A thoughtful piece by independent developer Allen Pike on the best way to move the mountain that is Apple. Consider this quote from Apple’s App Store Review Guidelines:
If your App is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to. If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps.
So what’s an indie developer to do? What’s the best way to affect change? An interesting read.
[via iOS Dev Weekly]
As a member of the press for over 15 years, Apple’s attitude towards them always bugged me. But they have a point here. There’s a difference between Trashing them, and telling your story.
And Apple does seem to know the difference, because there are times when they reverse a decision when it’s obvious they made a bad call.
Indeed, “Apple”, “Microsoft” and “Google” are not a monolithic, vindictive entities. Sometimes, there are corporate policies and practices that make lives difficult for consumers and “collaborators”. Most of the time, however, it’s about navigating yourself amongst humans who, aside from who their employer is, is human just like us. Many are good, nice, helpful folks. Some are not.
I will never forget the Apple genius who replaced my iPhone without cost after I told him honestly that I dropped it in the ocean. Policy didn’t require him to do that. He did because, as he said, “Apple appreciates honest, loyal customers.” But it was him, not Apple, who put the appreciation in practice.
That sort of replacement happens more often than not at Apple because Apple fosters the type of community that encourages this behavior. Try the same thing at a Samsung or Sony store.
FWIW … This is one of the rare cases where “effect” is the correct verb, rather than “affect.”