Apple censors a dictionary

Neither is an iPhone app, it's content on a corporate platform.

I think you'll find the care-factor is close to zero among normal people.

So people chat about stuff they've read on non-technical news sites (like the shaken baby story which was particularly retardedly reported). How does that factor into the decision of "I'll buy a nokia or a Samsung phone instead because then at least I won't have an app store to worry about"? (and yes, I know Nokia has an app store, but only in the same way they are places you can download Windows Mobile apps from, i.e. it's a checkbox item rather than something people actually use). I don't see anyone who owns an iPhone getting rid of it for the barrens that is other phones and as my office is gradually filling up with iPhone owners, the only reasons I hear for not getting one are the same as always: Cost and size.

And since you mentioned the shaken baby story... Was that bad that it was allowed on the app store to begin with or bad because Apple bowed to media (yes, media not customer) outrage and removed it? Would it be allowed now if it was adult rated? If not, are games like Silent Hill or Resident Evil going to be allowed?

Some people want everything not child-friendly banned, some people want nothing banned, but most people have 'opinions' on what should and shouldn't be allowed on a case by case basis and the problem with that is that there isn't some big committee working on approving these apps, there one (probably minimum wage) employee with a set of guidelines that can't possibly cover every eventuallity (since it's hard to quantify "will this cause a media frenzy?" as a rule that a minimum-wager can apply). For example, people say it's OK at have swear words in a dictionary app because all dictionaries have those words in them and we let children use them. But it wouldn't be OK to have them in other software like a game were the character swears whenever they get hit or whatever. How do frame a guideline for that other than saying "no swear words except for dictionaries"? To write that rule and rules like it, you'd have to anticipate every kind of app that's ever going to be written.

Ultimately Apple does have the right to control what apps they publish on criteria that applied equally (just like Nintendo did for many years not allow blood and gore in games). And of course mistakes are sometimes going to be made because or the way approvals are handled when there are tens of thousands of apps instead of a few per month. I trust they'll sort most of them out in the long run, but if you think there would be any less fuss if Apple just made it a free-for-all and allowed people to publish whatever they liked, which is the only viable alternative, then you're mistaken.

I guess if you think it's been unfairly denied you could sue them, but good luck with that. The developer agreement includes plenty of vague clauses which allow Apple to deny almost anything, but there's still the legal principle that it should be applied reasonably. If developers have a good case (such as a similar app that was not denied despite apparently breaking the same rule) and Apple refused to change their minds, you could sue.

Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of complaining about the app approval process (and other business issues to do with the app store) among signed developers. It's just the idea among the general nerd community (many of who, it's safe to say have reason to spread dissent), that any of this will lead to imminent demise of iPhone is just laughable. People have to realise that the tech media writes about these app rejection stories because they have to write about something and the popularity of the iPhone means it gets more coverage than everthing else put together. It's not a reflection of what people generally care about though any more than the stories on the evening news really represent what's important to the average person in the street. By taking part in the doom and gloom in forums people are just being sheep and playing along with the idea that it matters and frankly the whole subject is really really boring now.