available to the public on the App Store is just bad form.

And that’s what the problem is. I have no problem with Apple rejecting an app when it violates a clear standard put forth in the SDK agreement when the app is new. But Apple has to put some system in place to review updated versions of apps quicker — meaning they only review what the developer submits as being changes. Rogue Amoeba’s case took 3 months to resolve. That’s horrible.

St. Jude Shirts For Pre-Order

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Dear Readers —

Several of you have reached out with support for my family since we discovered our son Josiah has brain cancer. He continues to do well at St. Jude, but we wanted to do something to give back.

So we partnered with a very talented local designer and are now selling t-shirts. These shirts are the official “Go J Go” St. Jude marathon team shirts, but we have plenty for sale to the public. All the proceeds go to St. Jude in Josiah’s honor. You can read more, see the artwork and order by clicking here. Thanks again.

The Memphis Flyer Looks Back

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The Flyer — Memphis’ top alternative newspaper — turns 20 this week. Editor Tim Sampson looks back at a lost age of journalism:

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. It was the freakin’ weirdest of times. They were fun times and they were stressful times. It was two decades ago, and we were starting this strange little newspaper called the Memphis Flyer. I was the first editor and in my 20s (for a very short time) and weighed about 50 pounds less than I do now. We didn’t have e-mail, the World Wide Web, spell-check, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, or even cell phones, but, by damn, we could — and did — smoke at our desks, and sometimes it was more than mere tobacco. We were out to change the world or, at least, Memphis. All two-and-a-half of us on the editorial staff who were putting the paper out each week. And we were nuts. Not as nuts, though, as many of the people who took to our little paper and thought that they had finally found the Holy Grail of alternative news reporting and opinion. But more about that later.

Intel to Settle in Antitrust Case

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The NY Times:

Trying to resolve a longstanding legal case, the chip maker Intel agreed on Thursday to pay its rival, Advanced Micro Devices, $1.25 billion to settle antitrust and patent disputes.

The settlement will resolve a case pending in Federal District Court in Delaware and two in Japan. In addition, A.M.D. said it will withdraw all of its regulatory complaints worldwide.

In the antitrust complaint filed in 2005 in Delaware, A.M.D. contended that Intel had bullied dozens of computer makers, retailers and distributors by threatening to retaliate against them if they did business with A.M.D. The complaint also accused Intel of using improper tactics, like discriminatory rebates and subsidies to win and keep customers.

Ouch.

‘Great Overall Package’

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Prince McLean at AppleInsider:

The latest iMacs deliver a significant performance boost, better specs overall and much greater RAM expansion. Along with its capability to act as a DisplayPort monitor, the new model and its incredible widescreen display delivers a great overall package at a new lower price. It’s also great to see Apple offering RAM upgrades at prices that aren’t simply absurdly unreasonable.

The iMac’s glossy screen will not appeal to some users, but the display looks amazing, and is a significant jump up in quality compared to last year’s iMacs. If you’re in the market for a new iMac, the new model makes a great, well rounded upgrade. If you’re considering a new large display, you might even be tempted to get the iMac just for that, and leave it running in the background as a server or distributed processing node. The only possible downside might be if the noises we heard are typical and not something that can be addressed by AppleCare or a software update.

Users wanting to add their own RAM have four slots to work with, but anyone hoping to add another hard drive must watch out for the new vendor-specific temperature sensors, an issue that we didn’t see mentioned anywhere on Apple’s site. Overall, the new big screen iMac promises to be a popular addition to Apple’s lineup, and deliver a great performance to dollar ratio.

After playing with one at our local Apple Store, all I can say is holy cow. It’s a very nice machine, all the way around.

Writing as a Transaction

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Steven Pressfield:

When you understand that nobody wants to read your shit, your mind becomes powerfully concentrated. You begin to understand that writing/reading is, above all, a transaction. The reader donates his time and attention, which are supremely valuable commodities. In return, you the writer, must give him something worthy of his gift to you.

In a world where we all carry Internet-connected phones in our pockets, this is even more true.

Prominent iPhone Developer Leaves the Platform

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Joe Hewitt — one of the lead guys on Facebook’s iPhone app — in a letter to Tech Crunch:

My decision to stop iPhone development has had everything to do with Apple’s policies. I respect their right to manage their platform however they want, however I am philosophically opposed to the existence of their review process. I am very concerned that they are setting a horrible precedent for other software platforms, and soon gatekeepers will start infesting the lives of every software developer.

The web is still unrestricted and free, and so I am returning to my roots as a web developer. In the long term, I would like to be able to say that I helped to make the web the best mobile platform available, rather than being part of the transition to a world where every developer must go through a middleman to get their software in the hands of users.

On the Bottom Line

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TechCrunch:

While the press and rivals obsess over market share, Apple quietly comes in and makes an insane amount of money. It’s the same in the computer industry. Small market share, huge amount of money. The most important thing for all of these are companies is the bottom line. Apple wins that battle.

According to the report, Apple made $1.6 billion in operating profit off of the iPhone in Q3. Nokia, meanwhile, made $1.1 billion. Let’s put this in perspective. Recent numbers suggest Nokia controls roughly 35% of the worldwide handset market. Apple? About 2.5%.

Not 25%. Two point five percent.

Bing Gets Wolfram Alpha into Bed

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IDG News Service:

On perhaps the more complex end, users can type in complicated math equations or even ask Bing to display a graph plotting an equation and get results.

More practical applications perhaps for a wider audience include answers to questions like which fruit, an orange or a kiwi, has more vitamins. Searching for a food item on Bing will return a nutrition facts label, much like the one attached to most food products, that summarizes the information.

The deal with Wolfram Alpha will also power a new body-mass-index tool in Bing. If a user searches for “BMI,” a box will ask the user to enter height and weight. Clicking “calculate” will deliver a BMI analysis.

For what it’s worth, Bing has been my homepage for about a week now.

Snow Leopard Update Kills Atom Support

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Reuters:

It shouldn’t be long before some clever hacker figures out a workaround and releases a patched kernel to the world, re-enabling the OS on Atom based computers. But that’s not the story. The bigger message is that Apple has finally stopped ignoring the incessant buzz of the hobby-hacking, Mac netbook scene and instead pulled out a fly-swat and dealt it a whack. The war is officially on.

And ironically, this will only hit the hobbyists and tinkerers. Psystar, that other flea in Apple’s ear, is unaffected, as the fake Macs it sells do not use the Atom chip.

It surprises me that Apple is just getting around to doing this now.

Wired Reviews the 13-inch MacBook Pro

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Christopher Null:

The littlest MacBook Pro finally gets all the features of its larger brethren, making it pound for pound one of the most impressive laptops on the market today. For starters, the aluminum unibody construction is solid to an extreme: There’s no wiggle or shimmy when you lift up this laptop. It’s a high-tech brick that, if you gathered enough of, you could probably pave your driveway with.

I couldn’t agree more. From my review of the machine back in August:

This notebook is the sturdiest I’ve ever used. The whole thing feels like one, solid chunk of awesome. Apple’s unibody construction makes the black MacBook I was using feel like a toy. Since there aren’t any seams on the top case, the edges and corners are very slick. The PowerBooks and MacBook Pros used to have rubber gasket around the edges which could chip and bend. Nothing like that here — the whole thing is one slab of metal.