
Banned for Life - lubomir
https://medium.com/@sgehrman/banned-for-life-c62f2404f66
======
_petronius
The author used other people's content, packaged them into an app, and then
repeatedly submitted the same app (with one minor modification -- the use of
someone else's content) to the Play store. 'Beta' apps or apps that you write
for close friends/family can be distributed via other means than the main app
market.

This article admits that he ignored all of the warnings he was given, and now
accuses Google of unfair business practice. I don't buy it.

There's a lot of logical contortion going on to dump the blame for this back
on Google. "The suspension email stated that I was trying to impersonate
another company" is followed quickly by "Well since Google was silent about
the exact reason for suspension..."; he even admits to intentionally ignoring
the warnings he was given because "if I thought a human at Google was giving
me the warning, I might have listened more carefully."

That is, at best, negligently poor reasoning. At worst, it's a contemptuous
disrespect for the other party you're engaging in business with, which is
pretty good grounds for them exercising their option to terminate that
business relationship.

Google, Amazon, etc., are for-profit commercial service providers. If you're
going to violate their policies, they will stop working with you, regardless
of the impact on your business. Anyone who depends on a third party supplier
for anything, in any business context, should keep that in mind -- they have
no duty to you beyond whatever contract you have signed (if, of course, you
have signed one).

~~~
Keyframe
Judging by the names of the apps/wrappers (if they were same in the store)
from here
[http://distantfutu.re/page/portfolio.html](http://distantfutu.re/page/portfolio.html)
he is lucky to not get sued at the same time as well. He's even argumentative
about trademark infringement in his post. I don't think he fully understands
what he really did wrong.

~~~
rrrx3
Agreed - the whole thing reads like a giant whine, to me. The author has zero
concept of what he's done wrong, which is astounding to me.

~~~
TuringTest
The question is, was the punishment proportional to the crime?

The 'whine' was about being banned for life because of novice mistakes made
without bad faith. How is one supposed to learn the ropes? It's like learning
to drive in a country where driving schools didn't exist and the full extent
of traffic laws applied to you. How possibly _could_ the author learn what he
was doing wrong?

~~~
danielweber
The majority of the post was "it's their fault that they didn't stop me!"

When his first app was suspended, Google should have given a better response
when he asked what he did wrong. But to just continue forward doing the exact
same thing he was doing before was asking for trouble. If Google wouldn't give
him a clear answer, he should have asked his friends or the community.

~~~
TuringTest
According to the timeline, all the applications that got his account suspended
were already in place when he got the first notice. So it's not as if he
_continued_ doing the same thing - he was sacked by inaction, and the warnings
didn't contain sufficient notice that more action (removing the other
applications, which hadn't got a warning yet) was required on his part.

------
JamesMcMinn
The author used others people's content and spammed with play store with
official sounding apps, then ignored warnings to stop. Got caught and punished
for it, now Google won't let him do it again.

Honestly, it just sounds like Google were doing the right thing and protecting
it's users from low quality spam apps.

~~~
cookiecaper
The author didn't use other people's content. He simply used the YouTube APIs
for exactly what they're there for -- remixing the YouTube experience to match
a specific use case YouTube has not yet accommodated. What else are APIs
supposed to be used for?

The original uploader of that content still retained all control over the
content. If the original uploader didn't like his content being reskinned, he
shouldn't upload it on a provider that gives users that ability through an
API.

The potential problem is in the implication that the mark's owner endorsed the
application. The post claims that the the author made significant effort to
indicate he was unofficial. It's arguable whether this continued to constitute
infringement, and for that reason I think the guy should've at least been
given a polite human touch and a direct, non-automated opportunity to correct
the _specific_ issue, which was never directly elucidated ("Impersonating how?
I'm just using the YouTube APIs that Google published for me to use...").

I'm not saying that the author has great judgment. I'm just saying that
Google's actions aren't really proportional, that the author's actions are not
at all as illegal as everyone is saying, and that Google should recognize that
they have a social responsibility to at least follow-up on things like this
_with a human_ to clear up any potential miscommunication. An expectation of
care in account deletion is one of the side effects of knowing and doing
everything about and for everyone. It's a big deal to lose big chunks of your
Google account.

~~~
JamesMcMinn
So using YouTube's API to use other people's content isn't using other
people's content? I don't follow the logic there.

Yes, he was not banned simply because he used other people's content. He was
banned because he was using other people's content to create low quality apps
which (even if unintentionally) imitated official applications. Taking someone
else's content and serving it up in a way that looks like it's official is
just asking to be banned, especially when the thing you're imitating is
YouTube and the app is on the Play store.

If someone is, for all intents and purposes, spamming your app store with
imitation apps, why should you waste time giving them a "polite human touch"?
If this had been a Chinese company rather than someone with a sob story would
you still expect Google to offer a polite human touch?

~~~
Dylan16807
>So using YouTube's API to use other people's content isn't using other
people's content? I don't follow the logic there.

It's not using it _without permission_. That's what the API is there for, to
let you use the content in certain ways such as what the app did. The only
issue was branding, and this is a severe overreaction to a branding issue.

------
ripb
>1 app, 2 apps, 10 apps? Did it matter either way? I could have posted 50 apps
if I wanted

>So I was using the app store as my beta testing platform.

>I was planning on taking all these apps down in a few weeks anyway.

>I thought I could get maybe 20-30 apps suspended without repercussions

>In this age of Google, it’s now “obey or face an instant lifetime ban.” This
is progress? What does the future hold if we are forced to strictly obey and
understand every legal gotcha in Google’s terms of service? I believe in
freedom, not blind obedience. I made some mistakes and would have removed all
my apps if I had known the true consequences.

He spammed the Google Play store with multiple unfinished versions of the same
applications for "beta testing", received warnings which he chose to ignore
and then got banned for his gross abuse of the service.

Instead of "I messed up, here's a warning to others" it's a case of "why don't
Google let me mess around with their service as much as I like? This is
oppression, this is America goddamnit, where's muh freedom?!?"

Zero sympathy. Well done to Google on taking down one of the many people
spamming the Play store with junk.

~~~
bengillies
Getting banned from publishing apps to the Play Store is reasonable and
proportional. Getting banned from all Google services whether related or not
seems a bit much imho.

------
Cthulhu_
> Anyone using my simplistic beta quality app would know instantly that this
> is not “official”

A silly assumption that both generalizes the audience and is ignorant of
copyright laws, imo. Not a valid argument in a court situation either. I could
make the crappiest Geocities site out there, but as soon as I put a Google
logo somewhere, people may assume it is an official Google site or affiliated
with it.

> One of my apps contained the channel id for Vice.com. Since the length of
> the app name is so limited I decided on “Vice TV”

Yup, there you go. Using a brand name, showing a brand's video - intent isn't
the issue here, the author was impersonating Vice.com there.

The author is guilty of being naive and lax about copyright and trademark
laws, imo.

~~~
stevejones
So you complain about being ignorant about copyright laws then demonstrate
complete ignorance of them. Copyright has nothing to do with it.

~~~
Someone1234
The apps contained icons taken from third parties and then utilised to
advertise these apps. So copyright is very much in play here, as well as
trademark infringement.

As to your jab at the person above, it might have come across better if it was
even remotely constructive. For example, you could explain WHY you feel they
misunderstand copyright rather than just waving your hands around and claiming
that they're "completely ignorant."

------
jpwagner
Sure Google is a private company. Sure this means they have no formal
responsibility to this developer. Programmatically, he seems to deserve to be
sanctioned: he violated their policies for several weeks with several
different apps.

 _I emailed Google back and asked them to tell me exactly what I need to
change to be compliant with the rules. Is it the icon? The name? The
disclaimer? What? Google refused to give me any additional information._

But if his story is true, he makes good faith efforts to be compliant. What,
if any, is the social responsibility a company has that owns half the market
of mobile development platforms to people that could potentially make a living
using their platform? Monopolies/duopolies throw a wrench in the invisible
hand, and I'm not sure there's a clear answer.

~~~
krschultz
A good faith effort would be reading the terms & conditions. He obviously
didn't, because they are quite clear about not being able to put other
companies' names in your app name.

If the article was about someone that had this happen, and they read the
conditions and didn't see anything that they had violated, and then asked
Google - that would be a different story. This guy just can't be bothered to
put the effort in himself.

~~~
msandford
Yeah because I'm sure the T&C is only a page or two long, not like say 50k
words.

[https://play.google.com/intl/en_us/about/play-
terms.html](https://play.google.com/intl/en_us/about/play-terms.html)

The idea that you should have to scrutinize that entire document to determine
what you did wrong is crazy.

Ostensibly someone on the Google side of things determined what he did that
was not OK right? I mean they don't just ban people for the hell of it right?
He had to do something SPECIFICALLY wrong, and that might correspond to some
portion of the T&C. Is it so unreasonable to ask WHAT section you're
violating?

I get that everyone on HN thinks the guy is a douche and deserves what he got.
But to refuse to even say what? That's douchey too.

~~~
krschultz
It's _not_ crazy. Guess what, sometimes publishing an app is more than just
writing code. I've had to dig through them before too. Compared to what the
iOS team has to deal with I consider it a pretty lightweight process.

If you just want to hack around with some code, then post the APK somewhere
and tell your friends to download it. If you want to _publish an app_ in an
app store, that is a fundamentally different thing. It's not even engineering.
This is what product managers and legal teams deal with at companies. If you
are a solo app publisher, you still have to deal with it. You don't get to opt
out of these costs just because it's not fun.

Those aren't even the right T&C. These are the developer ones, and they're
even shorter.

[https://play.google.com/about/developer-distribution-
agreeme...](https://play.google.com/about/developer-distribution-
agreement.html)

[https://play.google.com/about/developer-content-
policy.html](https://play.google.com/about/developer-content-policy.html)

If you stick both into word, that's only 16 pages of stuff to read. Don't
claim to be an engineer if you can't wade through 16 pages of specs. And the
relevant part for this discussion is on page 1, the 4th bullet point after
"Hate Speech", "Violence & Bullying", and "Sexually Explicit Material". It's
not exactly buried.

~~~
msandford
If I sue someone for something I don't get to just say "your honor, look at
the law and this contract, they're clearly violating it!" and blammo get a
judgement against them. I have to enumerate my claims as to what they did
wrong. I have to CITE things.

Should we hold Google to the same standard that we hold the criminal justice
system? No obviously not.

But if it's so obvious what portion of the T&C he's breaking surely a
hyperlink to that portion of the document should take only a second to
generate. And if it's not obvious and requires some nuanced thought then
perhaps a paragraph explaining would be warranted. And some links.

But to suggest that Google explaining itself would prove some kind of undue
burden on Google for their actions is ridiculous! They've already hired people
to police this kind of stuff. To suggest that Google couldn't have these human
reviewers take a second to explain their decisions (at a fairly lost cost)
boggles the mind.

~~~
krschultz
_" The suspension email stated that I was trying to impersonate another
company, and that this was forbidden."_

 _Impersonation or Deceptive Behavior: Don 't pretend to be someone else, and
don't represent that your app is authorized by or produced by another company
or organization. .. Apps must not have names or icons that appear confusingly
similar to existing products_

I don't know how Google can be any more clear about that. By the authors own
admission, the email used the _exact same words_ as the T&C he violated. If I
had to bet, there was a link in there to page. You're arguing here without
actually reviewing the underlying documents.

~~~
msandford
"Apps must not have names or icons that appear confusingly similar to existing
products"

Okay so then a single extra sentence stating "The icon and name you have
chosen are unacceptable because you are not X, Y or Z and constitute
impersonation in our opinion" would have cleared up all the problems.

But that didn't happen did it? Nope!

------
oskarth
Did OP do something wrong? Yes, definitely. Is being banned from all other
Google-related activities forever without recourse proportional? No. The
response - being the sum of all its direct consequences - is tyrannical, and
worse, automatic and faceless. Unless you enjoy being A Perfectly Obedient
Citizen (TM), the only real lesson here is to not put all your eggs in one
basket. Use Google, use Apple, but beware of letting them have full control of
important parts of your life.

~~~
girvo
I use their devices... but my data I own, at least as much as possible. I
don't know what I did before ownCloud...

------
justinpaulson
"These warnings to me felt like the warnings on a plastic bag telling you not
to put it over your head"

And yet you still put the bag over your head and took a deep breath! Why not
just remove the ten apps and use common sense to determine that naming your
apps after another company's product is a bad idea??

------
mimog
Good. I wish all the people developing crappy and useless apps, flooding the
place, would get banned. You publish 10 different apps where the only thing
that changes is the youtube channel, and claim you were beta testing? I hope
Apple and Microsoft ban you as well.

~~~
Iftheshoefits
The most amusing thing is that the Play Store has an incredibly easy way
_alpha_ test as well as beta test versions that are distributed only to users
who have signed up for testing. In fact, when you upload the apk to the store
it's almost literally impossible to miss it. The one issue I have with their
test mechanism is that test users have to have an account with Google(even if
it's just membership to a single Google Group).

What the OP did was publish spammy garbage. Not to say Google couldn't afford
to put a more human touch on their customer and developer relations, but the
OP is just way out of line on this one.

------
VLM
"Google could have, and still could block my gmail"

They have a different revenue generation business model for gmail.

My son's account was blocked, couldn't figure out why, and they wouldn't say.
I suspect some kind of data mining thing where watching more than 5000
blitzwinger videos on youtube "proves" you're a kid or a teen. He does like
his video games...

He falls into that gap between being old enough to have an account per
google's rules, but young enough to not have his own credit card or a drivers
license (they'd accept a scanned copy of his DL, but he's not 16 yet) so the
only option to reinstate his account was to get Dad (me) to charge 50 cents on
his CC to "prove" he's of legal age.

So part of the gmail business model is to hold kids (teens) accounts hostage
with a threat of permanent deletion until Dad pays 50 cents. I'm not annoyed
at the 50 cents, gmail is worth a large multiple of that. I am annoyed that at
a random time long after BAU was initiated, they felt like charging us for
fun.

It is possible the gmail biz model of randomly applied fees could be applied
to play store / wallet accounts.

Not sure if OP would have flown off into as much of a rage for a $50
reinstatement fee, or if he'd be like me, pissed off at the "business
agreement" being unilaterally rewritten at a later date. Either way, the gmail
biz model does appear to be superior to the play/wallet/app store biz model,
at least GOOG would get some revenue, however little.

I assume based on evidence Google dropped the "don't be evil" motto a long
time ago.

~~~
me1010
I know lots of people don't know how to setup an email server. But gmail, as
an email account, is worth less than $10/month. And, in fact, your ISP
probably includes several email accounts with your internet service. If your
child needs an email account, just assign him one...

If you have Verizon, here's how... [8 extra]
[http://www.verizon.com/Support/Residential/Internet/HighSpee...](http://www.verizon.com/Support/Residential/Internet/HighSpeed/Email/Setup+And+Use/Setup+And+Use.htm)

If you have Comcast, here's how... [5 extra]
[http://customer.comcast.com/help-and-
support/internet/adding...](http://customer.comcast.com/help-and-
support/internet/adding-new-user-names-or-email-addresses/)

If you have Cablevision, here's how... [4 extra]
[http://optimum.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1673/~/c...](http://optimum.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1673/~/creating-
optimum-online-e-mail-addresses)

So, in point of fact, gmail - as a 'free' email service - is actually a huge
additional COST, considering the payment in privacy. And this is why I do not
use it myself...

~~~
omnibrain
I advice against using your ISP's email service. What happens with your email
address when you switch providers? Are you going to mail all your contacts
with your new email address and update it at every service you ever registered
for?

~~~
me1010
I agree, if the email account is going to be used for long term purposes.
However, an email account for someone at the high school level should be fine.
Presumably, the kid is going to go to a college somewhere - and will use the
college account until such time as the kid graduates and moves on into the
'real' world -- whatever that means. I'm just trying to say that a gmail
account for a kid isn't a necessary burden that needs rescuing at even the
meager upfront cost of $0.50... plus the massive cost in lost privacy - which
is an ongoing fee into the indeterminable future...

------
M4v3R
> I continued to be an Apple fan until they announced the “walled garden” and
> the app review process for iOS. I am totally against having to get
> permission from a corporation to write and sell apps (...). All Apple
> products are banned in my household to make a statement about programmer
> freedom.

> Now my Google play account and Google Wallet account are both banned for
> life. I’m no longer able to write Android apps ever again, and my family and
> I can’t even use Google wallet to purchase from Google Play.

So much for programmer freedom. Apple is at least very explicit about its
rules. Google seemingly lets you do whatever you want, but then bans you if
you do something that they don't like. Now of course one can say that the ban
is justified, as author clearly misused the Play store and didn't follow the
guidelines.

If he did try to do that on the App Store his apps would be probably instantly
rejected, but he would not be banned. The funny thing is that there's a big
chance that he would then write a blog post about how App Store is a "walled
garden" and that on Play store that would be OK.

~~~
icebraining
The rule is explicit: it's called trademark law. You can't just copy the name
and logo of another company, append " TV" and distribute it publicly.

This is an official app of The Verge:
[http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Ios&appID=54251...](http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Ios&appID=542512225)

This is OP's unofficial app:
[http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Android&appID=c...](http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Android&appID=com.sickboots.sickvideos.theverge)

It's pretty clear that this is prone to cause confusion, even with the
disclaimer.

~~~
wolfgke
Quotes from the article:

"I emailed Google back and asked them to tell me exactly what I need to change
to be compliant with the rules. Is it the icon? The name? The disclaimer?
What? Google refused to give me any additional information. So, I just left
the app in the suspended state and never attempted to update it since I really
didn’t know what I needed to change"

"Why didn’t you give the apps a different name?

Well since Google was silent about the exact reason for suspension, I didn’t
know what I needed to do. Was it the app name? Probably, but I didn’t know for
sure."

If Google does not inform you in detail that it was the trademark that was
violated, they have no right to ban you on that reason.

~~~
tripzilch
But the initial app suspension email from Google _did_ say he was violating
trademark.

~~~
wolfgke
But which one?

------
danielweber
If you ever find yourself making this argument:

 _I didn’t think they would mind, I thought I was doing them a favor. Pointing
people to their great content. It’s free advertising_

then stop. Other people don't want your "free" advertising.

------
IanDrake
Microsoft was known as the Borg, but that was poorly placed. Google has been
more of a Borg than MS ever was.

Google has decided to automate everything. There is no way to get actual help
across their entire product line. Having problems with your adwords account?
It doesn't matter if you spend $20K month, you get automatic email responses
to your queries with obnoxious links to the help system that you've already
read.

While I agree that author did more wrong than he realizes, he also asked
Google for an explanation to their objection, to which he received no
response. I guess the Borg NLP engine was down that day and couldn't find the
appropriate form letter.

Whatever you think about this author, you can't deny the danger of relying on
one ecosystem so heavily. Google is the worst. At least Apple would have
denied his app with a reason which he could have corrected.

------
neil_s
Summary: No sympathy for the blog author, but its still terrifying how broad
Google's ban-hammer can be if you run afoul of them.

~~~
puredemo
idk, these are a bunch of products I barely even knew about.

I thought google wallet went away around the same time google wave did, for
instance.

~~~
ZoFreX
It's the only way you can buy content (apps, music, books etc) and devices
from the Play Store. If you use Android, not having a functioning Wallet is
extremely limiting.

------
baldfat
March 25th post that was on Hacker News at least twice already. This is the
only article on his blog.

Here is hi github page:
[https://github.com/sgehrman](https://github.com/sgehrman) He is still
developing. I am wondering what the updated status is on this? Seems that if
he is still developing he isn't banned for life?

There already were some petition at [https://www.change.org/petitions/sergey-
brin-respect-the-eff...](https://www.change.org/petitions/sergey-brin-respect-
the-efforts-of-small-and-indie-android-
developers?recruiter=86686242&utm_campaign=twitter_link&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=share_petition+via+%40Change)

~~~
Cthulhu_
So that petition is accusing one dude in Google of disrespecting 'small and
indie android developers' when they're blatantly violating trademark law?
Lols.

~~~
fuzzywalrus
Never underestimate the pariah complex...

While it'd be nice for Google to explain why he was banned, it already sounds
like he understands why he was banned but he had a chance to grand-stand so
he's on his soapbox.

------
aaronem
I started laughing at the bit about all Apple products being banned in his
household to make a statement about freedom, and I just didn't stop.

------
arsalanb
After just skimming through the post, I have a question for OP. Why did you
create 10 different apps? Why not just one app, that gave the user the ability
to enter a channel name and check out all their videos? I think that's better,
both in terms of not spamming — for the lack of a better work — the Play
Store, as well as UX.

I'm afraid the actions taken by Google in this case can be justified, since
publishing 10 apps a day is a dubious figure. However, I'll give it to you,
they could've made the regulations regarding this a little more explicit and
visible.

~~~
icebraining
_Why not just one app, that gave the user the ability to enter a channel name
and check out all their videos?_

According to the article, that's what he was working on after releasing the 10
apps.

 _However, I 'll give it to you, they could've made the regulations regarding
this a little more explicit and visible._

It's called trademark law. It's very explicit that you can't copy the logo and
name of another company.

------
true_religion
Has anyone read the list of other developers who've gotten suspended?

> [http://blog.hutber.com/how-my-google-devlopers-account-
> got-t...](http://blog.hutber.com/how-my-google-devlopers-account-got-
> terminated-with-no-option-to-appeal/)

This guy here writes an app called "Sex Diaries Alpha", and has it rejected
because of pornographic purpose. He then assumes that its because he used a
picture a cartoon donkey as the icon, so he reploads "Sex Diaries Test" with a
picture of a cartoon _girl_ instead.

More repetitions follow. He never once thinks its perhaps the name 'sex
diaries' or the stated purpose of the app. Nope, maybe its the fact that this
picture has a nipple, or this is cartoon bondage.

> [http://andrewpearson.org/?p=681](http://andrewpearson.org/?p=681)

This guy writes an app and stuffs it with 100s of keywords (as one could see
by checking the same app in the 3rd party app store), then he complains he
isn't in violation because you could play all those artists through his
generic music player, and google didn't cap the number of keywords you could
use. So he's not in violation. He knows this for sure, because he's an
attorney.

> [https://groups.google.com/forum/#%21searchin/android-
> develop...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#%21searchin/android-
> developers/adsense/android-developers/5qBdcAzmE-g/GdvJf4Sv0eEJ)

This guy says that Google transfered $4000 of android sales into his adsense
account so they could pay him for non-US sales, but they failed to verify his
account since he didn't have $10 worth of adsense budget. Then they disabled
the entire account due to invalid clicks on a dead-end blog. If his story is
actually true, he should get a lawyer and I feel this is really the time that
Google customer service would be nice.

------
TuringTest
...and thus, the natural consequences of walled-garden markets begin to rear
their ugly heads.

It was all love and rainbows while the gold rush held it promise of instant
richness and fame, wasn't it?

------
mikehall314
It's an unfortunately common idea that copyright violation is sometimes okay
because it amounts to "free advertising" for the organisation whose content
you're co-opting. I was disappointed to see that argument made here.

------
fishnchips
I wouldn't call the OP blameless but there is a lesson here: it is dangerous
for a professional software developer to become too invested in one technology
or platform, especially with a capricious corporate overlord behind it.

------
tomordonez
I understand that an app is content wrapped around a concept. It is common
sense not to use a known name unless you are asking for trouble. I could make
a news app. Do I want to name it CNN? No, unless I am authorized to use that
name. It is naive to think you can use just any name, even if you meant good.
You are looking for trouble. Next time call it something else. The video app.
Learn by Watching...I mean you couldn't come up with another name?

~~~
VLM
The problem is he specifically tried to figure out if that was the problem and
google wouldn't say. Perhaps he got the banhammer for not getting using a (TM)
after the brand name in the descriptions. Perhaps he's actually in trouble for
not getting permission for some of the content in the screenshots. All of that
is probably a good idea. But specifically, he will never know why he got the
banhammer and we will never know either.

The problem with whatever-as-a-service business model, is you're never worth
more than a penny more to the provider than the cost of sales to replace you
when/if you leave. So, people are throwing themselves at google to be an app
dev, so I guess he's worth precisely nothing at all to GOOG.

A business relationship where one side is worthless to the other is best
described as parasitism and often that doesn't turn out well for the parasite.
That is the true lesson for all app developers to learn from this story. An
inherent part of the biz model is you can get annihilated and the host (host
as in parasite lifecycle model) will not care. Make sure you understand that,
when making business decisions.

------
joshdance
I think the best comment, which was buried in the replies was this:

"There is a guide and it's pretty clear:
[https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-
developer/answ...](https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-
developer/answer/2986097?hl=en) \- For example, if your app displays the
brand, icon, or title from another app [...] your apps can be suspended and
your developer account terminated."

------
ericfrederich
Don't believe you

You were a die hard Apple fan boy since '85 even during their darkest times...
then you can't provide your users updates within hours so you...

"threw out my macs, smashed my iPhones, switched my whole family to Ubuntu and
Android."

[http://www.reactiongifs.us/wp-
content/uploads/2013/09/dont_b...](http://www.reactiongifs.us/wp-
content/uploads/2013/09/dont_believe_you_anchorman.gif)

~~~
fredoralive
I'll be a pedant and point out that bit of hyperbole has a bit of an odd
timeline issue. It seems to say he jumped ship to Android when the app store
was announced. But iPhone OS 2 which introduced the walled garden app store
came out before Android 1.0.

Plus, if you're so worried about things like walled gardens, why buy a phone
that doesn't officially allow third party native apps like the iPhone with
v1.x OS?

------
yonran
A lot of people think that the author deserved the punishment for his
stupidity. However, I think he had an important point that needs to be
discussed: that he was dismissed without a fair hearing and was banned for
life from services unrelated to the one on which he committed the offense.

I think this is a growing problem that more people need to be aware of. We do
not have the _right_ to use modern marketplaces (such as the Google Play
Store, Apple App Store, Google Adwords, AirBnB, Ebay, Uber, etc.) Instead, we
have _permission_ from corporations to use them. If an individual bases his
livelihood on sales through one of these and then makes a mistake, the company
is likely to ban him, destroying his income. There is currently no guarantee
of due process or proportional punishment. When you are banned from the
majority marketplace, one often has no real alternative. Can anyone make a
living selling his goods on the second most popular auction site?

I think we need to fight for the right to due process and fair punishment
online.

------
api
"I was a die hard Apple fan since 1985 and was an Apple developer all through
the darkest days of the Apple death spiral. I continued to be an Apple fan
until they announced the “walled garden” and the app review process for iOS. I
am totally against having to get permission from a corporation to write and
sell apps, and I certainly don’t think I should be forced to sell my work
through their store and their store only."

Regardless of the merits of this particular authors' case, I'm frankly
astounded that more people don't seem to care about this aspect of mobile
platforms. I remember the _uproar_ the Microsoft caused in the 1990s with
their "trusted computing" trial balloon, and the uproar that locked PC BIOSes
continue to create today. Yet you change the form factor a little and nobody
cares. Wow.

~~~
rmrfrmrf
I think you missed the part where Microsoft and Apple had completely different
core businesses.

~~~
api
I'm talking about how mobile platforms are completely locked down and gated,
with app stores taking ~30% of your app revenue and no ability to install what
you want.

That sort of thing would _never_ have been tolerated in the PC world, yet in
the mobile work nobody seems to care.

------
pessimizer
Would they have cut off his Nest? If google since G+ thinks of itself as a
single product, it might not be smart to let them into your house, or to
depend on them for anything important.

That being said, these kinds of apps are what make the phone app market a
cesspool. Would the iOS app store accept youtube channel viewers?

------
juliob
Google's culture of automated customer service continues a long tradition of
poor people skills, and disdain for feelings and livelihoods, as well as their
own reputation. I was contemplating switching from AWS to the Google Cloud,
but it's posts like this that remind me that, oh yeah, I myself have been
unjustly banned twice from one of their services.

Google cannot be trusted to handle relationships, whether with developers or
companies. It's clear that they don't care and that's fine. They have their
niche for providing services to those who don't mind the lack of the human
touch. Just not for me.

------
pnathan
Google is extremely well known for poor customer service in account
management. That should not surprise _anyone_ at this point. Automated bans
and automated denial of appeal are pretty par for the course from the stories
I've read.

That said, I'm not sure I actually side with the author outside of that point
of agreement. Looks like the apps were mega shady.

I would advise the author to (1) not place their trust in a corporation again,
and to secure their business & personal affairs against single points of
failure, (2) not make shady software, and finally (3) consult a lawyer on the
implementation of the law and contracts.

------
dictum
1\. Don't repackage other people's content. Especially with their trademarks
attached. If they had no role in creating the app, don't be a jerk. If you
want to make a video app, make a general-purpose video app and teach your
users how to add channels.

2\. I can't help but appreciate the karma angle of someone who tried to
repackage web content as apps getting bitten by the gatekeepers of the walled
garden.

3\. Ah, Google, the business that would certainly still exist (and be as large
and powerful as it currently is) had it been forbidden to ever skirt the
limits of copyright law...

------
tuhrig
I don't understand his whole logic. He publishes the same app 10 times for
different channels. One after another gets banned and he even thinks this
proves that the rest is OK. He says that he made "beta apps written for my
kids", but he puts it on the biggest app store in the world. He says an app to
display videos is worth 50.000$, 10 times the same app is worth 500.000$. He
says it was a free project, but he made it to collect user data for his
commercial project.

------
tripzilch
It's pretty clear to me.

First, what the guy did was wrong, and he appears pretty stupid, pretending to
be stupid, or both.

Google is generally known for their abysmal communication and "customer
service", but in this case they were in fact pretty clear about the problem
right when the first app got suspended.

He can whine all he want but Google's decision to ban his Android developer
account was not too unreasonable.

 _However_ even with that in mind I do believe that they went completely
overboard with the decisions to also ban-for-life his Google Wallet and Google
Music accounts. Those are completely unrelated to this matter[0], and
escalated this thing out of proportion.

It is kind of frightening they will just take those things as "collateral" for
violating a bunch of rules on a completely different service that just also
happens to be part of the Google ecosystem. It starts to become and look like
a state that way (hello, cyberpunk future), but with a state you should also
have clear rules and ways of appeal. Google definitely doesn't have a
meaningful version the the latter.

People depend on all sorts of services that Google provides, and the ability
to take all or any of them away (there are no laws) because you violated an
unrelated rule, is an amount of power that should come with mechanisms that
keep it in check.

Indeed what if they instead had taken his GMail account?

[0] unless there is more that the author is not telling us, which is not at
all unlikely.

------
chrisBob
The author should also do a quick search (perhaps with bing, DuckDuckGo, or
Yahoo) on PayPal accounts being blocked. He recommends this as the safe
option, trusted option, but I have seen more PayPal banned for life rants than
google ones. With PayPal you can loose your account just because your
customers are using stolen cards.

The lesson should be that basing a business on _any_ single external resource
could be an issue, and you should approach it carefully.

------
X-Istence
Apple is banned in the household, because walled garden, and yet he doesn't
see the Google Play Store as a walled garden... oh boy, this guy is going to
go far.

------
chasing
"Because I had listened to the leaders at Google say that the open web, open
source and freedom are important values at Google, and I fully agree with that
ideal."

"All Apple products are banned in my household to make a statement about
programmer freedom."

"I believe in freedom, not blind obedience."

This guy comes off as being a bit naive. And/or dishonest in his telling of
this story...

------
logicallee
I stopped reading at "So, I threw out my macs, smashed my iPhones, switched my
whole family to Ubuntu and Android." (Because nobody does that, specifically
the first two things.) BTW until this line I was relating strongly with the
author and especially the stuff about supporting a family.

Never got to find out the meat of the story. Oh well - it was promising and I
was looking forward to it, I kind of wish I didn't realize what I was reading.
(i.e. a fabrication.)

Basically, I don't find the sentence credible, nor am able to read it in
context as an exaggeration or metaphorical, it's presented as fact, and I lost
interest.

This is written by a marketer, not a developer. i.e. it's "a paid lie" (if we
are cynical), or more generously it's allegory, that I don't have time to
read. None of this stuff happened, in my judgment.

Granted I didn't read the 3900 word essay so I could be wrong - I stopped at
word 278. It's just my impression that this story takes you for a ride.

------
kelvin0
Google's 'normal' support is horrendous and it takes forever to get someone to
even pretend to help you. We had a paying google app engine account for our
company... I've dealt with them, and it`s a pain to say the least. Now I can
only imagine how they treat people who they consider 'deliquent' (not saying
that the author is one)

------
avz
I'm absolutely astonished by the degree of egocentric delusion, arrogance and
lack of self-criticism displayed by the author:

* he smashes thousands of dollars worth of equipment because the producer's business model no longer fits his idea of freedom,

* he writes a trivial wrapper app with no original content or behavior,

* he spams Google Play with ten versions of it hard-coding different YT channel IDs in each,

* he values this contribution to the Android ecosystem on about $500,000,

* his apps obviously infringe on trademarks and possibly copyrighted content,

* he ignores multiple warnings and app suspensions, because they don't tell him precisely what to change,

* he considers Google to be under the obligation to handhold him through the nature of his violation of the terms and conditions,

* after all this he continues to think he is in the right,

* he writes a rant and expects to receive sympathy riding on general disappointment in devs community with Google's admittedly lacking customer support.

Wow.

------
PythonicAlpha
The OP made some grave errors with his apps. But is it really a good reason,
to not tell him, what was going wrong and instead swinging the big hammer on
his head (life-long ban)?

Google once started with the slogan "Don't be evil".

By being the new "Judge Dredd" of the internet, it can just become, what it
never wanted to be. All that, just because Google tries to drive technology to
its extremes ("customer-service from hell").

This is going to be more and more important, because there exist only very few
major app-stores and very few major internet-payment systems (gladly, there
the situation could still change to the better). But I know, how much Paypal
was criticized because of his behavior and being a semi-monopolist in internet
payments.

With our today's trend to centralization -- I don't want to put my fate into
the hand of one of these new Judge Dredds.

~~~
g051051
They did tell him, didn't they? They told him 3 times.

~~~
PythonicAlpha
As much I understood, they did tell him not enough, that he could understand
what was wrong. Automated eMails are "customer-support from hell".

~~~
smoe
I have no experience with google customer support as a normal developer[1],
but I guess there is a vast amount of this kind of arguably spamy apps
submitted every day. On that scale it's probably hard and too time consuming
to distinguish naive from fraudulent developers.

For me its difficult to believe, that someone who has been a developer for so
long, really didn't think, that using another companies name in an app name,
use their logo – and removing their ads(?)[2] – couldn't lead to some sort of
serious problems.

The punishment might be too harsh, but defending yourself in this case with
70/80 rebelism and doing them a favor with "free advertisement" is just
bizarre.

[1] I've worked in the advertisement team of the biggest swiss news site, and
we got decent personal support from google. Unfortunately, i guess it is as
always in life: If you're big, others will listen to you. If not, you'll be
ignored.

[2] "No ads, no junk, just videos"
[http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Android&appID=c...](http://www.myappwiz.com/home/getapp?platform=Android&appID=com.sickboots.sickvideos.theverge)

~~~
AppSec
Googles' model is to allow apps without pre-screening. This model (trust but
verify) lends itself to having more spammy apps submitted to it (no proof,
just an educated guess). Google is providing a gateway for others to generate
income.

The OP stated: 1) They had a disclaimer in multiple places. 2) They reached
out explicitly because they weren't sure where the real problem existed. 3)
Only one app was notified at a time when multiple apps had been following the
same style and none were notified until later. Surely Google would want to
investigate whether the developer posted any other apps which might be in
violation? 4) Was not trying to nor had any interest in making any money off
of this set of apps.

It has been said, the OP was naive and should have pulled the apps after the
first notice since they were just beta. But any corporation that is providing
business support services really needs to fund a customer service desk with
real people. The fact that people use google for businesses like this knowing
this situation is really surprising.

------
pronoiac
I knew I'd seen this before. It looks like Medium's wacky URL structure is
bypassing the dupe checker. If you search for the hex code at the end[1], you
get the previous discussions.

From when this was first posted in March:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7478975](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7478975)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7569454](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7569454)

From May:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7855337](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7855337)

[1] like this:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?q=c62f2404f66#!/story/forever/0/c62f...](https://hn.algolia.com/?q=c62f2404f66#!/story/forever/0/c62f2404f66)

------
Donzo
He wants to know the difference between an app and the web: see Chubby Checker
settlement.

------
piratebroadcast
I used to make Android themes back in the day. I would wait until a game got
really popular on iOS and count on Android users checking the Android app
store for the same titles. I'd sell an "Angry Birds" phone theme for 99 cents.
Many Android users werent that technologically savvy and thought they were
buying the actual game. This went on for about 6 months. I was making serious
money. Eventually they caught on and I was banned from the store. I was a kid
and doing something a bit douchey but I definitely understand banning me.

This guy doesn't quite seem to feel the same way.

------
izzydata
Is there anyway to call google help directly? I've heard plenty of stories of
google automated email support that never adequately explains anything, but
I'm curious if you can actually call them.

If anyone has seen the movie "The Internship" there is a scene where they all
have to learn how to do phone support. I would find it very weird if that is
entirely a lie and it is nearly impossible to call them.

Also he smashed his apple devices because he disagrees with their ideals? That
seems kind of immature.

------
FiddlerClamp
He could sell the app outside the Play Store, of course. Nothing can stop him
from doing that (trademark issues aside) and collecting payment via PayPal,
etc.

------
desireco42
I had this happen to me with adwords, once you get your account suspended or
even before that, it is hard to get anyone to talk to you or have a way to
correct issue. If you are fresh at it and clueless you are almost certain you
will be banned.

Mostly this is due Google not having customer support, so you are just
interacting with machines.

It would be easier if we had more options, this way if you get kicked out by
apple and google, nothing else is left.

------
bg451
> The suspension email stated that I was trying to impersonate another
> company, and that this was forbidden.

> I decided on “Vice TV”

> I didn’t plan on trying to sell Vice TV

> I was also secretly hoping I would get a contract job out of this or someone
> might say, “Hey, add my blog and Facebook pages and I’ll buy the app from
> you.”

The last quotation isn't necessarily in context with the third one, but
nonetheless this guy was either stupidly naive or ignorant.

------
mark-r
Regardless of how you feel about this particular case, there are two things
that are troubling:

1\. Google is big enough to be an indispensable part of your life.

2\. Google doesn't believe in allowing human contact - it doesn't scale.
They've put all their eggs into the algorithm basket, and when the algorithm
decides you're guilty that's it. No appeal, at least not in any real sense.

It's a story that gets repeated over and over.

------
the_real_bto
The escalation from written warning to banned for life is a huge leap to make
in one step.

A month long suspension would get the point across.

------
wldcordeiro
That this guy was banned from Google Play is meaningless. He would have been
banned from the iTunes Store as well for apps like this. This post is just
getting traction because it's Google and HN has an axe to grind against them.

------
venomsnake
He is wrong. But the technology giants wield way too much power and must be
tamed.

------
Karunamon
Yeahh.. I'm finding it really hard to have much sympathy here. Spammy single-
content-source apps like this are a plague upon the store.

Furthermore, the author's ignorance of trademark really doesn't win them any
points.

------
JimmaDaRustla
The ignorance hurts my bones.

------
0x0
If he spent even 5 minutes looking at the ios sdk, he'd see that there's no
review process involved in distribution of beta apps to customers...

------
henrygrew
Google is a bully to say the least and they are not as open as you might
think, i learnt this when my adsense account got suspended.

------
59nadir
The __TL;DR __should be:

Google suspended my Google Wallet account when they shouldn't have.

------
bitJericho
I love how the tl;dr bit is at the end of the article. If I were too lazy to
read the entire article, why would I scroll to the end before closing?

"If one of their algorithms thinks you’re a bad guy, you’re banned for life."

In his case scratch out "thinks" and put in "knows"

------
remon
TL;DR version "Didn't read the rules, broke the rules, :("

------
jeffehobbs
Duh.

Honestly, why don't you just use a friend's account?

