
Apple Answers the FCC’s Questions - tvon
http://www.apple.com/hotnews/apple-answers-fcc-questions/
======
jackowayed
_> For example, on an iPhone, the “Phone” icon that is always shown at the
bottom of the Home Screen launches Apple’s mobile telephone application,
providing access to Favorites, Recents, Contacts, a Keypad, and Visual
Voicemail. The Google Voice application replaces Apple’s Visual Voicemail by
routing calls through a separate Google Voice telephone number that stores any
voicemail, preventing voicemail from being stored on the iPhone, i.e.,
disabling Apple’s Visual Voicemail._

This is misleading bullshit.

First, they mention the "phone" icon right after complaining that GV is
"replacing the iPhone’s core mobile telephone functionality and Apple user
interface with its own user interface for telephone calls, text messaging and
voicemail" to try to give people the false impression that GV is stealing the
phone icon, which an app can't even do.

Then, they try to claim that by cherry-picking calls and not letting the
forwarded calls hit apple voicemail, they're "disabling" visual voicemail,
which is just untrue. People could still call your iPhone's direct phone
number, and visual voicemail would work juts fine.

~~~
GHFigs
I think what they're trying to say is that they are abiding by the general
principle of not allowing apps that duplicate built-in functionality, because
they feel it might negatively impact the user experience of their product.
This is a much more defensible (and I think _probable_ ) position than that
they are singling it out for purely competitive reasons.

~~~
jhancock
I think either/both could be the answer. I see no reason why the first
outweighs the second.

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e1ven
Question 2: Did Apple act alone, or in consultation with AT&T, in deciding to
reject the Google Voice application and related applications? If the latter,
please describe the communications between Apple and AT&T in connection with
the decision to reject Google Voice. Are there any contractual conditions or
non-contractual understandings with AT&T that affected Apple’s decision in
this matter?

Answer 2: Apple is acting alone and has not consulted with AT&T about whether
or not to approve the Google Voice application. No contractual conditions or
non-contractual understandings with AT&T have been a factor in Apple’s
decision-making process in this matter.

\--

I guess that is about as straight an answer as we could have hoped for on the
issue. Apple, not AT&T, made the call.

~~~
jf
As much as I'd like to believe this, it just doesn't feel right. Why didn't
Apple respond in this manner sooner? Why did it take a strongly worded letter
from the FCC for them to do so?

~~~
e1ven
One reason may be that AT&T and Google's answers are also now public, so Apple
wanted to have it's best face forward.

[http://www.scribd.com/doc/18983512/ATT-Response-to-FCC-
iPhon...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/18983512/ATT-Response-to-FCC-iPhone-
Letter-082109-as-Filed)

<http://www.scribd.com/doc/18983640/Google-Response-to-FCC>

Personally, I suspect that Apple would prefer that AT&T take the blame for as
much as possible.

From the tone of the letter, it sounds like Apple tries to shift blame onto
AT&T where they can- For instance, Apple was responsible for the initial
SlingPlayer rejection.

Apple's response says that they rejected the app because it violates AT&T's
TOS, but doesn't say that AT&T requested the rejection.

Viewed in the context of the Google Voice rejection, this leads me to believe
that Apple is happy to be able to point to the TOS as the reason for the
rejection, rather than having to decide if they want to allow an (indirect)
competitor to their iTunes TV store.

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sachinag
Engadget has AT&T and Google's responses as well as quick commentary from
their in-house lawyer: [http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/21/atandt-tells-the-
fcc-it-h...](http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/21/atandt-tells-the-fcc-it-had-
no-role-in-removing-google-voice-fro/)

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isharan
In my opinion, this is total BS. Apple would obviously make up some lame
excuse and everyone knows it.

Update: Though, there is this at the end: "In little more than a year, we have
reviewed more than 200,000 applications and updates."

That computes to around 515 applications per day. Can't really blame them for
taking too long, eh?

~~~
jonursenbach
This is the kind of problem that you can throw people at though. There is no
excuse for them taking this long.

~~~
ubernostrum
Yeah, you can throw people at it. And many of them will be underqualified or
undertrained, and will reject things for no good reason...

~~~
anigbrowl
With >600% YOY growth in iPhone sales, margins of approximately 36% and
quarterly revenues/profit of $8.3/$1.2 bn, I think Apple can afford to hire
and train plenty of people.

Recruiting, training and retaining 100 employees at a salary of $48k/yr -
which seems like a pretty good starting wage to me - would only run them about
$8-10 million a year, or ~0.2% of that profit margin. What the hell, double
that amount if you need to rent/build a new office block for them. It would
still pay itself in terms of positive press and developer relations.

40 reviewers each testing 40 apps per day is absurd, that's less than 15
minutes each. OK I know a lot of iPhone 'apps' do only one thing and have a
novelty half-life of 90 seconds, but still.

These #s from <http://www.macnewsworld.com/rsstory/67654.html>

~~~
jhancock
They wouldn't have to train so many if they easily allowed 3rd party app
stores. If you don't like the wait in Apple's official store, go to the
alternative. As long as they insist on being the bottleneck, this will be a
problem.

~~~
anigbrowl
Yeah, but they wouldn't be making those sweet margins either, I suspect :-)

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jsz0
It shouldn't take a company with billions in revenue this long to ponder an
issue as they say. It makes me wonder if there's a bit of a civil war going on
inside Apple over the App Store. Apple initially approved the apps, then un-
approved them, and is now leaving the door open to re-approve it. If I were an
investor in Apple I would be concerned about the management structure around
Apple's single most important product taking weeks to deal with the Google
Voice situation that has evolved outside of a techie issue into the mainstream
business press (WSJ)

~~~
jstevens85
My guess: Apple has decided that they want to implement Google Voice, Skype
directly into the Operating System. Just like Copy-Paste, you won't hear about
it until a couple of weeks before the update.

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tel
So yeah, sounds like Apple is more or less shooting straight. They're facing a
huge problem (hundreds of submissions per day) and are trying to be decent
about it.

The Google Voice thing is annoying but not altogether unsurprising since no
one is really pretending this is an open platform:

 _Google is of course free to provide Google Voice on the iPhone as a web
application through Apple’s Safari browser, just as they do for desktop PCs,
or to provide its “Google-branded” user experience on other phones, including
Android-based phones, and let consumers make their choices._

In other words: just try it Google. You're going to play by our rules here.

~~~
apgwoz
The funny thing about that is, you're still circumventing visual voice mail
and all the other stuff they're complaining about by using the web interface,
albeit in a much less convenient manner, which is obviously the point.

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relme
"The Google Voice application replaces Apple’s Visual Voicemail by routing
calls through a separate Google Voice telephone number that stores any
voicemail, preventing voicemail from being stored on the iPhone, i.e.,
disabling Apple’s Visual Voicemail."

How does a 3rd party app prevent voicemail from being stored on the iPhone? I
don't understand.

~~~
bvttf
If you actually use Google Voice all calls go through it, and get sent to the
GV voicemail, instead of whatever voicemail your phone uses. This would make
the Visual Voicemail and SMS that ship with the phone useless.

~~~
relme
Oh I see, but does this "prevent" AT&T voicemail from being stored on the
iPhone? (Which is what was said)...

I mean you could use both the Google Voice Voicemail and the AT&T voicemail,
right?

~~~
GHFigs
My understanding is that you can use both in the sense of alternating between
them, but for any given message, it only appears in one place.

From a user experience perspective, this means that some fraction of users
will be confused, annoyed, or downright furious that they now have two
completely disconnected ways of making calls, recieving messages, listening to
voicemails, etc. I think that's what bothers Apple about it.

~~~
akmiller
I don't understand this point which someone tried to make above. If GV
actually came pre-installed you may have a point, but the fact is that the
users seeking to use GV will not be confused, annoyed, or furious at all. We
understand exactly what GV is and what we want out of it. Apple's point is
completely bullshit about confusing users because only users specifically
seeking this functionality will have it.

~~~
GHFigs
_We understand exactly what GV is_

Maybe _you_ do, but can you guarantee that every potential GV user does? Of
course not. This is what I mean by "some fraction of users". That fraction is
unknown, but as GV creates a significantly different parallel method of
accomplishing core phone functions, it is quite plausible that users with an
imperfect understanding of how it works and why would suffer as described--for
instance, a user who does not understand why his voicemails might show up in
two different places. While it is true that it is ultimately the user's
responsibility to understand the software he is using, this potentially
impacts the core functionality of Apple's device, so it would be only natural
for Apple to want to consider it carefully.

 _Apple's point is completely bullshit about confusing users because only
users specifically seeking this functionality will have it._

Does not follow. Users who specifically seek to purchase (say) Microsoft
Office are entirely capable of being confused, annoyed, or infuriated by it.
The same can be said of most software, hardware, and machines in general. Have
you ever seen someone try to push a pull door or pull a push door?

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sahaj
This is an easy to solve problem.

Duplicate phone functionality: Let the user decide which number they want to
dial from by changing the Settings on the iPhone and thus making the iPhone
capable of making and recieving the phones calls from either AT&T and Google.

Voicemail: Let both AT&T and Google store the voicemails at their own servers
and push them down to iPhone.

SMS issue: Solution is same as voicemail. Let the user decide which number
they want to send the SMS from, and let both Google and AT&T deliver the SMS
to the iPhone Messages app.

This solution will allow for flexibility for both the users and the service
providers.

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darkxanthos
Pondering? Could they choose an any more lazy way to describe this process?

~~~
jimbokun
"Pondering?"

This seems to call for a parody video of Pinky and the Brain working as App
Store app reviewers.

(Apologies to readers too young to get the reference.)

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lacker
I'm surprised that Apple rejects 20% of all submissions. That number seems
huge!

 _We receive about 8,500 new applications and updates every week, and roughly
20% of them are not approved as originally submitted._

No wonder complaints are so common.

~~~
lallysingh
It's submissions, not applications. I'd expect the majority of the apps whose
submissions were rejected to be updated and resubmitted.

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gcheong
So apple says they haven't rejected the application which in iTunes connect
terms would mean that it is still "in review". So did the Google development
team mis-read the status or is Google lying about the rejection or did the
media jump the gun or is Apple just outright lying now or what? I wish I had
access to their iTunes connect account to see for myself.

~~~
tvon
Apparently Google never said the app was rejected, they only said it had not
been approved (which was 6 weeks after it had been submitted).

~~~
jzdziarski
Six weeks is not a long time to wait. I've had applications take 3+ months
before they ever get a response. Google should stop acting so entitled and get
in line like the rest of us.

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jrockway
So Apple _is_ evil.

------
tvon
(via Daring Fireball)

