Apple’s Head of Worldwide Marketing sat down with the New York Times earlier this week in order to shed some light on the reversal of their standing policy that culminated in over 5000 apps being removed from the store.

When pressed for specifics, Mr. Schiller followed with the following: 

It came to the point where we were getting customer complaints from women who found the content getting too degrading and objectionable, as well as parents who were upset with what their kids were able to see.

We obviously care about developers, but in the end have to put the needs of the kids and parents first. 

It seems as though Apple will not be apologizing to developers but rather will be taking the high ground with it’s customers and explain away its policy reversal as something that simply protects woman and children. He also made it quite clear that Apple has no intention of removing any app that might harm sales given the upcoming release of the iPad. When asked about a seemingly inconsistent policy that has, to date, not affected either Playboy or Sports Illustrated he simply said,

The difference is this is a well-known company with previously published material available broadly in a well-accepted format.

Hooray for the courage that Apple is showing defending its hypocrisy and blatant double standard. I could care less about not being able to download a jiggling boobs app, I just struggle with censorship in this day and age.

This is an article by The Apps Machine.

Apple’s recent purge of anything remotely sexual led to a single day removal of over 4000 apps, according to AppShopper.com. That’s right, 4000 apps in a single day, with a total to date well in excess of 5000. Generally speaking, the App Store is in the habit of removing around 100 apps each day. But the recent sex ban deleted about 3% of all apps in the App Store in less than 5 days.

This maelstrom of puritanical madness began with the removal of “Wobble iBoobs” developed by ChiliFresh. In a subsequent conversation with an Apple representative, the owner of ChiliFresh claims to have been told that the following are no longer acceptable in The App Store:

• “No images of women in bikinis”
• “No images of men in bikinis! “
• “No skin (he seriously said this) (I asked if a Burqa was OK, and the Apple guy got angry)”
• “No silhouettes that indicate that Wobble can be used for wobbling boobs (yes – I am serious, we have to remove the silhouette in this pic)”
• “No sexual connotations or innuendo in app titles: boobs, babes, booty, sex – all banned”
• “Nothing that can be sexually arousing!!
• “No apps will be approved that in any way imply sexual content”

If these are to be Apple’s policy,  it’ s easy to presume that this wholesale removal policy will see thousands more apps taken down from The Store.  Playboy surprisingly remains in The Store.  Double standard or oversight?  Time will tell.

This is a story by The Apps Machine.

Via Gigaom

This is an article by The Apps Machine.

One of the big story this month is Apple’s removal of over 1000 apps developed by the Chinese developer Molinker. They were banned for allegedly writing fake user reviews.  The news got a lot media coverage because the banned 1000 apps eliminate nearly 1% of the apps in the App Store.

Molinker’s alleged review fraud is uncovered by Patrick Timney and Glyn Evans of iPhoneography.com.  Now, Patrick Timney has once again discovered that those Molinker apps may sneaking their way back to the App Store by publishing it under another name, Shining Works.

Patrick was looking at an app call R&B. When he decided to check out the developer’s website, he found that its header clearly displayed Molinker logo.  It has Molinker copyright phrases at its footer too.  Molinker probably forgot to tell the web designer to modify their new Shining Works website. Patrick also checked out the site’s domain registration info.  As expected, the site has Mark Ma, the same registrant as Molinker’s website, as the registrant.

Looking at the App Store, Timney found 23 apps developed by Shining Works.  Shining Works has some firework apps.  But the newly released apps seemed to be those familiar photo apps.

Glyn Evans has emailed Phil Schiller, the person in charge of the App Store with these information.  So far, there has been no comment yet from Apple.  The ball is now in Apple’s court.  Will Apple ban Shining Works? Or will they let them come back under a different name?

Via iPhoneography

This is a app store news story by The Apps Machine

Just a few days ago, Apple announced that the App Store has reached a new milestone with over 85,000 apps available for download.  With so many apps to choose from, Apple really needs to focus on helping iPhone owners discover quality app that they need.  Apple has recently launched the Genius list for the App Store.  That adds a new breadth to the App Store, delivering app customization for each individual.   Now, to further aid users in integrating their iPhones and iPod Touch to everyday life, Apple has introduced an “Apps for Everything” section on their website.

“Apps for Everything” is similar to the “There’s an App for That” TV commercials for the iPhone.  However, instead of introducing 1 app for each function, “apps for everything” introduces  around 10 apps for each subject.  Currently, featured subjects and categories include apps for cooks, keeping current, the great outdoors, music, work, students, moms and dads, working out, going out, managing money, traveling, and the fun and games.

Looking at these categories, the “Apps for Everything” section seem to focus on the general demographics with their everyday lives.  It is a good start for folks just getting started on the iPhone.  But for the technophiles like you and me who dig twitter, IM, and social media, there’s a entire blogosphere that provide advanced app introduction and discovery.

It’s good to see that Apple is trying different ways to help iPhone and Touch users discovering apps that they may need to enhance their lives.  Hopefully the App Store app discovery process  will get easier as time passes.

This is a post from the App Machine

Apple has just announced that the App Store has hit two billion downloads.  Considering that the App Store has just been open for a little over a year, this is a tremendous accomplishment.  Steve Jobs himself stated that during the third quarter alone, 500 million apps has been downloaded, reinventing what a mobile device can do.

It is just in mid-July that Apple announced the milestone for 1.5 billion app downloads.  Now, just 2 months later, a new milestone is reached.  With such an explosive growth, the day that Apple will reach 3 billion, 5 billion, and even 10 billion app downloads may be sooner than you think.

Apple has also announced that there are now over 85 thousand apps in the App Store for 50 million iPhone and iPod touch users all over the world.  Although there are lots of apps, unfortunately, many of them are pretty much worthless or mimic the same function as other apps.  Luckily, Apple has introduced some new features in the latest 3.1 OS update to help discover and manage apps.  The Genius for apps should allow users to discover more useful apps and fun games based on user’s previous download history.  To search for all those apps, Apple’s better app organizing and search features should help users keep track of their large library of iPhone apps.

Apple should also celebrate that iPhone users buy more paid apps than Android apps.  Admob estimates that 1 out of 4 apps downloaded in the App Store has been paid.  Compare that to Android’s ratio of 1 out of 8 apps, the App Store is a success just continuing to get better!  Now can anyone guess which day the App store will hit 100,000 Apps available for download?

This is a post by The Apps Machine under iPhone Milestones