“[Ninjawords] is a terrific app – pretty much exactly what I’ve always wanted in an iPhone dictionary, and, yes, with both a better user experience and better dictionary content than the other low-cost dictionaries in the App Store. But Ninjawords for iPhone suffers one humiliating flaw: it omits all the words deemed “objectionable” by Apple’s App Store reviewers, despite the fact that Ninjawords carries a 17+ rating. Apple censored an English dictionary. A dictionary. A reference book. For words contained in all reasonable dictionaries. For words contained in dictionaries that are used every day in elementary school libraries and classrooms.”
Please, refer to more blocked applications by Apple. This is the insane closed company politics. As illogical as it may sound, right now Windows Mobile is the most open platform for writing and distributing mobile applications.
More so than Android?
Technically the most open platform is Java ME for mobile applications. But WinMo does have a good market penetration, much higher than Android.
More so than Android?
Well, you are right – Android is open, but I don’t think it’s mature enough yet. The devices which are sold preinstalled with Android are scarce. One day it will be a real alternative. Let’s hope sooner than later.
BTW, what’s the situation with S60? Especially after this headline: http://www.osnews.com/story/21949/Symbian_S60_UI_is_dead
I recall that they used to have some kind of license as well, but I think it’s not relevant anymore.
Edited 2009-08-06 08:29 UTC
Let there be no F words on the sacred JesusPhone
Oh that is what that i in iPhone stands for.
You know, that in Latin Jesus is spelled Iesus.
I could say that is becoming a bad joke, if:
a) It would have been at least for a second funny
b) I knew it is a joke.
None of the above statements are true, so I ask myself why in teh universe are people still putting up with Apple?
Did they escape MS just to find a new , more sadistic master?
The iPhone ecosystem is the evil one. OS X and Macintosh computer and peripherals (other than the iPhone), are ok, if you like the OS.
Lucky for me, you don’t need (yet) and iPhone to use a Macintosh computer, and if you do have/use an iPhone, you really don’t need to buy stupid apps all day. It’s a *very* comfortable phone to use on a daily basis , very easy to find contacts, send msgs, etc.
Mine is an old Gen1 iPhone, which has been Jailbroken since day one (I live in Europe, so a friend brought it to me in the States and sent it). When this phone breaks apart (and it’s almost there) I might buy a 3g and Jailbreak it again, I like to use the iPhone as a phone and couldn’t care less about apps. But that’s just me.
“Apple requires you to be 17 years or older to purchase a censored dictionary that omits half the words Steve Jobs uses every day”
1. Attempts to silences criticisms
2. Removes words from dictionaries
3. Achieve cult status
Looks like Apple is on their way to becoming an Inner Party incarnate!
It sounds more and more like you have to be either naïve or masochistic (or perhaps both) if you want to be an Apple customer. Yet there’s something funny about all this. I mean, first the iPod hand grenade and then this surge of anachronistic puritanism about an iPhone application containing words most English speaker know since primary school.
Ever wondered why foreigners can’t eff and blind properly in English? Now you know.
I find there’s a humorous streak in so much they can do at Apple. It might be difficult to detect, but it’s there. I’m just a bit sorry OSX is in their hands. (smirk). But maybe one day they’ll just exhilaratingly balls it up.
I had to look up what ‘eff and blind’ meant. Being a yankee, I had no idea
It’s interesting that Apple allows the dictionary.com app which allows you to look up all kinds of words, even those 7 words George Carlin warned us about.
Ah, what I wouldn’t give for a day without any Apple hardware or Apple company policy or Apple AppStore related news on OS… OS!!! OSnews…
😐
-zsejk
The AppStore is the only way to get Apps onto the iPhone OS — the AppStore is effectively the ‘Package Manager’ for iPhone OS.
This news matters, because how many seconds would you think it would take to reach the news if Linux distributions began censoring content through their package managers?
Apps are what make an OS usable; many people rely upon a good web browser to get their work done. In this respect, the issues raised by the draconian AppStore policies are critical and could one day apply to other Operating Systems outside of just the iPhone.
True. But wouldn’t you say all that is by the good grace of Apple? I’m not saying it would make for a very good phone, but it’s theoretically possible for there to exist an OS that is manufacturer-only. iPhone OS is not manufacturer-only, because Apple, however much convincing it took for them to get there, decided it would be. As such, it’s their guidelines that, well, guide what goes on there. I’m sure it says somewhere they get to decide what goes on, what doesn’t, what get’s taken off after a while, etc. You might not agree with some of the decisions, but it’s their right. It’s nothing strange or out of the ordinary. Combined with the amount of articles that lament this very same thing… it’s becoming too much. That’s all.
🙂
I don’t know. But I’m sure it happens. Do all contributions make it into the package list? Does nothing ever get taken out after it turns out it for instance sub-standard? Of course it’s different because the Linux community as a whole I guess gets input, whereas the iPhone OS and the AppStore are Apple’s and well, they can do whatever they please. Once again nothing weird or out of the ordinary. Combined with the amount of articles about this very same thing… still a little too much.
As mentioned in the beginning: the iPhone and the iPhone OS would be usable (enough?) without the apps submitted through the AppStore. It’s an extra, it does not change the OS, the fact that one dictionary app gets pointlessly removed also does not change anything about the OS.
Anyway. It’s all just too much for me, too much focus on Apple’s AppStore. … is all I was saying.
🙂
I, for one, am not willing to pay actual money in order to take possession of a phone whose software restricts, for no valid technical reason, what I can do with the device. I certainly will not then be reverent and grateful that the Great Apple has deigned to allow me to handle their blessed hardware. If I purchase the device, I should be able to do with it as I please; I do not acknowledge that Apple, for creating this wonderful thing, have established for themselves the right to retain control over it and what I can do with it, after I have paid a fair price for it and taken possession of it.
That’s not what he means at all. First off, yes, things get removed from package managers, for being sub-standard, or just being to much work to package, but not for allowing access to content that, say, Canonical (or Red Hat or Novell or Patrick Volkerding, to bludgeon his name’s spelling) is worried some would find offensive. I think that was Kroc’s point. He’s complaining that the app was removed, not for some valid technical reason, but that it can be used to access content that Apple doesn’t want you to access. That’s a whole different question, and that is something that no linux distributor I know of would ever consider doing.
And, for the record, if a package isn’t available in my distribution’s package manager, I can usually still acquire it on my own, and install it separately. That also changes matters.
Here I might actually agree with you. While censoring a dictionary is disturbing behavior, and vaguely amusing to boot, it’s not exactly earth-shattering news. Basically, we all know that Apple are jerks. Most people who care about these kinds of issues aren’t going to patronize Apple, because we all know this already. It’s not a revalation.
Edited 2009-08-05 16:02 UTC
I don’t know if this is exactly what you were looking for, but there was the Debian hot-babe ( http://dindinx.net/hotbabe/ ) controversy a few years ago. See http://www.linux.com/archive/feature/41355 and http://lwn.net/Articles/113644/ for articles on it. It does not appear to currently be in Debian ( http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=hot-babe&searchon=names&… ).
LOL
I could imagine some mom suing the Debian organization for making a a CPU meter to fap to when she sees her 13 year old son had installed that on their PC.
But the argument remains the same. Debian removed it from their package manager, but if you still wanted to install Hot-Babe on your PC there’s nothing stopping you.
On the iPhone on the other hand unless you jail break the phone there’s no other way to install 3rd party apps excpet through the AppStore.
Ah, what I wouldn’t give for a day without any Apple hardware or Apple company policy or Apple AppStore related news on OS… OS!!! OSnews…
Yeah, but think of the alternatives. It would be hate for MS Windows, or oozing love for linux, OR we’d hear about Thom’s adventures in darning his socks!
http://www.osnews.com/story/21944/The_10_Most_Annoying_Things_in_In…
See #10.
Every site has their own slant. OSNews’ slant right is rather dynamic, but currently it has a hate on for all things retarded with Apple.
Who knows, maybe David will end his tirade against Apple, Thom will come to love the candy like goodness that OS X offers and it will come to an end and all the Linux lovers can get their love on again.
I don’t care what they print as long as it’s interesting. I stopped using Apple products because I became tired of seeing what was a great product slowly errode, affected by the ever increasing priority of the i(Phone|Pod) instead of their core competencies. This is, as Thom hates to hear, only my opinion and not supposed to be taken as fact.
As has been said over and over countless times, OSNews is not just about Operating Systems or Open Source…it’s a consolidator of popular tech news along with some homebrewed content. Complaining that it’s not operating system related only irritates, it doesn’t get you anywhere.
You’ve got it wrong, though. I criticize because I love!
I appreciate your love for Apple…
I just don’t understand it sometimes
About the worst thing we can do for those we love is to become “enablers” for their self-destructive behaviors. It may be easier for us in the short term. It may seem the right thing to do. But in the end, we cannot escape from the fact that we are facilitating their substance addiction… their ruinous gambling habit… their kleptomania… their compulsive need for approval… their obsessive and bank-breaking fetish for Ron Jeremy blow up sex doll collectibles…
We may not be able to stop them. We may lose their love. But we do not have to assist them in their self-destruction. In the end, it will surely be worth it to know that we did what we could to save them.
Corporations might have different pathologies than individuals, but the principle is the same.
Speaking for myself, though, as someone who doesn’t particularly love Apple… they can go screw themselves. Doesn’t matter to me. I’d be content just to reduce the damage they do to others on their way down. 😉
Edited 2009-08-06 02:58 UTC
Isn’t it possible that by not enabling their self destruction, not doing anything but continuing your purchasing of their products you’re only confirming their actions as right in their corporate thought process?
I don’t like what they are doing, but I will continue buying their products…that will show them!
Honey? Are you sure you wouldn’t like some angel dust?
Do not condescend to me…
You’ve taken light heartedness and turned it to insult.
In what way? I was agreeing with you.
Calling me honey, I conside that an insult and much too often it’s said in condenscating situations.
If I mistook that, I am sorry. Might be standard practice from wherever you might be from
Has anyone tried to make a generic iPhone app that acts as a host to run arbitrary programs?
There was news about how no emulators were allowed yet Apple let some through anyway. They pick and choose.
Just make your app a web app and point Safari at it until they start adding sensoring to Safari.
Use GWT like google wave uses and you’re only developing for one platform… the web.
Please FOAD already. Fascism is not acceptable from an American company.
Do they sensor Safari or can you visit explicit websites?
Screw Apple and their fanbois.
Buy an Android phone. Cool as hell.
No joke, had my girlfriend and a buddy in my car. We wondered where grits came from. One had an iPhone, one had a G1. I said they should race each other. Girlfriend with G1 didn’t care to but after 30 seconds and no answer from iPhone she took hers out and had the answer before he did. It comes from corn.
Everyone should know where grits comes from. Tsk! You must be from the North.
Maybe, he’s corn-fused.
Living in Florida but born and raised in Wisconsin.
Up there we eat hashbrowns and homefries cooked in tons and tons of butter. Not margarine mind you… that even used to be illegal. My parents would tell me stories of crossing the border to buy it.
Mmmmmmmmm! Butter!
Yes, you can.
What does the phone platform have to do with how well someone can search Google?
The iPhone 3G is every bit as fast as a G1 in terms of rendering. I don’t see that as being the issue so much as a person who doesn’t understand how search works.
I understand how search works. I know that they are on two different provider’s networks too. I’m just saying that in this case, tmobile was faster than at&t… just another plus for ditching apple and going with Android.
IBM would have a manual 400 pages thick to describe how to evaluate mobile applications. Apple seems to use phone psychics, spinning a wheel, or throwing darts to decide.
I’m not sure what they’re doing there, but I had 2 apps to be updated last week (The Weather Channel and another I don’t remember), but 1 had a 17+ rating and I have zero apps that I couldn’t show to a child.
I really don’t understand what is so difficult. If rap that demeans women (no, I don’t have any) can get to my iPod touch, why not applications?
Edited 2009-08-05 16:14 UTC
Not all rap demeans women. Some glorifies drugs and violence.
and bling, can’t forget the bling.
Phrase about my car (Volvo!),
rhyme about my crew
Rap about how much more crunk I am than you
Rhyme about my rims,
rhyme about my bling
Chorus where I scream cause I don’t know how to sing
Rhyme supporting guns,
and also drinking 40’s
Misogynist rhyme about banging lots of shorties
Rhyme about my dough, and then some made up lyrics
Get off the gas you swinga, check the deuce, yo sabiirit
Linus: He’ll come here because I have the most sincere Apple collection and he respects sincerity.
Sally Brown: Do you really think he will come?
Linus: Tonight the Great Apple will rise out of the Apple store. He flies through the air and brings iPhones to all the children of the world.
Sally Brown: That’s a good story.
Linus: You don’t believe the story of the Great Apple? I thought little girls always believed everything that was told to them. I thought little girls were innocent and trusting.
Sally Brown: Welcome to OSnews!
Edited 2009-08-05 16:30 UTC
I hate how I can’t vote on comments after I make a comment.
+1 for Funny
Apple is just looking out for the kiddies. Who else will stop youngsters from looking up “boobies” in the dictionary and snickering?
(note to Apple: Can you please also stop the calculator app from accepting the numbers 8008135 or 5318008?)