Apple Requiring eBook Apps With External Purchases to Also Offer In App Purchasing

[firewood]

Questions
I) Why did Apple decide to initially ignore the rule, and then suddenly start to enforce it?

Easy, developers were complaining about how long reviews were taking (and still are), so Apple streamlined the process to not always look for some things that weren't a big problem yet.

II) All developers know the rules, ...; so why did any developer ignore them in the first place?

Lots of developers try to "cheat". Read some of the apps that have been pulled from the store and some of the published rejection notices for some of the things that devs have tried to slip past Apple.

III) Is it possible that some big developers have different rules, or have negotiated their own set of rules up front and that is why it seems that the rules are not being universally applied?

Yes. When they pulled "skin" apps, the Playboy app remained. Why? Playboy corp. has a huge legal department.

IV) Will there be more apps subject to this new enforcement?

Always.

V) Why is any developer surprised by the enforcement of a rule that has been around?

Most likely complacency. Or sometimes stupidity.

VI) If a developer is so upset by a rule; why don't they remove their app and go elsewhere?

The money.
(Even for free, non-ad supported apps!)

XIV) Is it wrong for Apple to start enforcing a rule after so long?

It's their store. They can do anything they want (until they get bigger than Android plus Nokia plus Blackberry in device sales, etc.)

.
XIIV) Why are some people so upset by this?

Because people like attention by complaining.

 

[knucklehead]

XIIV) Why are some people so upset by this? Isn't it really between Apple and the Developers?

Up until now, I have only had to consider how I might feel about Apple's way of doing business (marketing, "Apple Tax", etc...) pretty much just in relation to each individual hardware purchase. Now with Apple moving more and more into controlling the commerce conducted on their devices, you need to consider how you might feel about Apple's way in a much broader and more complicated context --- is this this going to be a system that you want to buy into and support. How much is Apple going to grab, control, and restrict what you do on their devices going into the future. Are these devices going to be more to help open up the world to individuals, or are they going to be more for Apple to take a sizable cut of every transaction that happens on them ... and things that don't directly give a cut to Apple won't be allowed.

Also, the disadvantage that DRM and cloud based delivery gives to the consumer means that they are at the mercy of the delivering company's "character" to not change the rules under their feet.

Could be that that the 'intimate' nature of these new devices make these issues all the more charged --- they sort of become more a part of you than a thing with a plug in it ever would.
After becoming excited by the great potential they could offer, it's disturbing to consider how much they might be restricted grubby buisness issues.

It would be nice to have a clearer picture where these things are going.

 

[Tumbleweed666]

I do understand your point on having my CC info on less sites is better as there would be less vendors to hack but there is a reason we are regularly advised to use unique passwords for whatever sites we access, be it for Social networking, forums or online shopping. To flip the multiple password advice by having a single login to abuse across merchants doesn't make sense to me.

Your password security as a route to access is not whats at issue here.

If someone compromises one of these sites and steals millions of credit card details, its not because they guessed your $uper$ecret password, its because they got in via a back door and hoovered everything up.

The very reasonable point made by the previous poster was that the odds someone will do that to one of 20 sites, is higher than they will do it to 1. Its probably not 20x higher, but maybe its 2x or 3x or 5x higher?

The only real 'protection' is probably to have a card with a very low amount that you would never normally exceed on these sites because generally you are buying low value items - books, cd's, games etc. Lets say its a $250 limit.
I say 'protection' because I presume you have to distinguish between "someone guessed $uper$ecret, in which case maybe its your liability, and someone just stole the entire Amazon credit card database, in which case, you are going to be covered anyway. But if you take those recent cases where people had their iTunes accounts compromised, possibly through phishing, some lost big money and I dont know if they ever managed to get it back.

 

[ChazUK]

Your password security as a route to access is not whats at issue here.

If someone compromises one of these sites and steals millions of credit card details, its not because they guessed your $uper$ecret password, its because they got in via a back door and hoovered everything up.

The very reasonable point made by the previous poster was that the odds someone will do that to one of 20 sites, is higher than they will do it to 1. Its probably not 20x higher, but maybe its 2x or 3x or 5x higher?

The only real 'protection' is probably to have a card with a very low amount that you would never normally exceed on these sites because generally you are buying low value items - books, cd's, games etc. Lets say its a $250 limit.
I say 'protection' because I presume you have to distinguish between "someone guessed $uper$ecret, in which case maybe its your liability, and someone just stole the entire Amazon credit card database, in which case, you are going to be covered anyway. But if you take those recent cases where people had their iTunes accounts compromised, possibly through phishing, some lost big money and I dont know if they ever managed to get it back.

Thanks for the explanation, that does make sense. It seems that may be naive in my assumptions that using multiple accounts is any more safer than a single account.

One question, how did you guess my super secret password?

 

[Tumbleweed666]

Thanks for the explanation, that does make sense. It seems that may be naive in my assumptions that using multiple accounts is any more safer than a single account.

One question, how did you guess my super secret password?

2Tb rainbow table and several thousand billion guesses later, there it was

 

[charlituna]

I don't know if statistically I am wrong or right by thinking that "Your premise is that putting your credit card on 20 sites is safer than 1?"

You know what is even safer than that. Putting it on none. Which is something you can do with iTunes that you can't with many other sites. Because you can go to the store, buy a gift card with cash and put that in your account and use it. Which is an option a lot of folks would like to have. For card account safety and then cause they can let their kids buy those frigging smurfberries safe in the knowledge that when the kid uses up his $10 gift card he can't keep buying like he can if Daddy's credit card, or worse debit card, is on there. Same with ebooks etc.

 

[MattInOz]

I say 'protection' because I presume you have to distinguish between "someone guessed $uper$ecret, in which case maybe its your liability, and someone just stole the entire Amazon credit card database, in which case, you are going to be covered anyway. But if you take those recent cases where people had their iTunes accounts compromised, possibly through phishing, some lost big money and I dont know if they ever managed to get it back.

Either way we pay, the costs of those big attacks is still borne by the consumer in the end. Although companies that don't manage their risk soon become uncompetitive if which case it's their investors who pay.

Still you think credit card companies would be trying to reduce the risk put a system in place that would generate a store specific sub-card number that if stolen couldn't be used at other stores. Lets face it if anyone is going to make some form of single net ID work it'll be one hosted by credit providers. I can't see them doing it as their focus seems to be getting us to spend more not wisely.