
Apple Literally Stole my Thunder - alariccole
https://medium.com/wwdc-round-up/253aed27a455
======
jussij
It always makes me sigh when I read stories like this.

For decades Microsoft was bashed for offering up a _closed system_ , yet the
reality was Microsoft would let you sell any type of software for Windows and
they couldn't care less.

Then along comes Apple with it's tightly closed, highly controlled platform
and no one raises a murmur, but rather everyone seems to celebrate the idea.

Watching on are the rest of the big players and they see how successful Apple
has been, so they all start madly creating their own closed systems.

The reality is none of these issues existed in the old style Windows system,
but thanks to the success of Apple, those days are now gone :(

Developers are now forever beholden to the big corporates.

~~~
alanthonyc
Of all the criticisms of the Windows platform I recall, I don't remember
anyone complaining it was " _closed system_ ".

In fact, the opposite problem made it a haven for malware and viruses.

~~~
dnautics
it was a closed system... I remember my dad shelling out $500 for MS Visual
basic for me, and then $500 for MSVC++. Visual basic was fun, but I didn't do
anything with it. I never got past MFC in VC++ and I wound up using borland's
C++ instead for my science fair project.

Now, I can put ubuntu linux on my machine - for free (or in my case, preloaded
from DELL at a discount over windows) and get a million different toolchains
with free documentation online.

~~~
ghshephard
You are conflating, "Closed" with "Wide Availability of zero-cost toolchains."

Windows was as open as open can get, in the sense of, "Do I need to ask
anyone's permissions to create, install, and sell a binary for this platform?"

~~~
dnautics
a fair criticism. It was de facto closed. Keep in mind during the 90s, the
internet was limited (for quite a bit of that time I didn't even have a 2400
baud modem). It wasn't until my second year in college that my friend
introduced me to linux, and I still didn't actively start using linux until
2006-ish (I spent 1999-2003 in BeOS and 2004-2006 in FreeBSD)

i guess the part of my complaint that had the most to do with 'closed' was the
MFC/developer licensing part. I knew enough to know there were APIs lying
underneath that weren't exposed to me that I could do awesome stuff with if I
was able to see it. At least with BeOS it "felt" like the most important part
of the API were exposed - and with linux I know that they are in principle,
even though I never use them.

------
eggbrain
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time this happened. This also won't be the
last time either.

When you build apps on a platform, be ready to run into brick walls if you
start to enter (or have already entered) areas that the platform wants to get
into -- that goes for Facebook and Twitter as much as it does for Apple as
well.

~~~
zeugmatis
I know people who have been royally screwed by exactly this - they give you an
API, devs everywhere come up with ideas, do the hard work - and the platform
picks the low hanging fruit. Not only do they get carte blanche to steal
peoples ideas but the licenses often give them complete rights to steal your
source code as well.

~~~
rmrfrmrf
A weather app is really a 3-hour project; a rudimentary exercise in retrieving
and parsing some kind of structured data. To say that any part of this
supposed app was "hard work" is disingenuous. Furthermore, the concept of
photorealistic animations for weather isn't new, so really this person added
nothing of value to the Apple ecosystem. And, wouldn't you know it, the App
Store rejected this weather app for exactly that reason!

That's not to say that there aren't instances where this has happened to devs,
but I feel like your indignation is a bit wasted on an app this
inconsequential.

~~~
general_failure
> A weather app is really a 3-hour project;

Someone recommended that pg flash the HN title bar whenever such insightful
comments are made. I would like to +1 that idea.

~~~
montagg
I think the takeaway here is not that it's easy. It's that you should find a
niche. A weather app is not it.

------
eridius
"Months before"? If your weather app is only a few months old, then you are
_far_ from the first person to do what you're describing. I had an app on my
iPad that provided exactly the experience you're describing, and that was I
think at least 2 years old (I don't remember the name anymore).

~~~
OriginalAT
That's only one small part of the story. I think the main thing here is that
he had an app that he worked on that was rejected because Apple felt nobody
wanted it, and then a few months later Apple releases pretty much the same
thing itself and everyone loves it.

~~~
eridius
It's not that Apple felt nobody wanted a weather app, it's that there are a
_lot_ of weather apps on the store already. The App Store guidelines do tell
you that apps that replicate existing functionality may be rejected. And Apple
already had a weather app, all they did was update it to be better.

------
crazygringo
Gotta say... best post title I've seen in a while.

But still a very valid point. I would really support legislation governing
online marketplaces, so that this kind of abuse couldn't take place. A company
shouldn't have to be a monopoly, for anticompetitive behavior to become
illegal.

~~~
dangrossman
Where does that stop? You have a nice little directory of apps you built at
[http://mjbaldwin.net](http://mjbaldwin.net). If monopoly is no longer a
requirement before the government steps in, you could have to list my apps and
anyone else's that wants to be included. Why should you have the editorial
control over what's included in your site you want to take away from Apple?

~~~
crazygringo
Well thanks! :)

I'm not a legislator, of course, but in my mind it would run something like:

\- if you have over _x_ third-party selling participants (say, 50 or 500)

\- and the marketplace provides services to the "general public" (e.g. the
Apple Store, qualifies, an intranet market would not)

\- and the marketplace has revenue over _x_ per day (say, $10,000)

\- then participation in the marketplace must be governed by a clear,
unambiguous set of rules that gives no advantage to products made/sold by the
owner/administrator of the marketplace, _and all interpretation of the rules,
or challenges to such interpretation, must be made by a neutral, third-party
arbitrator without influence from or by the owner /administrator of the
marketplace_

\- and additionally, rules of the marketplace must not be written in order to
give any kind of explicit or "implicit" advantage to the owner/administrator
of the marketplate (Apple can't always feature its own Maps application over
Google's, for example)

These specific rules are totally off the top of my head, but it's just a kind
of idea -- once any market reaches a certain size, it's in the general public
interest to ensure a level playing field and due process -- I mean, that's
what things like court-enforceable contracts, food regulation, stock exchange
and public company regulation, etc. are all about.

~~~
Steko
You're trying to solve the problem of "app x/y/z not approved in store" but
all you've done is move those goalposts to the third party arbitrator who now
has a financial incentive to deny approval to anything.

Just no.

Even worse your solution is effectively a government takeover of any store
over size X. Trying to force goods on vendors is not the free market, it's
central planning lite.

Apple runs it's store the way it wants to. If you don't like it don't sell
your wares there, don't shop there, picket their retail locations, call for
boycotts online, etc.

~~~
fpgeek
Eh. Nothing that invasive is required. Just mandate that Apple allow
sideloading and/or third-party app stores and the rest will take care of
itself.

The elegant part is that regulation would target the real problem - the tying
of the iPhone to Apple's App Store, which, in my opinion, seems pretty fishy
for an allegedly general-purpose device. As I understand it, this tying might
theoretically be an antitrust violation even in the absence of an iPhone
monopoly, but legal requirements for an illegal tying arrangements have become
considerably stricter over time.

~~~
Steko
"Nothing invasive is required."

Oh we'll just force them to program their machine differently is all so that
anyone can free ride on the market they invested hundreds of millions to
create. Sounds about as noninvasive as a mandatory trans-vaginal ultrasound.

~~~
krichman
Freedom of general purpose computing is more important than a company's bottom
line. Also restricting anti-competitive behaviours is not equivalent to a
forced medical procedure.

------
milesskorpen
While I totally understand why you're angry, I'm almost certain Apple's app
review team does NOT have access to pre-release versions of iOS, so this
probably didn't happen because Apple was working on similar functionality.

~~~
wilfra
When Steve Jobs was around all the really great ideas probably found their way
directly to him. If he then decided to call any of those ideas his own and
reject the apps, do you think anybody at Apple would defy him?

Whomever that person is now (Jony Ive?) probably got ahold of this app and did
the same thing.

Very easy to hide all of this under the veil of 'we were already working on
something like that'. The author even acknowledges as much. So blatant theft
is basically impossible to prove. But it's pretty naive to think that does not
go on.

~~~
blocking_io
I very much doubt the app reviewers have any better access to Apple executives
than you or I. They are like call centre staff.

~~~
wilfra
That's why I said 'found their way'. It would just be a matter of training and
infrastructure to make the process efficient.

Example: an internal 'is this one of the coolest apps you have ever seen?'
option given to all app reviewers. One guy whose job it is to review all apps
where that box was checked. If he agrees, he sends them on to somebody on Jony
Ives team. If they agree, they send it on to Jony.

~~~
gutnor
Frankly, outside of a keynote with an audience expecting to be impressed, I
doubt a weather app would get a thunderous reception.

At the end of the day, that is just a weather app with cool graphic and the
guy reviewing apps probably sees a shit ton of those per week. It would take
something significant or sufficiently unconventional for him to start a buzz
inside Apple.

(BTW: not criticising the guy, he is a dedicated developer and Apple let him
down. But let's keep stuff in perspective)

------
speeder
I think the most weird part, is that I made a app exactly like that, but with
cartoon instead of realistic, and it got approved on the first attempt.

For those wondering, it is this one: [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weather-
and-clock-for-kids/i...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weather-and-clock-
for-kids/id596055030?mt=8)

Granted, a bit more than a month ago, Apple rejected a update for it (because
the message of it complaining of lack of GPS had a ok button that quit the
APP), and it was really weird, because the thing they complained always
existed on the app, and I on purpose proposed a terrible alternative, and they
said they wanted THAT. So I DID made the terrible alternative on my point of
view, and now the app uses that...

------
andrewmunsell
Way back in 2010, I developed an app called World Weather Watch for WebOS:
[http://forums.webosnation.com/webos-apps-
games/231824-introd...](http://forums.webosnation.com/webos-apps-
games/231824-introducing-world-weather-watch.html)

It had animations and an "overview" screen that had times, temperatures, and
forecasts. Here's a couple of screenshots: [http://us.appitalism.com/app/palm-
webos/244623-world-weather...](http://us.appitalism.com/app/palm-
webos/244623-world-weather-watch-time-weather/)

I also developed World Weather Watch for Mac OS X:
[http://www.andrewmunsell.com/work/world-weather-
watch/](http://www.andrewmunsell.com/work/world-weather-watch/)

(The animated weather concept was inspired by HTC's Sense UI, though as far as
I can remember, the overview list was entirely my own concept and idea)

So, the concept of animated weather, or even Apple's overview list of weather
and times, goes back _much_ farther than a couple of months.

EDIT:

If anyone's curious what World Weather Watch for WebOS looks like in motion, I
made a video a while back too:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3tS7n4VAsk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3tS7n4VAsk)

------
kenneth_reitz
I’m glad I’m not alone! I made a very very similar that did nothing but show
you images of things you searched for.

Apple disabled my account one day, without explaining why to me. Today, they
owe me $17,000. I contact them every few months, and never hear anything back
but silence.

------
revelation
HTCs custom Sense UI had this all along (even on Windows Mobile, I think):

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlTOI7ZUziQ](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlTOI7ZUziQ)

It's, uhh, not exactly _novel_.

~~~
alariccole
That is a cloud graphic moving along an animated path. I'm talking about
generated graphics--very different.

~~~
baby
Still kind of the same idea. Nothing new.

------
smsm42
That's what you get for submitting to the development model controlled by
faceless bureaucracy invested with monopoly power.

And now people are calling for government intervention there - because if you
have a faceless bureaucracy with kafkian rules and rampant rumors of abuse,
adding government to it always helps.

~~~
r00fus
I agree to all but the government part.

Government in this case is a set of rules, optionally with an enforcement body
(e.g.: public utility commission) that puts fear into the provider.

The only problem with the above is that it requires sane and non-corrupt
legislators. Those are getting fewer by the election season in the US.

~~~
smsm42
Putting fear into people is, of course, a worthy goal. But I'd prefer making
situation better instead, and making one bureaucracy fear another... well, you
can see how well it is working now. No way two layers of stupid, obtuse and
possibly corrupt bureaucracy can be worse than one for the people having to
deal with them, right?

>>> The only problem with the above is that it requires sane and non-corrupt
legislators.

Yeah, there's a tiny-tiny problem with that... As soon as we solve it,
everything else would be just peachy.

------
dualogy
This is why mobile apps just don't appeal to me -- the "approval" of what I
create by any committee other than the actual-end-user marketplace. Having
grown up sharing one's programs and work in a simple, radically open (if
slightly risky for somewhat naive users) "download and install" or "install
from floppy/CD" or "build from source" exploratory environment, I'd feel
extremely foolish submitting my stuff for approval. I'd feel submissive. I
don't want Apple's or Google's or Microsoft's or Facebook's permission to
share software I make, only their users' choice for or against.

Firefox OS is my only hope but in mobile, they'd also need to get some
significant traction going fast.

Chrome Apps are cool, Android is cool, but "Play Store" \-- if it's just
remotely as "submit for approval" as Apple, then thanks but no thanks.

Thankfully, we still have web dev, mobile web, and a huge base of non-mobile
"desktop-OS" software users.

~~~
mdwrigh2
> Chrome Apps are cool, Android is cool, but "Play Store" \-- if it's just
> remotely as "submit for approval" as Apple, then thanks but no thanks.

It isn't. There's no approval process. Pay your developer registration fee and
start putting apps in the store.

------
signed0
Somewhat related, the BBC launched a new weather app for the iPhone (and
Android) today.

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/appsblog/2013/jun/10/bbc-
wea...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/appsblog/2013/jun/10/bbc-weather-app-
iphone-android)

Perhaps the requirements are somewhat relaxed for large entities.

------
joelrunyon
Doesn't Haze already do this? [http://gethaze.com/](http://gethaze.com/)

Seems strange that they would let some animated weather apps through and not
others...

------
drawkbox
This does suck, I wish it was a true free market. But it still is more open
than say console markets or even Steam. I am not sure why they don't fully
trust the market to produce and choose the apps.

But in the end we are sharecroppers in a kingdom, they built the platform and
have the last say. Diversify to other platforms (I am sure android or windows
market would like to see this) but don't stop developing. Every once in a
while they let you know with a rejection who's platform it is. In the future
maybe it will be fully open, it is what drove Android markets in the early
days. I am still surprised one of the competing markets hasn't been more open
or taken less than 30%. They just line up behind Apple following suit.

Personally from a game developer perspective, Apple is the most open viable
market that has been created for game developers and remade handheld gaming.
From a web developer perspective it is more closed.

------
jonheller
Outside App ([http://www.outsideapp.com/](http://www.outsideapp.com/)) came
out two years ago and did this. Not as nice, no question, but I think the
guy's paranoia about the rejection is way off base. Though I do agree that
there doesn't seem to be a good reason to reject it.

------
bredren
They built some of your app concept into the core of the phone. They rejected
your app because they were about to debut their version. It makes sense why
they did it, and it was fair of them to do it.

However, they should have let your app go into the app store. It is unlikely
your app would have made techcrunch headlines or taken the world by storm (ha
ha) but even if it had, Apple had nothing to fear.

Which makes it strange that the company rejected it.

They couldn't exactly say, "Sorry, but things in your app are going to be in a
keynote. We're working on the same thing."

Situations of an app being rejected by apple due to a forthcoming release are
rare. (though I do know of another example by a prominent developer)

Your story is a nice read, however your other experiences of rejection are not
related to this one. They also speak to a different time for the app review
team.

------
inselkampf
I really doubt somehow that app reviews in Apple are cahoots with the internal
app developers.

Apple is too secretive for that.

------
TheMagicHorsey
Look, man, I feel really bad for you. But there are lots of open platforms to
develop apps for. You make a choice when you decide to specialize in iOS apps.
The choice you make is to make yourself a bitch to the arbitrary whims of some
goofball asshole sitting in Cupertino, who doesn't give a fuck about your
aspirations or vision. You can complain all you want, but they made the
garden, and they can do whatever the fuck they want with it.

It blows. But now you know why you need to support an open platform.

~~~
eropple
_> But there are lots of open platforms to develop apps for._

No, there aren't, because a critical part of "platform to develop apps for" is
a user base. Specifically, a user base willing to pay money for things. On
mobile, that means iOS and to a much lesser extent Android and Windows Phone.

"Develop for an open platform" is like telling somebody to grow a third leg.
There are no relevant open platforms. Nor will there be, because consumers do
not value openness and no other developers are going to damage themselves by
only providing products on niche systems.

~~~
TheMagicHorsey
The web is an open platform.

Linux is an open platform.

Android is an open platform in the sense that, if Google blocks you from the
Play Store, people can still install your APK off the web.

~~~
eropple
Web applications intrinsically suck and aren't particularly viable unless your
product fits the SaaS business model (I find that most things of value to me
do not, personally) and unless you want to spend your life supporting SaaS (I
like not getting pager alerts at 3AM).

Linux has such a small userbase as to be essentially irrelevant. Platform
fragmentation is a massive pain in the ass and its users are generally
unwilling to spend money on software (video game addictions aside).

Android has a userbase but they don't seem to really spend money, either; the
_overwhelmingly_ dominant revenue source for most cross-platform applications
is iOS. And I say that as somebody who really likes Android and uses a Nexus 4
and Nexus 7 as daily devices.

You can "develop for an open platform" and have shit-all for a potential
ceiling or you can take the (generally minor) risk of developing for iOS and
actually have a chance (if small) of making something that pays for itself.
It's disingenous to tell developers "well, develop for an open platform" when
doing so means _you don 't pay your rent_.

~~~
TheMagicHorsey
If you are married to a specific business model (selling applications) then
yes ... maybe you are stuck on iOS.

But, people are definitely making a good living pursuing other business models
for software on the web, Android, etc.

Some people even make money selling games on open platforms (Minecraft is an
example off the top of my head. There are several other PC games that come to
mind.)

------
pablasso
I get his frustration, but I don't think an animated weather on a weather app
is such an innovation that someone else couldn't think of.

~~~
ozten
The OP made the point that it was a commodity app. He didn't claim
earthshaking originality.

He was proud of his superior execution and baffled at rejection.

~~~
JasonSage
Thank you so much for pointing this out, apparently a lot of people missed
this point. The topic of this discussion shouldn't be setting out to prove
that the OP was not the first to bring this kind of app to the table, but
rather how (un)justified it was to be rejected.

------
austinl
I think this got through too
[http://conditionsapp.com/](http://conditionsapp.com/)

~~~
alariccole
Lots of them got through!

------
desireco42
Who cares, you didn't have to develop for their closed system. You could make
apps for macs that can be downloaded if you care so much about programming for
macs. Honestly, who cares.

Also, whatever happens once, doesn't have to happen ever again, but if it
happens twice, it will almost certainly happen again. You will get burned over
and over, unless you get smart.

------
nemothekid
The iOS 7 weather app looks like they just told Yahoo! to build the new app.
Almost everything is the same down the typography, which isn't to say they
stole it, seeing how iOS' weather is powered by Yahoo!

That said, I'm not sure there are too many ways you can innovate a weather
app. HTC Sense has been doing animated conditions for over 4 years now.

------
thret
Obligatory xkcd: [http://xkcd.com/725/](http://xkcd.com/725/)

~~~
205guy
Indeed. At first, I thought the use of "literally" was hyperbole. Then it
almost sounded like Apple had stolen his thunder graphic (in which case, it
would've been an awesome title). But no, so back to hyperbole. I do feel for
the OP, but given the number of other animated weather apps, I don't think he
had any thunder to steal.

~~~
Dylan16807
It's not hyperbole. Apple stole the place in the app store.

------
k-mcgrady
I highly doubt that app reviewers had information on what was coming in iOS 7
and to bias reviews based on that.

------
hnriot
I agree with apple, the world doesn't need another weather app that does
nothing more than animate clouds and snow etc. the apple weather app that we
all saw today is a world clock, has pinch to summary, a ton of more useful
info and was layered both in visual appearance and functionality. By
comparison your weather app was highly simplistic and looks like someone
concocted in a weekend without being finished. I don't mean to sound harsh,
but I wouldn't have given your weather app another look when you put it up
against apple's new one one or yahoo's existing one. If anyone should be
whining it should be yahoo, they even have the layers idea going on where the
scroll panes slide at slightly different speeds. Very much like Apple's
accelerometer driven panes.

------
sharninder
I know there is no end to this discussion so I'll just put in my 2cents and
GTFO.

As a user of Windows systems in the 90s, the so called "openness" was
precisely the reason I moved to using Linux. Most software available for
Windows, in those days was crap, and I as a user needed something that worked,
not mostly but, all the time. Linux gave me that. Even if there was just one
office suite (star office, remember?), it worked.

After using Linux for about a decade or so, I moved to OS X, since Linux
wasn't really going anywhere. The fabled desktop linux wasn't coming and
everything seemed in a limbo.

OS X and Apple, for all it's faults, works, for the most part, for the user
and that's why the platform is popular.

We guys here are talking and thinking with our developer hats, but users think
very differently.

------
grey-area
This is why the web will win.

Not the web of FaceBook and twitter APIs, but the open web of documents and
apps interacting without restrictions. There is a fundamental lack of control
and instability in building on a platform owned by a corporation, be that on
the web or mobile development.

------
general_failure
Most developers are there to make a living. Expecting ideals from them is a
little too much. They probably have ideals in others spheres of life. I
wouldn't expect most devs to just follow the money and continue writing iOS
apps until it gives them good returns.

------
par128
Our weather app YoWindow features computer generated sky just like ios 7 app.
Despite of this it was approved by Apple 2 months ago.
[https://itunes.apple.com/app/id606193225](https://itunes.apple.com/app/id606193225)
Quick link
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtD2VosqX3Y](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtD2VosqX3Y)

Alaric, I know it's depressing to see that you idea is copied. But I think in
this case Apple didn't sole. Be brave and move on. Eventually you win. Just a
bad luck.

------
venomsnake
I do hope that with PRISM revelations the walled garden system may be on its
way to reforms.

If enough people wake up to the topic how important device and software
control is for the owner there will be pure market pressure and current Apple
kinda lack the salesman Steve that is able to override privacy concerns in the
public.

Also we should have good streamlined legal process to declare software
platforms "common carriers" when they are above certain size or market share
with all the benefits and responsibilities that come from that. And lets hope
cases like that will be greatly reduced.

------
zobzu
I think it'd be hard for me to call them out with much harsher words, if that
happened to me. This stuff is as unfair as it gets, but then again, that's the
norm today ain't it?

------
hawkharris
In response to Apple's initial response to the "Images" app: I'm amazed by the
disconnect between how people really feel about porn and how they purport to
feel about it. Sexual desire is a basic human need. The vast majority of
American men and women view pornography, yet few acknowledge it.

I appreciate that this is difficult to change because prudishness is deeply
engrained in our culture, but I would like to see tech companies take a more
progressive role in opening up a realistic dialogue about sex.

~~~
shabble
It's a lot less risk for an organisation to appear prudish or paternal than to
give their opponents a free attack ad about "corrupting our children/society".

The weird rules (apps vs browsers) likely just fall out from the "censorship
theater", in a parallel with airport security. It's an escape hatch, giving
the organisation an "At least we tried!" defence.

------
notlisted
I'm sorry, but the app you seem to describe has existed for quite a while.
Actually, there are several of them. I installed them on my first iPad (the
original) way back when.

This is one of them: [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weather-
live/id464770748?mt=...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weather-
live/id464770748?mt=8)

------
ccera
Apple's app store review "process" is complete bullshit, but this kind of
weather app already exists for iOS and Android, and has for a couple years or
more.

I've installed probably 4 or 5 of them between the two platforms, all with
beautiful high-def animations, etc. (and uninstalled all of them, since I find
the simpler WeatherBug to be more than adequate for me).

------
alexobenauer
To be fair, the app review team is not the iOS development team, and they are
not informed about the developments from the iOS team.

------
gridmaths
Take the graphics, concept, UI and remake it as an HTML5 app.

You could even increase sales using "..stole my thunder" as a meme :]

------
kschua
I can empathize with you. Back in 2009, I created a call filtering app for
Blackberry which had the ability to determine if a call is urgent based on the
frequency of the incoming call and to block the call if it was not urgent.

Guess what, in 2012, Apple put in an uncannily similar feature called
"Repeated Call" in iOS 6

------
nleach
Sad story, but I think it's being blown out of scale. In the comments on his
post, he linked to the app's teaser site:
[http://www.horizonapp.com](http://www.horizonapp.com)

I really don't see how this app could "confidently" stand up to the new
Weather.app

------
inkaudio
Perhaps not, Solar app: [http://thisissolar.com](http://thisissolar.com) has
very similar effects. It was not rejected and it is still in the app store.
Off course it does not have the full marketing of Apple behind it, but still.

------
ChikkaChiChi
it's not impossible that the Dev teams flag certain categories of apps shortly
before launch dates to prevent similar applications from stealing their
thunder so to speak. after all why get egg on their face when you violate the
developer agreement retroactively?

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robterrell
As a developer of a weather app myself, I seriously doubt that Apple refused
your app due to its use of video clips & the possibility of its competing with
iOS 7's weather app. Yahoo weather exists, after all, and it's really close in
look & feel.

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alexscheelmeyer
Given the sometimes arbitrary nature of these rejections, it would seem that a
natural strategy would be to keep trying (with changes to meet their
expectations) - at some point you should get it approved.

Is there some maximum tries that one get to show ones worth as a pubilsher?

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dirkgently
So from most of the defensive arguments here is in the form of classic...
"well, that sucks... but... Apple must have a reason, so it's okay?".

Really? On a site full of tech geeks and nerds? When did majority of us lose
our balls and become so meek?

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jdmaresco
Is it possible that the app review teams were instructed to find a reason to
reject all apps in a given category for a month or two leading up to the
release of iOS7? Were other weather-related apps approved recently?

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trendspotter
There must have been other reasons why his animated weather app was rejected
by Apple. There are already very flashy iOS weather apps, just take for
example a look at "Clear Day".

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piyush_soni
People still don't take a lesson from this. They have done exactly the same
thing before. Apple is EVIL, understand that. May be one of the most evil tech
company out there.

~~~
eridius
Are you honestly calling Apple evil because they updated the built-in weather
app to include realistic weather effects?

That sure sets a low bar for what it means to be evil.

~~~
piyush_soni
Really? That's what you understood from the whole article?

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dave1010uk
Come join us on the Open Web. It's actually really good now. There may be
restrictions and difficulties but no one will stop you getting your hard work
out there.

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usaphp
Can we see a working example of the app or at least screenshots? Because the
execution of the concept can be bad and this is why apple rejected your app?

~~~
nleach
He links to it in the comments: [http://horizonapp.com](http://horizonapp.com)

~~~
dirkgently
My eyes! No, not the app, but the very tall form factor of that device!

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rohamg
but.. this isn't anywhere near a new idea.. Weather HD, now Clear Day, is by a
team in Egypt and has been doing the animated weather thing for years:
[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clear-day-formerly-
weather/i...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clear-day-formerly-
weather/id364193735?mt=8)

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coin
Yet another site that disables pinch zoom on iOS. He develops iOS apps yet
makes his webpage hostile to iOS browsing.

~~~
dirkgently
I am not sure, but doesn't Apple allow more than one browsers in their walled
garden?

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Jleagle
I hear these stories every month, just make your apps for a different OS if
Apple don't want your business.

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thisisomebs
How the hell are you guys viewing this site? I get a "sign in to collaborate"
bullshit.

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paul_f
Your app probably sucked and Apple had to pick some reason to deny it. Any
excuse will do, no?

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gboudrias
Why in the hell do people still develop for Apple? It seems like an uphill
battle...

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ethanazir
Have a great idea? submit it to us. If we like it we will pretend its our own.

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crimsongene
Ofcourse the have to do that now.. short of ideas they are!

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Stevens
This article has the best headline ever.

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rorrr2
So did you learn your lesson?

DON'T DEVELOP FOR APPLE.

Considering how many horror stories we've seen, I wonder why anybody would
waste their time developing apps for that weird company.

Develop for open systems instead. They will win in the end.

~~~
parasubvert
Apple, Microsoft, not to mention Oracle, IBM, CA, etc. are still making money
hand over fist. They all make money by selling closed source systems that may
or may not have open sub-systems.

You have a curious definition of "win in the end".

~~~
rorrr2
Microsoft OSes don't have any restrictions on what software to run.

Apple does make money, but Android and Microsoft are eating their market share
like mad. Apple was smart enough to invent a new market, but isn't smart
enough to keep it.

~~~
xmodem
> Microsoft OSes don't have any restrictions on what software to run.

They didn't until windows 8. The 'classic' desktop hasn't changed, but you
can't run Modern UI apps other than from the app store, and on ARM you can't
run anything that's not modern UI unless it's from Microsoft.

Microsoft also has other OS platforms (Windows phone) with exactly the same
model as Apple's, only less transparent.

