On: What’s Really Going On With Apple, Google, AT&T And The FCC

[sil3ntmac]

A very controversial post.

I do get tired of bloggers disputing what should be fact by mixing it with rumors or secondary sources...

[techcrunch quote]: "The first part of Apple’s argument, that they never rejected the application, is “a total lie,” according to many sources with knowledge of the Google Voice application process." ... "There is overwhelming evidence that Apple did in fact reject the application."

[daringfireball quote]: "Google’s initial statement regarding this did not use the word rejected either. Their spokesperson told TechCrunch: “Apple did not approve the Google Voice application we submitted six weeks ago to the Apple App Store.”"

Who is trying to mislead us here? Techcrunch throws unnamed "overwhelming evidence" and unnamed "sources" at my face, while daringfireball talks about Google's "initial" statement. Was there a second or third statement that cleared things up?

Anybody have the facts?

[wvenable → sil3ntmac]

  re⋅ject
  3. to refuse to accept (someone or something);
  source: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/reject

Seem to me like the "reject"/"not approve" disparity is splitting hairs.

[mrshoe → wvenable]

I'm not going to claim to know how long Apple should be allowed to "ponder" the Google Voice app, as they said they are doing in their answers to the FCC's questions. Six or eight weeks seems like plenty of time to decide.

However, there is a big difference between an app being still under review and being rejected.

Arrington's language claiming that Apple's answer to the FCC was "a total lie" reminds me of Dick Cheney talking about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. There's "overwhelming evidence"? And that's enough for you to accuse Apple of lying to the FCC on TechCrunch? Obviously not all journalists hold themselves to the same standards.

[wvenable → mrshoe]

There may be a big difference between an app under review and being rejected. There's also a difference between an app being sold in store for months and an app being pulled from the store! Reminder, it was Apple pulling 3 existing Google voice applications that prompted questions to Google about the status of their official app in the first place.

Google's response at the time sounded pretty final: "We will continue to work to bring our services to iPhone users, for example, by taking advantage of advances in mobile browsers."

[tvon → wvenable]

So once an application is submitted to the App Store, it can safely be considered and discussed as having been rejected until the author has been notified of it's approval?

[tptacek → sil3ntmac]

Gruber at Daring Fireball also retracts when he gets things wrong.

[TomOfTTB → sil3ntmac]

I don't see the problem here. TechCrunch is reporting info from Sources where as DaringFireball is quoting from the official statement. These are two different things and more to the point they're two things that almost always contradict each other (there's no point in quoting sources if those sources are just repeating what the official statement says)

[zngtk4 → sil3ntmac]

Here's something that seems to be left out of this discussion: there was an existing Google Voice application on the App Store called GV Mobile. At the time that Google's own app was either "rejected" or "held for further review", Apple also pulled GV Mobile from it's App Store. That at least, is rejection.

[petercooper → sil3ntmac]

I do get tired of bloggers disputing what should be fact by mixing it with rumors or secondary sources...

The companies that get reported on are no better with their "We definitely won't be doing X" and then they do X.

I think this story isn't grounded very well but there's a kind of precedent with Apple's DRM play with iTunes.