Tag: blockheaded

Apple rejects iPhone apps with no reason given

Ars Technica reports on Apple rejecting iPhone applications without offering an explanation. Of particular note:

Marco Arment, lead developer of Tumblr and creator of Instapaper, chronicled the situation on his blog. On the last day of WWDC ’09, Apple had a session dedicated to the process of publishing an iPhone app to its App Store. The session ended early, and lines of developers formed at the microphones to ask questions—ostensibly concerning App Store rejections and how best to resolve issues identified in the review process. However, at the end of the presentation, the presenter and other engineers quickly exited the room, leaving the assembled developers scratching their heads.

“It was a giant middle finger to iPhone developers,” wrote Arment. “Clearly, they had absolutely no interest in fielding even a single question from the topic that we have the most questions about.”

And later, as reported on tuaw.com, one unlucky developer got this in their e-mail:

“As you know, Apple reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to reject any application for any reason.”

So if you plan to develop for the iPhone, this is what you’re getting into. You’re at the mercy of Apple, and they may not even tell you why you can’t sell the application you just spent hours or days working on.

No other computing platform, anywhere, has one company deciding what can and can’t run on it. (And yes, I realize it may seem odd to call the iPhone a computing platform, but that is in effect what it is: a computer that can also make telephone calls.)

I believe the developers, at minimum, have the right to know why Apple rejects an application. However, I also believe a far wiser choice, one that might just get Apple’s attention, is for developers to stay away in droves until Apple takes a more hands-off approach with regards to the iPhone platform.

Personally, I believe the only valid reason for rejection of an iPhone application is if it has the potential to cause harm to the mobile networks that the iPhone connects to. I should note here, “harm” does not include the following:

  • letting the user make phone calls over a VoIP network like Skype or Gizmo;
  • content that Apple finds objectionable or that in Apple’s judgment does not belong on a mobile phone;
  • parodying Apple, AT&T, O2, or other carriers which Apple partners with;
  • any of the other reasons Apple has for rejecting applications for the iPhone.

It’ll probably be a cold day in hell before that actually becomes reality, however. I’m not going to wait.

Kid’s henna tattoo runs amok

From weinterrupt.com comes this story of yet another body art mishap, this time on a five-year-old boy who sat for a temporary henna tattoo while on vacation with his parents in Indonesia.

Cannon Cribb got more than he bargained for when after the henna wore off, he was left with a large welt in the shape of the Oriental dragon tattoo. The scar happened because the “henna” contained a chemical called para-phenylenediamine (PPD), normally used in hair or textile dyes. DuPont, one of the makers of PPD, specifically warns against using PPD directly on the skin as quoted below:

DuPont does not recommend and will not knowingly offer or sell p-phenylenediamine (PPD) for uses involving prolonged skin contact. Such uses may involve, but are not limited to, products formulated with henna for tattoo applications or other skin coloration effects. This use of PPD in prolonged skin contact application has the potential to induce allergic skin reactions in sensitive individuals.

If there is a lesson to be learned, it is this, and this applies equally to anyone doing any type of face/body art: never use chemicals directly on the skin which are not intended to be used in that fashion.

I wish Cannon a full and speedy recovery, and sincerely hope someone out there will learn from his misfortune.

More on Green Dam

This just in: even the government-run Chinese media story contains statements critical of Green Dam. In particular:

“Government power should not be abused and more transparency is needed,” said Yu Guoming, a journalism expert with the Renmin University of China.

“The real purpose of a forced installation is still being questioned. It is important to emphasize that the government is keen to protect people’s rights to information, civil participation, opinion and supervision,” Chen Lidan, a senior researcher on journalism with the Renmin University of China, said yesterday during an online forum on People’s Daily website.

“The IT industry knows there is no reliable system to ensure all content is safe on the Web, but Web users have a choice to view what content they want to view,” said Fang Xingdong, a Beijing-based IT expert.

If the Chinese government is willing to publish statements like these in its own media, one can only imagine what they are hiding.

China and censorship: the Green Dam fiasco

Maybe it’s just me, but the first thing I think of now when I hear “China” is “censorship.”

Two recent articles on Freedom to Tinker address the new “mandatory” Green Dam software. The first article by Dan Wallach exposes just how powerful censorship software becomes when installed on the end user’s PC. Since I doubt that Green Dam will be released under a free software license (this is China we’re talking about here) it also highlights just how dystopian things can get when one trusts proprietary, non-free software. This is either the bottom of the slippery slope or very far down it.

The second article by Ed Felten describes just how insecure Green Dam is. In essence it is a security breach waiting to happen. I’m not surprised. A quote from a University of Michigan report quoted within the article sums it up nicely:

Correcting these problems will require extensive changes to the software and careful retesting. In the meantime, we recommend that users protect themselves by uninstalling Green Dam immediately.

I honestly am quite surprised that the software would even allow for uninstallation given what it is designed to do (censorship) and where it is designed to do it (on PCs in China). If Green Dam does allow for uninstallation, this is the first thing any responsible PC owner in China who gives a damn about his/her freedom will do.  I personally build my own PCs when I can, and start with a clean hard drive when I can’t. It would honestly surprise me if neither is an option in China.

Phone camera bill: a symbol of law run amok

A recent Ars Technica article sheds light on a very dumb but well-intentioned bill before Congress, requiring mobile phone cameras to make an audible noise when taking a picture.

The good intentions are obvious (it’s an attempt to curb voyeurism). However, it’s the first step down a slippery slope towards requiring the same thing on every camera, long after technological advances have allowed the feature of silent cameras. (The shutter on my Nikon Coolpix L18 is barely audible from 5 feet away.) That can’t be good.

As bad as that may be, the implications for private investigators and law enforcement are particularly nasty. While an exception could be written into the bill, it makes much more sense to just not pass this bill in the first place.

It is also an attack on the freedom of programmers, who if I read this correctly, will face legal sanctions for disabling this “feature” of the new breed of photographic gadgets.

My favorite quote from the article:

As for politicians and parents who are worried about surreptitious cell phone camera users lurking around in dressing rooms and parks, they might want to, well, watch their children. Just a thought.