IMPORTANT POINTS:
* App review process is messed up in many ways.
* Apple is not trying to be evil, they're just a bit incompetent right now.
* Management doesn't WANT to be incompetent or evil.
Some of that isn't news, but some of it is for some of us.
Unfortunately I think things will only get worse as the iPhone user base gets larger. Long-term I think the only solution is to allow users to get apps from other sources but still keep the iTunes store as the only "trusted" source.
So if you get on the app store you're still approved by Apple, but consumers know they can trust you. You'll make more sales because of it. But if you want to sell "iPorn" (or whatever) on your website, you can do that, even for non-jailbroken phones.
I think Apple will eventually realize that its either this or they'll have to hire thousands of people to review apps. It eventually won't be possible to keep up.
No.
Based on the information he had at the time, his first article was accurate.
The problem was that it wasn't accurate information. Now, you'll say "that's a writer's job." But that's exactly the problem here! Developers don't know what's going on, Apple won't tell them, and they don't know exactly what it is they're supposed to be doing. So the developers can't get a straight answer and neither could Gruber. (Until now.)
So the fact that Gruber's article was wrong only proves his point that miscomunication is the real problem here.