Ok, Apple Not Stupid – They Have Just Turned Into “The Man”

9 Sep

Wow, I got a lot of feedback yesterday.  Protip: don’t call Apple stupid in the title of your blog post if you want Apple fans to read the content of your post!  I got some really thoughtful comments which I’ll go over here, but I got a lot more email that, if there were Cliff’s Notes, would read something like, “no your [sic] stupid.”

bud says:

I’m sure apples boilerplate rejection has nothing to do with the apps rejection.

It is pretty obvious why they would reject it; to prevent hooks from websites into the iphone; potentially malicious hooks.

Isn’t this obvious? If it is not obvious, you are disingenuous.

Yes, I agree – most likely Apple is not ignorant of the implications of Big5 and phonegap projects!  There is a small chance that the review team at Apple just didn’t “get it”, but most likely they did get it and decided to keep it under wraps.

Why? Peter agrees with bud that there are security concerns:

As has been pointed out, this is rejected because it allows an external application to access information about the iPhone. That said, he’s right that someone at Apple should have explained that rather than using the “limited utility” explanation.

To wander a little bit afield, though, I worry about this “limited utility to the broad iPhone/iPod touch user community” sentence.

One of the reasons for third-party developers is to address these areas that are of limited utility to some but valuable to others. For example, medical dictionaries are not of interest to “the broad iPhone/iPod touch community”, though there are some who will find these invaluable. So is Apple now going to try to determine whether there really is a market for your application and decide whether or not enough people would be interested in it?

He brings up a good point about the implications of Apple deciding what is considered ‘useful’ to the general public.  2 years ago if you had asked me if Twitter was useful to the general public, I would have laughed in your face.  Now, I read the RSS feeds of a bunch of different people on it and I consider it one of the best ways to access people’s raw, unfiltered thoughts.

Imagine if Apple owned the internet platform and just didn’t see the usefulness of this app…

But, as I said – Apple isn’t stupid (in the ignorant way), they are just turning into “The Man.”  My partner in crime got so riled up he went so far as to suggest Apple is the new Microsoft.  Personally, I would rather have the new innovative Big5 browser and then patch the security risks later, rather than shutter it out of fear.

As much as I hate to use Internet Explorer as an example of anything but a steaming pile of sumo wrestler dump on a burning tire, imagine if the 90+% of the people in the 90’s hadn’t been exposed to it because it might have security risks?  We know now that it was chock full of nice juicy security risks, but I would say the exposure to the internet and booming of the industry that pays my bills is a far greater consequence!

  • My personal opinion is that in 10 years, it'll be the windows of the mobile space, full of virus / trojans and whatnot. I've looked (briefly) at how they are doing security, but honestly, not stopping / testing apps before they go out will really make this a playground for a lot of nasty people.
  • It's widely known (from internal Microsoft memo's, for example) that Internet Explorer was a response to the Internet's booming success in the 90's, not the other way around.

    If 90+% of people in the 90's hadn't been exposed to Internet Explorer, they'd have used some other browser. Imagine how many fewer sites (and appliances) would require IE now. I dare you to buy a LinkSys managed switch without owning a Window's PC. And it has a web-GUI!

    So you used bad example. Fine. Your point, it would appear, might be summed up with a question like this: "to what degree should Apple manage security risks on the new iPhone platform?"

    There is a whole spectrum of positions one might take on this question. But there are a few aspects of the iPhone as a software platform to keep in mind:

    - Apple has said publicly that the iPhone/iPod Touch are a huge part of their handheld computing platform
    - Apple's 'plaftorms' since the return of Jobs have life times measured in decades (iMac, notebooks, Xserve, Mac OS X, iPod)
    - The iPhone as a software platform is only 3 months old

    Discussions like this one can serve to inform and even apply pressure as Apple continues to develop this nascent platform. But to expect Apple to treat the iPhone platform as a mature platform (even if it is fairly polished compared to other handheld platforms) might be a bit like asking a parent to make their toddler clean up her room before she can watch TV. Right idea; wrong time.
  • Interesting argument, and yes I agree the iphone platform is still in its
    infancy. But, I see no reason why we can't take a look at now-mature
    platforms (like the internet) and apply the some critical thinking. Namely,
    walled gardens don't work (AOL, etc). Also, no matter how secure you think
    you are - someone is always out there smarter and more determined than you
    to break your security (DRM, etc).
    So, Apple needs to allow applications like Big5 to roam free. If it's an
    issue where they KNOW about security risks and just haven't fixed them yet,
    then be upfront damnit - Dirk spent quite a lot of time on Big5 and got
    absolutely nothing in return. There are other phonegap developers like
    myself that are frustrated for him.
  • There are plenty of ways to install whatever you want on iphone. It's called jailbreaking, and plenty of people have been doing it for a long time.

    Much like Nokia has a signing method for there S60 apps, but people can still bypass this and experiment.

    If you want to play with cutting edge stuff, jailbreak the phone and quit whining. The rest of Apple's "normal" customers are probably much better off with Apple doing a bit of QC for them first.
  • Yea... you've completely missed the point.

    Apple is arbitrarily choosing what apps they allow and what they don't - even if an application follows all of the rules that they've set out for their developers.

    Apple shouldn't decide what apps are in the best interests of their audience... iPhone owners are pretty much as diverse as they come and Apple deciding which applications fills their users needs is impossible. I'm not an iPhone gamer, but I'd buy an "ultimate guitar chord/scale" app. I would also use an app like Big5 - because, like a lot of iPhone users - I'm technically inclined and I like the Internet - and if I could visit a site that takes advantage of the features of the $300 phone that I'm browsing a site on, I would like that.

    All of this close-mindeness and opaqueness poses a really really obvious problem - if developers are going to invest (RISK) their time and expertise developing for a proprietary platform with no guarantee that they will be allowed to actually launch their app at some point developers are going to stop innovating and the only apps on the app store will be bejeweled clones and flashlights.
  • rand
    Hi again :)

    Assuming that without internet explorer that there would be no mass exposure to the internet is wrong on many levels. Without IE being built into the os, it may have taken a year or two more at worst, but the momentum was definitely there already.

    I have a feeling you'll like android. My personal opinion is that in 10 years, it'll be the windows of the mobile space, full of virus / trojans and whatnot. I've looked (briefly) at how they are doing security, but honestly, not stopping / testing apps before they go out will really make this a playground for a lot of nasty people. But we'll get the apps ;)
  • Haha, you're right - I probably will love the wild west of Android.

    I agree that IE itself wasn't that important - but the concept behind it was - release an application that spawns innovation and fix the security holes when they arise. Windows is a nest for malicious software because they chose innovation over caution. But without that, the computer industry wouldn't be where it's at today, and Apple would have never been able to establish itself as the 'safe alternative' and the 'cool kid on the block.'

    The funny thing is, I'm writing this from a macbook pro :)
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