22 thoughts on “The App Store rule even Apple ignores”
If Apple sticks to once per year, I really don’t care. The apps that annoy me do it multiple times per day.
This isn’t that though imho. It’s the store itself notifying you of an event. You can’t really think of the app store as an app in the normal sense really. Either way it’s a tempest in a teapot at the most.
It got me to disable anything but badges for the App Store.
“Either way it’s a tempest in a teapot”
Which Marco loves. 🙂
Well put lol.
But a rule is a rule, is it not?
If Congress passes a law(funny, I know) that says No Speeding, and then a member of congress speeds occasionally because they were late for a charitable event, does that make it ok? Could anyone who gets caught and fined for speeding(or anyone who abides by the law for that matter) not point to the hypocrisy? I was busy too! It was for a good cause! So who deserves special treatment and who doesn’t?
Can you see how this quickly becomes a rabbit hole nobody really wants to go down but we go down too often because ! Why even make the rule in the first place?
Hard questions, I know, for regular people who get bombarded with notifications in the first place, it’s only one, and it’s for a good cause.
BUT, for developers whose entire livelihood depends on some random app reviewer’s interpretations of the guidelines, these are important questions that have real consequences.
People who accuse Jim of never pointing out anything Apple does wrong should look at this link. Good post, Jim!
“If Congress passes a law…”
Bad analogy. Congress has passed all kinds of laws Congress is exempt from.
Patent law is an area that the us government is mostly immune to for example IIRC.
Yes, but if they passed a law, as they often do, with no exemption for themselves?
(I will give Apple a rules pass here if only because App Store itself is not an App Store app as such; it’s pre-installed.
Apple ought to obey as an example, though.)
Sad but true.
Yeah.
It is user-hostile, though, which is unusual for Apple.
(Ala the U2 thing; there’s a little strain of thought at Apple, maybe, that “because we think [U2 is awesome, RED is a great cause], we should shove it at users who will naturally agree and be glad”.
That never works out well.)
Is a rule a rule? A lot of rules are meant to be broken. I’m not saying all of them, but if the intent is to drive money to Apple’s most-loved charity and they’re doing it once a year, what’s the harm really?
I still haven’t got one of these notifications. Is it possible you had to sign up for them somewhere?
A law with an exemption for a class of people is different than a law that is generally applicable and broken.
You can’t really make that blanket statement. Some laws by their very nature require exemptions or exceptions.
You might just have missed the notification if you set it as a banner. I didn’t think I got one too but looking at the Notifications tab, I saw I got it yesterday.
Also, of course there are cases where flexibility trumps rule mongering, I understand that. But when rules and the enforcement of them become arbitrary, like the most recent incident with disallowing buttons in notifications, and a lot of people’s livelihood depends on those rules, it becomes a little more serious. Apple breaking one of their own guidelines while threatening to take down apps for developers breaking others sends the wrong message, that they admit that the rules are arbitrary and they don’t really care. Users might not care either and that might be Apple’s point. They cater to users. But if the environment is hostile to developers, they will stop creating innovative apps, sticking to safe, boring methods instead of trying out new things. Who’s at loss then?
omg. the definition of first world problems. do. not. care.
I agree. I’m saying that there’s a huge difference between breaking a law and doing something that is illegal for most other people, but legal for a certain group of people. A good example of this is refusing to testify because someone is your friend vs. because you are their clegyman or lawyer. The former is illegal, the latter is not.
Even in some cases your friend can legally refuse to testify. No law is absolute.
I’ll complain when it becomes more frequent and is trying to push Flappy Bird clones on me.
Is it? How many times have you seen a rule that is never broken, for which transgressions are always prosecuted?
And how many times have you seen this particular rule broken by developers?
I do have banners turned on, but I definitely never received it. I don’t know why. Perhaps you had to opt into it, or perhaps my phone was off and that notification was not queued for delivery later.
If Apple sticks to once per year, I really don’t care. The apps that annoy me do it multiple times per day.
This isn’t that though imho. It’s the store itself notifying you of an event. You can’t really think of the app store as an app in the normal sense really. Either way it’s a tempest in a teapot at the most.
It got me to disable anything but badges for the App Store.
“Either way it’s a tempest in a teapot”
Which Marco loves. 🙂
Well put lol.
But a rule is a rule, is it not?
If Congress passes a law(funny, I know) that says No Speeding, and then a member of congress speeds occasionally because they were late for a charitable event, does that make it ok? Could anyone who gets caught and fined for speeding(or anyone who abides by the law for that matter) not point to the hypocrisy? I was busy too! It was for a good cause! So who deserves special treatment and who doesn’t?
Can you see how this quickly becomes a rabbit hole nobody really wants to go down but we go down too often because ! Why even make the rule in the first place?
Hard questions, I know, for regular people who get bombarded with notifications in the first place, it’s only one, and it’s for a good cause.
BUT, for developers whose entire livelihood depends on some random app reviewer’s interpretations of the guidelines, these are important questions that have real consequences.
People who accuse Jim of never pointing out anything Apple does wrong should look at this link. Good post, Jim!
“If Congress passes a law…”
Bad analogy. Congress has passed all kinds of laws Congress is exempt from.
Patent law is an area that the us government is mostly immune to for example IIRC.
Yes, but if they passed a law, as they often do, with no exemption for themselves?
(I will give Apple a rules pass here if only because App Store itself is not an App Store app as such; it’s pre-installed.
Apple ought to obey as an example, though.)
Sad but true.
Yeah.
It is user-hostile, though, which is unusual for Apple.
(Ala the U2 thing; there’s a little strain of thought at Apple, maybe, that “because we think [U2 is awesome, RED is a great cause], we should shove it at users who will naturally agree and be glad”.
That never works out well.)
Is a rule a rule? A lot of rules are meant to be broken. I’m not saying all of them, but if the intent is to drive money to Apple’s most-loved charity and they’re doing it once a year, what’s the harm really?
I still haven’t got one of these notifications. Is it possible you had to sign up for them somewhere?
A law with an exemption for a class of people is different than a law that is generally applicable and broken.
You can’t really make that blanket statement. Some laws by their very nature require exemptions or exceptions.
You might just have missed the notification if you set it as a banner. I didn’t think I got one too but looking at the Notifications tab, I saw I got it yesterday.
Also, of course there are cases where flexibility trumps rule mongering, I understand that. But when rules and the enforcement of them become arbitrary, like the most recent incident with disallowing buttons in notifications, and a lot of people’s livelihood depends on those rules, it becomes a little more serious. Apple breaking one of their own guidelines while threatening to take down apps for developers breaking others sends the wrong message, that they admit that the rules are arbitrary and they don’t really care. Users might not care either and that might be Apple’s point. They cater to users. But if the environment is hostile to developers, they will stop creating innovative apps, sticking to safe, boring methods instead of trying out new things. Who’s at loss then?
omg. the definition of first world problems. do. not. care.
I agree. I’m saying that there’s a huge difference between breaking a law and doing something that is illegal for most other people, but legal for a certain group of people. A good example of this is refusing to testify because someone is your friend vs. because you are their clegyman or lawyer. The former is illegal, the latter is not.
Even in some cases your friend can legally refuse to testify. No law is absolute.
I’ll complain when it becomes more frequent and is trying to push Flappy Bird clones on me.
Is it? How many times have you seen a rule that is never broken, for which transgressions are always prosecuted?
And how many times have you seen this particular rule broken by developers?
I do have banners turned on, but I definitely never received it. I don’t know why. Perhaps you had to opt into it, or perhaps my phone was off and that notification was not queued for delivery later.