
Apple bans App Store’s 3rd-most prolific developer  - zaveri
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/03/apple-bans-app-stores-3rd-most-prolific-developer/
======
ujjwalg
I am really happy that Apple did this. There are multiple developers who are
trying to do exactly what Khalid is doing with copyright infringement and
taking advantage of dumb/stupid people (surprisingly some of his apps were in
top 100 with 5 copied pictures @ $4.99).

This will definitely give a sigh of relief to legitimate developers.

~~~
jcromartie
Hell yes! My favorite example: iCounterstrike was a promotional image of the
game with a few sound files ripped straight from an install of the game placed
in a picker control.

~~~
look_lookatme
Wow. I've never use the app store as I have a G1, but that's amazing that such
an app ever made it through the approval process.

~~~
blasdel
If you don't know what Counterstrike is, that app is structurally identical to
any Fart app, just with SWAT team noises.

The reviewers are clearly not of our world -- they're probably the same people
who were reviewing audio + video for the store before apps came along.

~~~
look_lookatme
Yeah, def not familiar with what "iCounterstrike" is, but I do know what real
Counter Strike is and it's amazing to me that apple would approve something so
that so blatantly capitalizes on another, well-known commercial product's
name.

------
roc
Clearly, Apple approved those apsp because (though useless) nothing was
outwardly _wrong_ with them. And clearly they revoked because of a pattern of
brazen violation of the IP rules of the app store agreement.

Saying Apple was wrong in this is to suggest they must personally validate the
ownership of all intellectual property of every app before approval.

And that's just absurd.

~~~
kragen
Maybe Apple shouldn't revoke apps for copyright infringement, nor should they
personally validate the copyright status of all apps they post. After all, we
already have a legal system to use for enforcing copyright, and in the US, it
currently includes a well-defined process for handling accusations of
copyright infringement (even though it is badly biased against the accused
infringer), with infringement takedown notice and counternotice provisions.
Apple could just use the DMCA safe harbor and remove apps when it receives
accusations of infringement.

~~~
jacquesm
Exactly. This is why it is a bad idea to become gatekeeper to a platform, you
end up being judge, jury and executioner.

It also raises the expectations of what you are liable for, after all if
you've approved something you associate yourself with it. An open platform
would never have those issues.

~~~
rottencupcakes
That's the problem! With an open platform, the copyright holder could only
come after the developer. All of a sudden, Apple is liable for 100% of the
content!

I would never want to be the gatekeeper to anything.

~~~
DrJokepu
I would say that the Android Market is a much more open distribution channel
than the App Store but still there are mechanisms built into the Android
Market to counter illegal or harmful apps such as users being able to flag an
application they consider to be one

The difference is that in a more open scenario it's the community that does
the majority of filtering and not a corporation or a group of corporations.
I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not but still an interesting contrast.

------
tumult
Hey, Apple actually leveraged their "we run this market" position in a
positive way. Props.

So can we get Google Voice now?

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alex_c
I'll play devil's advocate here, since (almost) everyone seems to be
applauding Apple for this.

The issues, as I see them, are:

1) high volume of apps,

2) low quality / low utility apps,

3) copyright infringement

A lot of the cheering seems to be related to 1) and 2) - getting an "app
spammer" out of the app store, improving the user experience, etc. IMO, these
are precisely the wrong reasons to cheer. They are perfect examples of the
problems with the app store from a developer's perspective - arbitrary
judgement calls which often end up being inconsistently applied. Apps do get
rejected all the time for having "limited functionality" - these two concerns
should be addressed during the approval process, and, if necessary, by
removing specific apps, NOT by outright banning a developer AFTER the apps are
approved (thus signaling to the developer that Apple is OK with them). If
there are "too many" apps, throw in a per-app listing fee after a certain
number of apps. If the app is low quality, don't approve it. These are messy,
hard to define rules otherwise.

 _intellectual property complaints concerning over 100 of your Applications_
\- Say a developer has 8 apps in the app store, one of the eight apps uses
unlicensed images, and Apple bans the developer instead of removing the one
app. I suspect the reaction here would be a bit different.

The ONLY acceptable reason in this case is repeated copyright infringement -
easy to define, easy to detect, and simple for the developer to avoid in the
first place. And yes, that is the reason Apple is giving - but it doesn't seem
to be the reason most celebrated by the comments here, it's mostly that
something bad happened to someone we don't like.

~~~
jacquesm
And even then, Apple should have nothing to do with it, that's between the
copyright holder and the infringer.

------
kqr2
It seems like he was banned primarily because of repeated third party
intellectual property violations:

 _Apple has informed you of numerous third party intellectual property
complaints concerning over 100 of your Applications and reminded you of your
obligations to obtain the necessary rights prior to submission of your
Applications. Nevertheless, we continue to receive the same or similar types
of complaints regarding your Applications despite our repeated notices to
you._

~~~
st3fan
Where does that quote come from? Did Khalid post them?

~~~
Zev
At the end of the article, before the comments, there are two emails. One from
Apple to Khalid, and the other from Khalid's company to anyone who applies to
be a developer there. I'm assuming that TC is in contact with Khalid, since
they have a quote from a phone conversation with him. So him forwarding the
email to them isn't surprising.

~~~
haasted
Doesn't explain how they obtained the puzzling mail that was sent in response
to Apple, though.

~~~
jcl
The article explains that the response is an automatic reply for any mail sent
to the e-mail address that the authors found for Khalid's company. The
response was not necessarily sent to Apple; presumably Khalid uses a different
contact address for his App Store work.

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stevejohnson
He's submitted 900 applications and he's only the third most prolific
developer? Who are 1 and 2?

~~~
cstejerean
From the article it seems like Brighthouse Labs is one of those top 2. I
didn't finish reading the article so it's possible the other might also be
mentioned.

~~~
socratees
2000 apps from a single developer is insane. So what is it? 4% of the total
appstore? (assuming appstore has 50k apps).

------
socratees
_We have a strict work schedule of 12 hours a day 6 days a week._

Maybe that explains how he's able to test all of his 5 apps that are made
everyday in his company.

------
yardie
It's about time. There are good developers that are being pushed off the
boards by crap like this. If your app isn't in the top 20 or top 50 than
chances are it won't get bought by enough people. This guy has 900 apps of
absolute crap. And some of them manage to clog up the leaderboards.

If you base your entire business model on another company than abide by their
fucking rules. So Apple pulled your apps because you weren't playing their
game?! Too bad, you know who else does this. Google Adsense and Secondlife. I
also don't see anyone sympathizing for the people who get booted from Adsense
when they try to game it.

You are more than welcome to create your own appstore, put in the
infrastructure and people to support. Oh and develop a delivery method for it.

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grinich
The app store is _not_ a free market, regardless of what developers would like
to imagine.

~~~
TallGuyShort
Most informed people on the issue aren't arguing that Apple should treat the
App Store like it's a free market. I quite agree - it's not, and Apple
shouldn't have to make it so. What people have a problem with is the
inconsistency. Apple has intentionally made the App Store a major business
platform, and start-up developers invest a great deal of time working on those
Apps. When Apple begins to harm developer interests inconsistently and only in
accordance with their own interests (regardless of obvious obligations), then
people have every right to complain.

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endlessvoid94
Apple creates App store. Developers apply and agree to Apple's terms. They get
accepted.

Apple does something 100% within their power and terms of use.

People cry "unfair".

Nothing to see here, move along.

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jrockway
This is also amusing:

 _We develop iPhone applications exclusively using Objective-C and the Mac. We
have a strict work schedule of 12 hours a day 6 days a week._

I thought Objective-C developers were relatively hard to find. Who would work
12 hours a day 6 days a week with such specialized (and presumably in-demand)
knowledge?

~~~
dejv
There are a lot people in India who can programm and you do not need a lot of
experience to produce this kind of crap, so you should find some programmers
very quickly.

------
Estragon
As just as this is, I can't help but wonder at the timing. It looks like an
attempt to distract people from the GV affair. If that's the case, it's just
another, albeit subtler, abuse of the same power.

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godDLL
Oh, I so have seen this Khalid type before. They are called "spammers".

The guy has assembled a team of the blackhat-coder type and spammed the
AppStore successfully with random crap for _months_ , looking to cash in on
the 6-to-9 percent social engineering toll (anything works for this percentage
of people if you have a big enough audience). Props to him for acting quickly.

Props to Apple for recognizing spam. _Shame_ on Apple for not labeling this
type of app-spamming as spam. It's crawling up the Top-Paid list, it's all
over the AppStore's search results, and will bring the AppStore down if it
continues (you can't quite install an __anti-app-spam filter __on your
iPhone/iTunes).

Next on the AppStore: Apps that take your C.V. and hand it out to money-
laundering types, with catchy descriptions like "find your place within an
international team of highly-paid professionals!" and "99% employment success
rate!", etc.

Creeping jumping limping Jeesus...

------
tfausak
I'm surprised such basic errors in math made it past any editors.

 _Khalid Shaikh ... [has] published 943 applications ... . That’s roughly 5
apps a day, every day, for 250 days._

(5 apps per day) * (250 days) = 1,250 apps.

943 applications is roughly 4 apps a day, every day, for 250 days. Or 5 apps a
day, every day, for 190 days.

------
acangiano
They were sending a copyrighted PDF to their job candidates. O_o

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falava
I want to review some "offline maps" apps. There are 2 nice apps that let's
you download maps from OpenStreetMaps...

If you search for "offline maps" here:

[http://appshopper.com/search/?cat=&set=&search=offli...](http://appshopper.com/search/?cat=&set=&search=offline+maps)

You get one offMaps, and the developer of the second result also has another
nice app (oMaps).

But there is also a guy that has spammed the app store with hundreds of
"offline maps" apps, one for each major city in the world, using the same
OpenStreetMaps source. I think that he does that with an automated script, and
he is not going to stop until he has an app for every city or village in the
world.

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voidpointer
Can they force him to pay refunds? I suppose customers who bought his (cr)apps
would need to delete them because they contained unlicensed content. (A bit
like the Kindle/1984 issue only I think Apple has no technical possibility to
kill apps that have already been bought). Anyway, everyone should be entitled
to a refund.

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makecheck
The process and the outcome (gaming the system) reminds me a great deal of the
current state of the patent system.

In both cases, I think that the original reason for the process has been lost
in the actual implementation, and there is a great risk of losing true
opportunities for innovation.

------
herf
Apple could make searching the store return the best match "per company".
Doesn't help Apple with the review process, but it might be slightly harder
for somebody to hurt the user experience...would have to incorporate dozens of
companies rather than just submitting 900 apps.

------
thomasswift
from the comments: <http://www.perfectacumen.com/welcome/>

------
cracki
"prolific" is an ambiguous term. bad headline.

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b-man
It boggles me as to why a programmer would willingly submit to a fascist
scheme like app store.

I wonder if it is something in human nature, where the presence of a big
brother makes you feel secure.

~~~
olefoo
It might have something to do with the fact that the app store provides a
market where people _pay money for software_.

~~~
b-man
There are others, freer markets, where you don't have to submit to a faceless
master that uses his definition of hygiene and beauty to control what can and
cannot be done.

Heck, you could even, I don't know, sell your software on the internet, by
creating a page for it.

Seriously, I'm a libertarian, and apple's policies, specially in this area,
bugs the hell out of me.

~~~
olefoo
Eh. Nobody is forcing you to put up with the iPhone, the fact remains that
iPhone has created an experience that is compelling for customers; and that
for all it's shortcomings is better than most of the competition at getting
end users to part with money for software.

------
vaksel
That's pretty bullshit, I don't care if the guy's apps were questionable,
don't approve them. Killing an entire business in 1 day, is pretty fucked up.

~~~
Zev
If your "business" is dependent on repackaging otherwise free content — that
you may not have the rights to — then, is it really a surprise that it gets
shut down?

~~~
logic
If your "business" is dependent on _publishing an application on Apple's App
Store_ then, is it really a surprise that it gets shut down? :)

It's tongue-in-cheek, but it's true: this isn't a free marketplace, it's
Apple's playground, and only the business models and application domains that
Apple approves of will be permitted. I don't like this guy any more than
anyone else here, but a single decision by Apple effectively killed that
aspect of his business.

Similarly, if you were to build a business around, say, a Google Voice
application for the iPhone, you'd be in the same situation.

~~~
BigZaphod
The implication that it's somehow wrong to base a business on the App Store is
goofy. It's not much different from basing one on a single OS or a mobile
platform or even a particular line of automobile or type of entertainment.

It's not a requirement that Apple (or any other company) protect your business
model at the expense of their own.

~~~
jacquesm
True. But you could at least expect:

\- consistency

\- open rules

\- an appeal process

The way it is it is more like a gamble.

~~~
ujjwalg
They are not very inconsistent with rules. I have 24 apps on the appstore and
the ones that were rejected and later accepted were consistent with the
policies aggregated here: <http://appreview.tumblr.com/>

I am upset because apple rejected google voice but so far I haven't seen
anything which was rejected and was not on the list in the link.

Moreover, apple does have an appeal process. Once the app gets rejected they
ask you to make changes, and resubmit the app.

There are definitely things that apple can do to improve the process for
example, they should definitely get rid of changing the availability date with
updates because a lot of developers just keep on posting updates with no real
updates to be on the new release list. Check McPhun for example and they are
actually able to keep themselves in top 10 for the past 6 months just because
they have an update every week. But other than these minor issues which I am
pretty sure apple will solve, there are a lot of good things going with it,
which people tend to ignore.

~~~
alex_c
_They are not very inconsistent with rules_

I disagree. The rules might be consistent, but Apple certainly doesn't apply
them consistently. The classic example is a simple bugfix update, which adds
no new functionality, being rejected for something that is already in the
approved version of the app. (happened to me, happened to Nine Inch Nails).

