Phil Schiller Comments on 'Ninjawords Dictionary' iPhone App Rejection

[stainlessliquid]

Why on earth are people rating this positive? All Schiller did was confirm Apple's boneheaded rules.

It was a DICTIONARY, other Dictionaries existed and Schiller agreed that this app should be singled out and given a 17+ rating when OS 3.0 came out or censor itself before OS 3.0.

Theres nothing positive about this at all. Its like the Apple store is being run by Kim Jong Il.

 

[dampfdruck]

Censorship sucks.

What is this? Iran, China or what?

I can very well decide for myself what I want to see and read. I don't need any censorship board who makes this decision on my behalf.

 

[MooseUK]

It is a sad day when someone so senior at Apple feels the need to respond to a douchebag like John Gruber.

Why on earth anyone gives Gruber any credit is totally beyond me. He is self-publicist who suffers delusions of grandeur regarding his importance when it comes to "all things Apple". This kind of communication from Schiller will only serve to reinforce Gruber's mistaken belief.

 

[uberamd]

No, this is not "knee-jerk" at all.

That's when you jump to conclusions without getting any facts. The point here is that they tried to get facts, but couldn't.

And that's the whole problem. The fact that they had to write a long (and inacurate) article to get a response from Apple. If Apple had been clear in the first place, the article wouldn't have happened.

"Knee-jerk" is when you don't even attempt to gather facts.

Well if you don't have the facts, don't try to make a conclusion, right? I mean I could ask any company something and not get a response back then make up some BS story if I wanted to. But I won't do that. Why? Just because you can't get the facts doesn't mean you should parade around like you know whats going on.

I just hate articles that try to pass off assumptions as fact.

 

[Blue Fox]

As is unfortunately so common in our "instant info" time --- immediate knee-jerk frothing outrage about something that did not, in fact, happen.

Perhaps
- slow down... just a little
- don't believe EVERYTHING

EXACTLY. People on this forum (and other forums and other media outlets) are SO quick to make opinions on matters they know nothing about, especially if it's against a "big, bad evil corporation" like Apple. (just read some of these comments on page 1, hilarious).

 

[wallinbl]

Finally, we see some good PR coming out of Cupertino! It's big, in my mind, that Schiller took the time to send this to Gruber, and it removes at least some of the sour feelings for Apple lately.

Huh? There is no good PR here. Did they rate Safari 17+? It can get to the same website.

 

[Small White Car]

Just because you can't get the facts doesn't mean you should parade around like you know whats going on.

I just hate articles that try to pass off assumptions as fact.

Did you read both articles? What is it that Gruber "made up?"

Right now we have a "he-said-she-said" situation going on between the Ninja Dictionary developer and Phil Schiller. Their stories don't match, but is that Gruber's fault?

He reported what the developers said. Then he reported what Schiller said.

Is he supposed to take sides? Only quote one of them? No, he should tell us what he has been told, and that's exactly what he did.

 

[BaldiMac]

And to be clear, Apple has a monopoly on the iPhone market. It's not illegal, but it's a fact.

Every company has a monopoly on their own product. What's your point? The legal question is whether they have market power. Since they only have around 1% of the market for mobile phones, this is unlikely.

 

[BaldiMac]

Huh? There is no good PR here. Did they rate Safari 17+? It can get to the same website.

Ratings only apply to applications distributed through the App Store. Safari can be disabled through parental controls the same way 17+ applications can.

 

[mambodancer]

Are they going to put a 17+ rating/parental controls on safari? I mean I can search all kinds a bad stuff with the built in safari does that mean they should put a high rating on it? this is BS

Parental controls are already a part of OSX.

 

[BaldiMac]

Censorship sucks.

What is this? Iran, China or what?

I can very well decide for myself what I want to see and read. I don't need any censorship board who makes this decision on my behalf.

Who censored anything? Did you read the article? They censored themselves.

 

[RebootD]

So every Webster's Dictionary in bookstores should now have an 17+ rating on it while covered in brown paper to hide its naughtiness right?

Why not add a warning screen on Safari as well?

*Warning! Some of the content you may see is not suitable for children, the easily offended or Amish folk*

 

[ipoddin]

Always nice to hear the rest of the story.

This makes sense. We all know Apple was playing nanny prior to the release of the 17+ age rating. And expecting them to release a comprehensive list of vulgar terms isn't realistic either, as there are simply too many, and any list they did create could obviously be circumvented. It would be nice, however, if they could provide general guidelines to help a developer in understanding what this content might be. (Common sense would probably narrow the list down more than a little, though).

It seems the developer, in an effort to raise some fuss, opted to leave out certain important details so their plight would come across as more desperate and dramatic than it really was.


What monopoly? Do you even know what that word means in the business context?

yet Phil doesn't address the fact that there are other dictionary apps in the store that contain "vulgar" terms. I have one on my phone right now.

 

[Bjohnson33]

Finally, we see some good PR coming out of Cupertino! It's big, in my mind, that Schiller took the time to send this to Gruber, and it removes at least some of the sour feelings for Apple lately.

Now let's see if Apple actually goes ahead and "[learns] and quickly [improves]".

I agree - it's easy to say it, but let's see if they actually do it.

 

[BaldiMac]

So every Webster's Dictionary in bookstores should now have an 17+ rating on it while covered in brown paper to hide its naughtiness right?

Why not add a warning screen on Safari as well?

*Warning! Some of the content you may see is not suitable for children, the easily offended or Amish folk*

Apple does not require dictionaries to be 17+. Safari can be disabled as easily as 17+ rated applications.

 

[BaldiMac]

yet Phil doesn't address the fact that there are other dictionary apps in the store that contain "vulgar" terms. I have one on my phone right now.

Yes. He did. Read the article. No problem with common swear words in a dictionary.

 

[RebootD]

Apple does not require dictionaries to be 17+. Safari can be disabled as easily as 17+ rated applications.

The point is if they want to find it they will and to have to put parental controls on a dictionary is absurd. They have to know the word to look it up, so that means their puritan mind has already been tainted.

Plus you don't have to type into Safari anything obviously sexual/obscene to find it. Type in 'donkey love' and have a great afternoon with that.

 

[BaldiMac]

The point is if they want to find it they will and to have to put parental controls on a dictionary is absurd.

Why? The only people affected by it are the people who want to use parental controls.

They have to know the word to look it up, so that means their puritan mind has already been tainted.

Not necessarily, most dictionaries that are allowed in the app store provide suggestions and results from partial words.

Plus you don't have to type into Safari anything obviously sexual/obscene to find it. Type in 'donkey love' and have a great afternoon with that.

And Safari can be disabled with parental controls. Where is the inconsistency?

 

[Lextar]

I just got a rejection for the Lite version of my game, Claustrophobia, because in the About section under Help, I have links to the freesound project where I got my sounds from. On THAT page, they have somewhere a Google Search bar. Apple said in their email:

"Claustrophobia Battle Client 1.0 allows unfiltered access to Google Search, which includes frequent mature or suggestive themes. Applications must be rated accordingly for the highest level of content that the user is able to access."

Therefore I either have to remove all links from my help section or make the game 17+. I also cannot mention any features found in the full version of my app.

Looking on my iPhone now I see several lite versions that mention features found in the full version. And looking on the App Store Google Mobile is rated 4+. This has gone too far!

EDIT: The full version of the game has the exact same links to freesound.org, yet was approved.

In my about screen I also use a web view. But when the user clicks on a link I show an alert view: "Do you want to open this link in Safari? http://...".

Just handle "webView:shouldStartLoadWithRequest:navigationType:" in the UIWebViewDelegate.

Maybe that way you can circumvent the problem.

 

[str1f3]

It is a sad day when someone so senior at Apple feels the need to respond to a douchebag like John Gruber.

Why on earth anyone gives Gruber any credit is totally beyond me. He is self-publicist who suffers delusions of grandeur regarding his importance when it comes to "all things Apple". This kind of communication from Schiller will only serve to reinforce Gruber's mistaken belief.

Did Gruber kill your dog or something? He has the best Mac blog out there. Period. Even Schiller reads it. What you don't bother to think about is that everything he wrote was correct. The app was still getting rejected even though those words appeared in Apple's own dictionary and dictionaries within the App Store that Apple approved for ages 4+ and 9+.

It's good to see Schiller talk about this but it doesn't change the fact that the App Store is screwed up right now in terms of some of the policies. This doesn't clear up the Google Voice fiasco amongst others.

Apple does not require dictionaries to be 17+. Safari can be disabled as easily as 17+ rated applications.

As has been said, the words that they were getting flagged for were words that existed in non 17+ dictionaries on the App Store.

 

[DavidLeblond]

In my about screen I also use a web view. But when the user clicks on a link I show an alert view: "Do you want to open this link in Safari? http://...".

Just handle "webView:shouldStartLoadWithRequest:navigationType:" in the UIWebViewDelegate.

Maybe that way you can circumvent the problem.

Awesome, that's what I'll do. Thanks!

 

[Small White Car]

Not necessarily, most dictionaries that are allowed in the app store provide suggestions and results from partial words.

These developers said they specifically excluded objectionable words from auto-complete before they even submitted it the first time.

 

[krye]

In your face Gruber. In. Your. Face. You know you're full of s*** when the man comes down and tells you to go f*** yourself.

 

[Small White Car]

In your face Gruber. In. Your. Face. You know you're full of s*** when the man comes down and tells you to go f*** yourself.

If you had a point to make, isn't this when you should be making it instead of just ranting?

It seems that all the 'Gruber Sucks' people refuse to write any actual arguments or post any actual facts.

Your only "fact" is, in fact, made up. Schiller simply added new information to the conversationn without making any sort of comment on Gruber himself. If you can't even complain about something real, what's the point of the rant?

I'd be happy to debate any actual arguments you have, but you all seem to avoid making them so there's not much I can do.

 

[iOrlando]

There's a simple solution. Have Phil Schiller personally explain Apple's reasons every time an app is rejected!

haha and each email will start:


Hi Developer. I'm Phil Schiller.

You may remember me from MacWorld09. No? Ok, how about WWDC09? No? Still drawing a blank? Well I'm kind of a big deal at Apple.

Anyways...

Your app was rejected because *insert reason here*

Thank you