
Tell HN: Rejected from App Store - "customer damaging their iPhone." - qixxiq
"We've reviewed Airborne and determined we cannot post it to the App Store at this time because it encourages a physical activity that could result in a customer damaging their iPhone."<p>I had a great and simple idea for an application a while back. It was actually a pretty cool game, and I'm certain it would have spread like wildfire - but its rather understandable why Apple denied it.<p>The game simply asked a user to keep their phone airborne (i.e. by throwing it / dropping it onto soft surface) and then measured the amount of time it was in the air for. I threw in a looping scream as well as challenges to push further for good measure. There was a high score table too :).<p>I've been trying to work out a way to get something out of this for a while, but unfortunately haven't come up with anything reasonable -- so decided to just publish the source code.<p>Its all available at https://github.com/qix/airborne as GPLv3 (to the extent I'm allowed to by the Apple license.)
The code is pretty shocking, I was just fooling around while learning Objective-C.
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ljf
Rework it for Android, no pesky risk of rejection there ;)

I'd most likely install it on my android phone, if it were free/ad supported.
Could see it being a very viral game, with people finding interesting ways to
game the scoreboard.

This is what insurance is for, right?

~~~
bradleyland
Insurance is for abuse? Insurance is a contract between you and a company who
assesses risk by allowing you to buy risk relief at a fixed price. In your
contract, there is usually a stipulation that you agree not to intentionally
damage the insured "thing" or put said thing at risk.

I hope you'll reconsider the ethics of how you perceive insurance.

~~~
ljf
Sorry I should have included the <joke>tag</joke>.

~~~
reason
No, you shouldn't have. I understood the sarcasm. Some people here take things
way too literally and seriously.

~~~
bradleyland
I apologize for the incorrect assessment of the parent's message, but please
consider for a moment that rampant amount of insurance fraud that goes on all
the time. There's a reasonable amount of ambiguity as to whether or not the
comment was sarcastic.

~~~
ljf
No worries, I forget that humour doesn't travel well online -
<http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poes_Law> ;)

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lipowicztom
Recently i have started taking photos throwing my iphone in the air. Do you
think you could extend app functionality to trigger camera while phone is free
falling?

Let me know :)

~~~
uxp
A picture right as it senses deceleration would be cool, at the apex of the
fall, just to see what the phone could see at that time. Video might be fun
also, though I don't know if watching blurry spins would be all that enjoyable
in actuality. The 3G is the only one that doesn't have real video
capabilities, though that's nearly deprecated anyways. Last I heard, Apple
isn't going to update it with the next major update. Whether that update is
4.3 or 5, I'm not sure.

To the OP, maybe you could use what you learned about using the accelerometer
framework to make an app that background updates the movement of the user, and
tracks approximate G-forces of elevators and driving, for example?

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rbanffy
Too bad. It would be wildly popular with astronauts... The screaming can be
disabled, right?

~~~
ljf
Does it need disabling? I thought in space no-one could hear you scream...

~~~
raquo
Onboard ISS it's not vacuum though )

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JonathanWCurd
You can push the app and generate buzz by giving away a replacement phone to
the top scorer over some period. If its ad supported and grows large enough
the money should cover the expense.

Something like:

"Want / Need a new phone see how far you can send yours flying for a shot at
new hardware."

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kabdib
I had an idea for an Xbox 360 achievement involving peripherals with
accelerometers (the Lips microphone, and Kinect).

"One Minute of Free Fall"

The Vomit Comet is about 45 seconds . . .

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bergie
We have a game like that on Maemo:
<http://maemo.org/downloads/product/Maemo5/n900fly/>

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kmfrk
Clickable: <https://github.com/qix/airborne>.

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Tichy
Cool, I had a similar idea, which was to make people throw their phones into
the air and try to make it do as many flips as possible. Great to see that you
actually built something like that.

I was well aware of the "risk your phone" aspect, "iDare" was my working
title...

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gcheong
Sounds like a great game for people switching to Verizon from ATT.

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Geee
Obviously the winners in this game would be those who damage their iPhones by
throwing them from 1000 ft buildings. :)

~~~
DEinspanjer
I was thinking that you might be able to win it by taking your phone on the
vomit comet. While considering that though, I'm actually not sure that the
accelerometer would be able to notice 0-g after equilibrium, would it?

~~~
listrophy
Indeed, without going into orbit, a vomit comet would be the best. Even if you
dropped the phone from the tallest building (assuming it would be tall enough,
which it isn't), the phone would soon register more-than-microgravity
acceleration due to air resistance.

The phone will most definitely notice 0-g after "equilibrium." Pretty much at
all times (unless being accelerated by your hand or your carelessness), the
iPhone registers a 1-g acceleration towards the ground... much like almost
every other static accelerometer you can buy.

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oemera
Hey I really don't know you and I don't want to be personal but it's ideas
like this that make me happy that Apple is taking care what comes to the App
Store and what not.

You know I really don't understand how someone could enjoy a game which
encourages people to throw a 600 dollar device onto a "soft" surface. You how
this ends right? Kids want to play this and they will throw the from
EVERYWHERE and BOOM you have to buy another 600 dollar phone.

You want to make money? Write something useful.

However I really like that you put the source code on GitHub.

~~~
burgerbrain
_"Kids want to play this and they will throw the from EVERYWHERE and BOOM you
have to buy another 600 dollar phone."_

Bullshit. Grow a backbone and just tell the little brat _"No, get a job and
buy it yourself this time."_

~~~
carussell
Alternatively, don't buy their first one.

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inji
just like this guy then... <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FtWWTllCrg>

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rhizome
There was another app that got rejected on the same criteria some time back.
It's just the way it is.

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koobe
sounds like n900fly, right?

~~~
msl
Sure does. Luckily the availability of that program has yet to damage my N900.
This can probably be attributed to my good judgment, but not everyone can be
assumed to be capable of making good decisions when there are bad options
available. A good thing Apple takes care of their mobile phone. Or is it the
customer's phone? I'm getting confused.

~~~
c2
A lot of the comments here are actually pretty disturbing to me. As if the
general population assumes that Apple should be the caretakers of how
customer's use their own phones, and that the general population isn't capable
enough to make their own decisions regarding their own property. Very 1984
vibe to it.

~~~
trobertson
> As if [...] Apple should be the caretakers of how customer's use their own
> phones

This is Apple's modus operandi with the iPhone, is it not?

~~~
c2
To be fair, I have no objection to Apple in this case. I was simply surprised
at how fully Apple customers have embraced the "protect us from ourselves"
mentality.

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power78
My friend created the EXACT same game for iPhone two years ago and they
rejected it for the same reason. Interesting.

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Void_
Thank you! I'm pretty sure it will help people to learn about iPhone
development.

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kgc
I submitted a similar App in 2009, and it was rejected for the same reasons.

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iamgabeaudick
Pivot: measure - and rank - how fast a person can shake their iPhone.

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Skywing
haha, omg. that scream is terrible.

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izak30
Step 1. Attach to carousel.

Step 2. ????

Step 3. Profit.

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TimothyBurgess
I made an iPhone app called "HammerTime!"

Round #1 instructs you to place your phone on a hard surface, find a hammer of
any kind, and hit your phone as hard as you can.

Rounds #2 and up instructs you to repeat Round #1.

A permanent blank screen indicates you have won and you may receive a prize (a
brand new iPhone!!) if you can convince Apple your phone is malfunctioning
because of something they did.

~~~
kevbin
Bathroom Scale HD: shows a single footprint; users stand on one foot on their
iPad, see their weight.

Lots of opportunity for evolution/addl features: time series, weight by time
of day, etc. Just one little problem.

~~~
huhtenberg
Stress Meter: place a pillow on the couch, throw your iPhone at the pillow,
check stress score based on acceleration, top speed and deceleration. Requires
initial calibration in unstressed condition.

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mthreat
There was an app called Hangtime that did this, <http://iphonehangtime.com/>,
but it seems like it's gone. I just searched the app store and found another
app, also called Hangtime!, that appears to do the same thing under the guise
of measuring how long you yourself are airborne (not just the phone).

~~~
damoncali
I ran into a (the?) developer of Hangtime (I think - it may have been a
similar app) a while back. He claimed Apple sat on it for a while before
finally letting it out _the day the new iPhone was released_.

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shareme
change game to user jumps or throws self while holding iphone..or would Apple
object to user throwing oneself?

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adharmad
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~~~
Geee
Quite a thought.

~~~
adharmad
Sorry about that. That was my 3 year old.

