Apple fanboy gutted
A self
confessed “Apple Fanboy” said he is gutted by the fact that Steve Jobs has
yanked his Google Voice related software from its App Store.
Kevin Duerr, the
chief executive of Riverturn, said he was “knocked to the core" when an
Apple representative told him that his application that let iPhone users log
in to the Google Voice service, had been removed from the App Store. The
reason was that Steve felt that VoiceCentral "duplicated features of the
iPhone" and refused to tell him what his developers could change to meet
Apple's requirements. In fact he would not even tell Duerr what features of
the app were duplicates.
VoiceCentral was approved by Apple for the App
Store in late April, and although it had not sold in large numbers, sales
had been on an upswing in the last few weeks, Duerr said. For some reason
Duerr believed that if he got through to someone in Apple, the outfit would
“actually talk to him”. A typical fanboy he believed that the company was
actually reasonable. Er, no it isn't. And no they have not returned his
calls.
Apple makes a fortune on the back of iPhone developers who flog stuff
through their App store. However it does have a problem in thinking that
they are fanboys who will do what they are told rather than people who
are out to make a bit of cash. In his blog Duerr said he knew it was
Apple, and they love their shroud of secrecy, but he didn't understand it in
this line of business.
"What's the harm in telling developers why an app has
been rejected or pulled from the App Store? Other than the volume of apps
that are submitted, I don't see the problem with taking action.”
He now
says that the iPhone platform is probably not worth supporting. It would be
difficult for him to authorise spending money on iPhone development when it
can be yanked on the whim of Apple with no explanation. To make matters
worse, Apple is now giving refunds to people who bought the software because
not it does not work. The software does work but Apple has yanked it.
Not
surprisingly Apple is saying nothing about Duerr's claims.