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Letter To Apple Re: App Store

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kriskay

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 19, 2007
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Dear Sir,

On Monday 19th January my Son aged 11 asked me a very disturbing question.

I was quite dumbfounded to the nature of the question and asked him if this was something he was studying at school. He said "no it was on the app store" I probed further and was told that he was going to download one of the games you have listed on there for his iPod Touch. He was reading the reviews, which I understand users can leave as feedback on their purchases.

The question my Son asked me was "What is a Holocaust"

As you can imaging alarm bells started ringing. I then had to explain to my Son what he had seen, which
you can imagine can be quite disturbing for an 11 year old (I am not in the habit of prefabricating things to my child)

I asked him to show me this on his iPod Touch. To be very blunt this was one in a long line of disgusting things I found. I saw words such as ****, Crap and one comment which stated that the customer hoped the developers died of Cancer! Not at all what I would be wanting my son or other children to be seeing.

Now I am a long time Apple customer and your products are admired by all kinds of age groups, especially my 11 year old and myself which is why we own iPhones and 2 Macs. However, I find it wholly unacceptable that these comments have not been moderated and have been allowed to appear on your feedback pages where children can access this information.

I am aware that you have built in access rights however you are gearing this device as a gaming platform (amongst others) and children will access this, had it not been brought to my attention by my son I would not have known at all what he was looking at.

I actually feel that I have a responsibility to let other parents know about this as I certainly would not want other children to be looking at this kind of profanity as I'm sure you can appreciate should you have young children.
I myself was actually sickened by the comments which were allowed to be left on your feedback pages. I know they do not represent the values of your company or staff but you do have a duty of responsibility to make sure this does not filter down to and end user level.

I now have to say to my son that he had to ask if he wants an application and we have to now check it out before he downloads it to his phone. Some of the applications I have seen on there really should have appropriate age ratings too I should point out. I would encourage all other parents to do the same for the foreseeable future which I'm sure is not good for your app store business, of which you have recently listed over 500 MIllion downloads and advertised heavily in the media.

If you are marketing these towards children then you have an unconditional responsibility.

I have posted this to macrumors.com to warn other parents of the pitfalls of your App Store in hope that someone
elses child will be safe from this profanity.

I have attached screen shots for you to view.

A very, very, very!! upset customer

Kris Gray
 

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You gave your son an iPhone, let him run wild into the App Store and you're blaming Apple for poor moderation?

Seriously - parenting these days. It's always someone else's fault. Never the parent. Ever stopped to think, "wait a minute, was giving my 11 year old son an iPhone - something that has unrestricted access to the internet, and has an App Store full of free games, some quite disturbing, a good idea?"

Really - you need to wake up and maybe take charge for what your son sees. Next time, you'll be suing the internet for allowing your son to type sex.com.
 
I hope they act accordingly, the reviews on some of the apps are really quite harsh and includes profanity.
 
Kilamite said:
You gave your son an iPhone, let him run wild into the App Store and you're blaming Apple for poor moderation?

Seriously - parenting these days. It's always someone else's fault. Never the parent. Ever stopped to think, "wait a minute, was giving my 11 year old son an iPhone - something that has unrestricted access to the internet, and has an App Store full of free games, some quite disturbing, a good idea?"

Really - you need to wake up and maybe take charge for what your son sees. Next time, you'll be suing the internet for allowing your son to type sex.com.
Click to expand...


No my son has an iPod touch, the screen shots are off my iPhone and yes we have restricted his access on many things.

As Apple aim certain attributes at children that is what i find unacceptable.

Even I find some of these comments utterly disgusting.
 
Sky Blue said:
Apple don't read MacRumors.

Couldn't your son visit any web site on his Touch?
Click to expand...

I have linked the article on the email.

You are right he could thats why we restrict his access and he is only allowed on the internet on the Mac at home when one of us is in the same room.

I do see your point though.
 
Tallest Skil said:
I assume you'd complain that the Xbox has both E and M games, right?

Parental. Discretion. Enact it.

We're also not Apple. You're wasting your time here.
Click to expand...

I appreciate your not Apple. However I would like to bring it to the attention of Apple customers who may have young children. I can safely assume your not one or your comment may have reflected differently.

So your saying I should go to a publication?

Im sorry but as an adult I find those comments disgusting let alone my children who know no better
 
kriskay said:
I appreciate your not Apple. However I would like to bring it to the attention of Apple customers who may have young children. I can safely assume your not one or your comment may have reflected differently.
Click to expand...

I don't see how telling you to use some common sense and parental discretion is against your position.

So your saying I should go to a publication?
Click to expand...

If this problem bothers you enough, sure.
 
I'm not going to comment on parenting and restricting internet access because it in no way pertains to me.

However, I will agree with the OP that a lot of the comments left in the App store are completely inappropriate. If someone leaves comments that are offensive or inconsiderate of others (like some highlighted by the OP) then I'm sure they're not mature enough to have an opinion I want to hear or relate to.

Apple should definitely work on filtering what is posted.
 
Perhaps you are not familiar with the first amendment of our American Constitution, Freedom of Speech.

If you can't monitor your own child, please don't force others to do your job.
 
Tallest Skil said:
I assume you'd complain that the Xbox has both E and M games, right?

Parental. Discretion. Enact it.

We're also not Apple. You're wasting your time here.
Click to expand...

TBH, I'm not sure what that's got to do with it - the complaint wasn't about the apps available in the store, but the comments in reviews, which should be moderated IMO.


CocoaPuffs said:
Perhaps you are not familiar with the first amendment of our American Constitution, Freedom of Speech.

If you can't monitor your own child, please don't force others to do your job.
Click to expand...

Completely irrelevant seeing as how the attached screenshots show the OP is located in the UK ;)

Going a bit OT, MacRumors is moderated and comments like those would probably be deleted - what about your American Constitution on here...
 
Tallest Skil said:
I don't see how telling you to use some common sense and parental discretion is against your position.



If this problem bothers you enough, sure.
Click to expand...

It was a complaint to highlight the inappropriate comments. Hopefully Apple will act and this will make their service better because of it.

I love Apple, I'm just appaled at the comments, I appreciate this may be the first time it has been highlighted to them, I dont know.

I did not expect to get shot down for trying to make their service more expendable.
 
Phil A. said:
TBH, I'm not sure what that's got to do with it - the complaint wasn't about the apps available in the store, but the comments in reviews, which should be moderated IMO.




Completely irrelevant seeing as how the attached screenshots show the OP is located in the UK ;)

Going a bit OT, MacRumors is moderated and comments like those would probably be deleted - what about your American Constitution on here...
Click to expand...

Scratch my comment about Freedom of Speech, how about supervise your own child and quit pretending the world is a better place.
 
To hear what you are saying about the comments in general - they require approval for comments on the Apple Store pages, so they could do the same here.

But really, there is just way too many comments to moderate. It'd be a full time job for someone just to view all the flagged as in appropriate, nevermind general moderation.
 
kriskay said:
It was a complaint to highlight the inappropriate comments. Hopefully Apple will act and this will make their service better because of it.

I love Apple, I'm just appaled at the comments, I appreciate this may be the first time it has been highlighted to them, I dont know.

I did not expect to get shot down for trying to make their service more expendable.
Click to expand...

That's MacRumors for ya!

Anything you come here to say is going to be cut on one way or another. If you're going to stick around just learn to ignore the negativity and take from it what the helpful people have to offer.
 
Can't blame Apple for this one. You can turn off the App Store via parental controls.
 
I like that one parent put up a post to warn other parents who have small children and you guys get mad and say he should do a better job of parenting.

It is a man who did not know about the comments, and when he found out not only did he take the parenting role to stop his child from reading them but he tried to warn other parents.

I do not understand why people are getting on him for trying to educate others on a situation. If this post does not apply to you then don't read it.
 
As Apple aim certain attributes at children that is what i find unacceptable.
Click to expand...

More like Apple often aims at mental children with extra money, not actual children. :rolleyes:

I agree that they should police the comments. They already police their own website rather stringently.

That aside, I'd say 11 is way too young to have access to the App Store. I'd turn off access via General - Restrictions

Up to you, of course.
 
so now Apple doesn't have enough control over the iPhone???
you wrote your son has an iPod Touch, first, and an iPhone near the end, does he have both? really? and he's 11? and it's really Steve Jobs' fault your son reads that stuff on the internet? come on now..
 
DavieBoy said:
I like that one parent put up a post to warn other parents who have small children and you guys get mad and say he should do a better job of parenting.

It is a man who did not know about the comments, and when he found out not only did he take the parenting role to stop his child from reading them but he tried to warn other parents.

I do not understand why people are getting on him for trying to educate others on a situation. If this post does not apply to you then don't read it.
Click to expand...

+1

Very well said, sir. Kudos to the OP.
 
I would suggest also taking advantage of the "Report a Concern" link of the reviews that are at your disposal on the App Store in iTunes.
 
lostprophet894 said:
That's MacRumors for ya!

Anything you come here to say is going to be cut on one way or another. If you're going to stick around just learn to ignore the negativity and take from it what the helpful people have to offer.
Click to expand...

I will do just that. Thank you!

I do read quite regularly, not as much as i'd like to though.
 
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