
Apple blocks Pragmatic Programmers' release of iPhone book for developers - nickb
http://www.pragprog.com/news/ubuntu-kung-fu-shippingpodcast-iphone-news
======
lux
It doesn't sound like Apple actually blocked it, just that since they haven't
lifted the NDA this can't be published yet, and since they don't seem to be
concerned with lifting the NDA they probably won't publish it anytime soon.

Additional developer resources, esp. a book from these guys, would be very
welcome though...

~~~
Harkins
Your subtle distinction comes down to: it's not that they blocked it, it's
that they haven't stopped blocking it.

I don't see a reason to treat that significantly differently.

~~~
raganwald
There's no reason to treat them differently, I agree.

The question I have is why we're still talking about old news? I'm searching
this story in vain for some aditional bit of information that is actionable in
any way.

~~~
bp001
An NDA being in place is a bit of an abstract concept for people and can seem
relatively harmless until you hear of concrete examples of how that has
impacted participants.

The reason this example is worthwhile is to aid the decision making process of
those who are considering contributing to this platform. People need to fully
understand the risks to invested time.

------
raganwald
Apple builds a plantation. Sharecroppers move in, deciding of their own free
will that life working for "Massa" is good. A sign at the front gate says,
"The first rule of the Apple Plantation is that Sharecroppers do not talk
about the Apple Plantation."

So the sign is still up and the Pragamatic Programmers are waiting untilt he
sign comes down. Interesting, but not a single bit of new information. Must be
a slow news day for this to get so many votes.

It would be news if the sign came down, or if Apple blessed the Pragmatic
Programmers and said, "the sign doesn't apply to you."

~~~
sovande
Hi Ragnwald didn't you plan on taking a break :)

~~~
raganwald
<http://weblog.raganwald.com>

~~~
sovande
I know, I'm a fan. I just noticed that all your comments on this post made it
look like you where starting to blog again, but in HN comment section :-)

------
froo
As soon as I saw this headline I thought that the comments would be instantly
split into 3 views.

\- The Apple Fanboys who say it isn't such a big deal

\- The haters looking for any excuse to heap ire upon Apple

\- The rest of us who are still confused as to why Apple hasn't released the
NDA and the fallout that is happening as a result of it.

Glad to see this submission delivers as originally thought.

~~~
lallysingh
I'm #3, but my guess is that nobody @ Apple with a clue's responsible for the
app dev program. The NDA & the app store absurdity are unusually dumb for
apple. Whomever (is anyone?) is at top-level control of all this is seriously
screwing up the potential for the next big platform.

But they probably think it's irrelevant b/c the iPhone sales are still doing
fine.

------
jdg
Key phrase: "which affects all publishers regarding this material". It's not
just pragprog. There isn't any real news here other than they're taking it off
their docket.

Same situation as before with their last blog post about the [redacted] SDK
NDA.

------
ashu
That's a bad flamebait-ish headline. There is no news here. Everybody knows
the NDA is still very much active. And, as bad as that is, it means the book
was not going to be published, and it isn't.

~~~
axod
It's a shame this sort of thing is consistently being voted up here recently.

------
axod
Summary: Apple has NDA, people wrote book ignoring the NDA, now shock horror
they can't publish it. Some conclude Apple is evil.

~~~
jrockway
Summary: Information exists in the Universe. Apple claims that gathering it
and telling others about it is illegal.

------
drawkbox
You can only block technology progress from developers for so long before they
find another platform.

~~~
axod
Which would probably be good for both parties in this case.

------
utnick
Has the iphone nda actually been enforced yet or even threatened to be
enforced by apple?

Or is this an issue like the chrome license that says goog owns everything you
type, but obviously they aren't going around taking my words?

~~~
wmf
The difference is that Google changed their license after people complained.

Presumably developers aren't pushing the boundaries of the NDA because they
fear being _banned for life_ , so there's nothing for Apple to enforce.

~~~
silencio
Exactly. Podcaster's adhoc distribution being blocked is a fantastic example.
Netshare being banned from the app store is another. At this moment, unless
you are a well known developer bitching a ton about this that Apple can't lash
out at you without completely and utterly (and possibly irreversibly) screwing
themselves over in the eyes of the Mac/iPhone dev community (i.e. Wil Shipley,
Craig Hockenberry), you don't want to because this insanity is preferable to
nothing at all because some cretin at Apple was like "woah, this person went
overboard with the criticism.. _blacklisted_ ".

~~~
jmatt
_Netshare being banned from the app store is another._

If you were lucky enough to buy Netshare when it was for sale - it still works
(yay!).

I wonder exactly what this means for future support for products such as
Netshare.

My guess is adhoc'ed distributions like Podcaster will be a pain in the but to
provide updates for - but it'll be possible. Especially with the appropriate
make / build script. I think those of us who own now banned applications may
be in trouble in the future.

~~~
silencio
Well yes. You can also pirate it and install on jailbroken phones (one of the
only reasons I do so, since I never was able to purchase it).

Podcaster used a loophole in the adhoc distribution method that allowed for
getting around the 100 device limit. Apple is now preventing that developer
from doing so. I think Apple would probably go as far as to monitor who is
using the adhoc distribution method to bypass the app store (since at the
moment they'd get lots of publicity for doing so, as this is typically only
for limited beta testing and the like) to disable their account in general. I
can't see how Podcaster will be able to update anymore...

I know lots of people have been bringing up Cydia as a viable alternative, but
it's not a storefront and Cydia will not last if the App Store becomes a
failure as a result. But it may be one available and open solution for banned
applications.

------
thomasmallen
I've been using Macs my whole computing life, and I thought of them as Good
until the first iPod worked with Windows. "But that's just business," you say,
but in fact that represented a huge shift for Apple, and I recognized it
immediately: Taking care of Mac customers was no longer Apple's chief concern,
nor was creating great computers. Profit was the new obsession at company
built by obsessions.

I watched 2002's July Keynote (MacWorld) from my local, brand-spankin'-new
Apple store, and only a handful of us [all Mac geeks in attendance] were
excited about the iPod. We came to see about OSX 10.1, and whatever cool
software Apple might be brewing up, and this threw us for a loop.

Then next-gen iPods were available for Windows. Then I couldn't use FireWire
with new iPods, even to charge them! And things have really deteriorated for
us old-school MacAddicts since then. For one, MacAddict became MacLife (lame).
Jobs killed off the "Sad Mac" and took all of the color and life out of the
company. OSX 10.0-3 were great, 10.4 was OK, and Leopard is a goddamn
trainwreck, relatively speaking.

From that point on, it was all about the Benjamins in Cupertino. I was
disgusted that Apple would so quickly switch to Intel processors after years
of persuading us (proving, in my opinion) that PowerPC was the superior
architecture. Having followed Apple for quite some time, I predicted back then
that Apple would eventually just sell software, iPods, and other gizmos:
Moving away from PowerPC would be the death-knell for Mac-exclusive software
(specifically catering to Mac users), be it at the hands of Apple or Psystar.
I could care less.

------
wayne
I don't get how this helps Apple. They don't want Android copying their API or
something? Guess it doesn't matter as long as the iPhone remains super
popular.

And man, it sucks to spend all that time writing a book, find a happy
publisher, and then not be able to release it cause of this.

~~~
raganwald
_it sucks to spend all that time writing a book, find a happy publisher, and
then not be able to release it cause of this_

Seriously? You get some technology, sign an NDA saying you an't publish a
book, write a book any ways, and then it sucks that nothing has changed? What
exactly sucks other than the business plan of investing time and energy in the
hope that someone else changes their mind about an agreement you signed?

~~~
bp001
The author did take a risk here, but the risk looked to be minimal upfront. It
is amazing to that Apple continues to take this stance with their NDA.

Any artificial barrier that cuts down on developer freedom and productivity
will keep developers away from a platform.

Yes, the author made the assumption that Apple understood that a level of
openness is required take a platform's popularity to the next level.

~~~
raganwald
_Any artificial barrier that cuts down on developer freedom and productivity
will keep developers away from a platform. Yes, the author made the assumption
that Apple understood that a level of openness is required take a platform's
popularity to the next level._

This is a point I see over and over again. People who are not Apple managers
telling Apple what Apple ought to do to run their business successfully.

I appreciate you are being sincere, but as a long-time Apple watcher, I also
recall people saying much the same thing about clones, about running Windows,
about sticking with OS9, about supporting Java on iPhone, about being bought
by Sun, and a great number of other things that Apple chose not to do, or
chose to do later, or chose to do and undo and not redo.

You may be right that in some alternate universe Apple would be more
successful if you called the shots instead of Steve Jobs.

But if we can return to the point of the post, it is that Steve Jobs _is_ the
CEO, Apple is doing what it does rather than what you or I want it to do, and
it is foolish to make bets that Apple will reverse one of their positions just
because you or I think they ought to do so.

~~~
bp001
I did not claim that Apple would be more successful if I called the shots
instead of Steve Jobs. I think that not one in a million could have staged
such a successful resurgence as Steve Jobs has.

However, I believe Apple is harming their platform in this matter. It is
possible that I am wrong and Apple will be better off with this decision.

In any case, some developers and authors are being due to their assumption
that the platform would be more open. This will lead to many developers
deciding to spend their work effort developing for other platforms.

~~~
raganwald
Well, my personal opinion's that Apple are harming their platform in this
matter as well. I know for a fact that many developers are shunning the
platform because of actions like this. As a matter of fact, I shun developing
directly for the platform because of similar actions in the past, like giving
iTunes away and driving all the payware music players out of business. Or
building the dashboard and driving Konfabulator over to Windows.

However, I stand by my assertion that given Apple's history and given the fact
that there was an NDA in place when the book project was begun, there is no
sympathy to give out here, nor is there any surprising "Who would have thought
Apple would do this?" news.

In fact, nothing has changed since the NDA was first revealed. I say again, it
will be newsworthy when the restrictions are lifted. Until then, it is like
telling the world that Steve Jobs is tyrannical and abusive to his employees.

------
boredguy8
Where is Fake Steve Jobs when you need him?

~~~
wmf
Maybe Real Steve Jobs hired him to run iPhone developer relations.

------
immad
Ridiculous

------
perezd
Apple's approach to this whole development platform is really starting to
bother me. I won't be investing in it until I can learn more about it from
some of the most trusted authors in the biz.

------
markbao
Is it just me, or is it sounding like Apple is coming out with their own line
of iPhone manuals or something...?

------
russ
fuckingnda.com

------
mroman
This is outrageous.

That's it, I am going to refrain from purchasing any and all Apple products
from here on, am going to encourage others to do the same, and will also
refrain from recommending their products to anyone.

~~~
wayne
Serious? That's hard core. This might discourage me from developing for the
iPhone, but it's not going to make me buy a Zune over an iPod. :)

~~~
aston
The new Zune stuff is looking _really_ good right now. Like better than iPod +
iTunes good.

~~~
dcurtis
You're kidding right? Bash Apple all you want, but you have to admit that they
create the best user _experiences_ of any company around.

Microsoft has proven for twenty years that it is incapable of creating a good
user experience.

~~~
aston
Well, having tried both, I probably have a better perspective on the matter.
However, I'll defer to authority: [http://gizmodo.com/5050410/microsoft-beats-
apples-itunes-gen...](http://gizmodo.com/5050410/microsoft-beats-apples-
itunes-genius-with-mixview)

