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Developers Complain as App Store Feature Promotes Rip-Off Apps

Deguello said:
Of course absolute right and wrong exist.

That a cat and mouse game exists between those who make the rules and those who try to evade the rules doesn’t justify those who make the rules actually promoting something that breaks the rules.
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There is no absolute right and wrong. What’s right 100 years ago wont necessarily be right today. “Absolute” means something that can withhold the test of time indefinitely.

While it seems ridiculous to see rule creators to promote actions that breaks the rules, the thing is, Apple is it’s biggest rule breakers in terms of app design for years and devs generally turns a blind eye on it cause they can’t do anything.
 
Shirasaki said:
There is no absolute right and wrong. What’s right 100 years ago wont necessarily be right today. “Absolute” means something that can withhold the test of time indefinitely.

While it seems ridiculous to see rule creators to promote actions that breaks the rules, the thing is, Apple is it’s biggest rule breakers in terms of app design for years and devs generally turns a blind eye on it cause they can’t do anything.
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Torturing a puppy is absolutely wrong. Murder is absolutely wrong. It was wrong 100 years ago. It is wrong now. It will be wrong 100 years from now.

Again, that Apple doesn’t apply the same rules to itself that it applies to others doesn’t justify its actively promoting third party apps that break its guidelines.
 
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The App Store is an absolute joke, the only reason I ever open it is to check for updates and install an app I already know I want.
I have never seen a single feature that made me discover an app I actually care about - they’re either garbage mobile games that casually happen to be from huge developers, trash I don’t care about or apps I already know and use.

I know everyone uses their phones differently so somebody else might find the features interesting, but I’ve never seen small unknown apps being featured so I’m honestly pretty convinced this is all glorified marketing.
 
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Easy. Apple does not care about users “safety”, only about increasing every year the previous year revenue. Tim is a “investor-pleaser”. For example, you can see that the greatest feature of ios 15 is “focus”!, really?. More and more rip off apps are being promoted, years later support for high refresh rate, no high zoom cameras, etc. Everything designed to keep us buying marginal updates every year with more marketing than content/features. And Tim being overpaid, what is the incentive for him to change anything?
 
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ouimetnick said:
This poor review process really doesn’t help Apple’s argument that the App Store should be the only place to get apps for the iPhone & iPad. Not only do they “review” and allow these sham/scams, they actively promote them.
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Agreed. But this issue is the quality, imo, will take a nosedive from where it is today, with multiple app stores, sideloading etc. If Apple can't figure this out, alternative app stores won't be able to either.
 
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I7guy said:
Agreed. But this issue is the quality, imo, will take a nosedive from where it is today, with multiple app stores, sideloading etc. If Apple can't figure this out, alternative app stores won't be able to either.
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It really depends on the goal of said 3rd party App Store. If they only have a 1000 apps, it’s easier to test and vet those apps. Apple probably gets that many app submissions every 6 hours.
 
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Shirasaki said:
To those who says “this and that should NEVER happen” and “ban them immediately”, every mirror has two sides. Absolute right or wrong does not exist. No matter how apple tweaks their app review rules, bad players will slip through. At some point, the bad player might be apple themselves or some very big companies. Now what?

It’s totally normal to remove current scam apps and kick them off of recommendation for now. But scam apps and such will eventually come back, in some form. This is basically a cat and mouse game apple has to play forever, and there’s never a single moment users could say “scam/fake apps are gone for good”.
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If an app is making too many customer complaints, put a focus to it, don’t promote it until a human has analyzed it. It is not so hard to detect foul behavior with algorithms, is just a matter of “why should I change my algorithms if I get a lot of menu?”.
 
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I7guy said:
Agreed. But this issue is the quality, imo, will take a nosedive from where it is today, with multiple app stores, sideloading etc. If Apple can't figure this out, alternative app stores won't be able to either.
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If Apple can’t figure it out, their argument against the dangers of others is weakened, though.

Apple has such a captive audience at this point, I think it’s getting to the point that an argument can be made that a third-party store has a greater incentive for safety than does Apple. A crappy stand-alone store would have trouble staying in business. Apple‘s store is going to stay in business as long as Apple sells devices.
 
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This makes me super curious what app reviewers actually see and can dig into when they’re doing their work. For example, are they just looking at a list that the app developer has provided of the functionality or some sort of fact sheet? Or, are they seeing an analysis that shows which APIs the app is using? Or something different?

In other words, does the app review rely primarily on developer submitted information versus some thing that allows the app reviewers to “open the hood“ of the app?
 
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ouimetnick said:
This poor review process really doesn’t help Apple’s argument that the App Store should be the only place to get apps for the iPhone & iPad. Not only do they “review” and allow these sham/scams, they actively promote them.
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Yup! What's the point of a walled garden if the guards are letting pretty much anyone hop over it?
 
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Gix1k said:
All subscription apps are a ripoff. Charge me a few dollar more, even $20....but transaction complete. My app now.
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I don’t know that they’re all ripoffs, but I’d also prefer a one-time payment.

i subscribe to one app because, for me, it’s such a clear leader in its genre that there really isn’t an alternative. I’ve avoided multiple apps that I would have paid for because a subscription was the only option.
 
Scotticus said:
Yup! What's the point of a walled garden if the guards are letting pretty much anyone hop over it?
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It is really a jail. They don't care what comes in, but they are making sure you can't get out. Calling it a garden just sounds nice.

I would be more sympathetic if Apple had been the first app store on iOS. They chose to not go that route and Steve said apps would be web pages instead. After the initial app stores took off, Apple changed their tune and released their own. They immediately started blocking 3rd party app stores and now we have this mess.
 
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This is Apple's equvalent to the end-of-quarter push. Someone in management needed to make his numbers. Nothing to see here. Moving on.

Sorry for the cynicism. Letting such apps into the app store is one thing. But featuring them is really quite obscene.
 
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Octavius8 said:
If an app is making too many customer complaints, put a focus to it, don’t promote it until a human has analyzed it. It is not so hard to detect foul behavior with algorithms, is just a matter of “why should I change my algorithms if I get a lot of menu?”.
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Yeah but then the question would be “is apple willing to spend money on flushing out those bad players with human oversight? Or they will just optimise algorithm and call it a day?”
 
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Seriously - why all the fuss?

The App Store curation is just people, and people make mistakes. Apple has never claimed that their process is perfect. I mean there's a couple of million apps in the store and sometimes things get through that shouldn't.

I'll be surprised if these rogue apps aren't gone by the end of the week. This is click-bait and I fell for it.
 
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jefhai said:
That’s competitive and free market… users can go search for other apps. And Developers shouldn’t complain about rip-off or knock off apps
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Too many bad players can destroy a free market in no time. There is no absolute freedom.
 
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