I went for 10 days of “disconnected” vacation and when I returned I found some really unwelcome news.
One is that Photoshelter Collection is being immediatelly discontinued — for reasons that leave me with 0% faith that those people are worth investing any time and effort, for any product. I guess I can count myself lucky I spent two nights total in uploading my photos.
The other, seriously worrying piece of news is Apple’s rejection of an iPhone application because it duplicates the feature already present in their desktop application. If this is not mistake by some approval editor, it’s utterly despicable. As I’m working on my own iPhone app (first of several planned) it sends a chill of uncertainty down my spine.
Fraser Speirs, John Gruber, Harry McCracken, Paul Kafasis, Dave Winer have more.
Things were much more rosy before the vacation. :(
Well, not sure why you are so surprised?
Apple is far worse monopolist than Microsoft was ever been — they want complete and utterly control both of hardware and software side of their business.
Having fact that developers are very small percentage of their user / customer base, I do not believe that they soon loosen up control of this kind — they do not have real reason to do so.
Feature duplication with a desktop app can’t be the reason they pulled it, it wouldn’t make much sense.
There’s also this take by Daniel Eran Dilger, which defends Apple’s action.
I’m obviously against this practice, but there’s one thing that particularly irks me here. One advise given is to ask for prior approval if you are unsure. However, in my recent experience with Apple, there is absolutely no guarantee when and if you will be answered.
I sent an official request (for the company which is quite large) for clarification on some items and 20 days later there’s nothing coming back. Silence.
I really wonder how much anyone can wait if each emai requires so much time to be answered.