In what is surely to surprise no one, and in what will surely be waved away by the usual people, Apple seems to be rejecting applications from the iOS App Store that mention “Pebble”.
We have just had the latest version of our SeaNav US iOS app rejected by Apple because we support the Pebble Smartwatch and say so in the app description and meta-data (we also state in the review notes that “This application was approved for use with the Pebble MFI Accessory in the Product Plan xxxxxx-yyyy (Pebble Smartwatch)”. See copy of rejection reason below.
SeaNav US has previously been approved by Apple with no problem, we have had Pebble support in SeaNav for nearly 2 years and there are no changes to our support for the Pebble in this version. What are Apple doing? Have they gone Apple Watch crazy? What can we do?
This application has been in the App Store for two years with the same mentions of Pebble and Pebble support, but now that the Apple Watch is here, that’s magically no longer allowed. Further down in the comments, another developer has had to remove Pebble screenshots from his application’s description page. About a month ago, I already predicted this kind of bevahiour, mostly because I’m really good at pattern recognition.
I think this calls for an official EU investigation into Google’s behaviour.
You lost me, Thom, with the last sentence:
> I think this calls for an official EU investigation into Google’s behaviour.
Shouldn’t it be “Apple’s behaviour”?
It’s a joke.
Sarcasm. An art that is being lost in time…
I thought so (a *sarcasm* rather than a *joke*), but wasn’t sure ’cause there are so many recent antitrust cases to Google I didn’t know if I might have missed any of them.
Thanks for the clarification 🙂
Not laughing though.
Haha, I get it now. I did have to be told it was a joke before I saw the humor in it. In a way that makes it even more funny.
Because, you know, Google should never be touched… 😀
I got that immediately, and laughed loudly when I read it.
This is petty and dishonorable. Do they not believe in their own watch?
Apple is not rejecting apps that support Pebble. This is the usual hyperbole from this site. Apple’s guidelines say you can’t talk about other platforms in your description. It’s not a new rule, this developer broke the rule, and has now rightfully had his or her app rejected. The only mystery is how he or she got away with it for so long. The fix is not to remove Pebble support, it’s to fix the description. Once that fix is made, the app will be approved, and will still support Pebble.
It’s a perfectly sensible rule. A car dealership doesn’t have descriptions beside the cars for sale stating that the same car can be also be bought at the place across the street.
Edited 2015-04-23 15:03 UTC
But, the definition of platform keeps on getting changed as Apple enters new markets.
So I have this app that works with a specific brand of car. Great SupaCar App approved!
Two years later Apple releases a car.
Now my app can’t talk about how it works with SupaCar anymore? WTF?
The definition of “mobile platform” does not change. A mobile platform is just that. The developer of the app ignored that rule – so Apple rejected the app. I just don’t see controversy here. Pebble was a mobile platform long before the Apple Watch appeared, and the appearance of the Apple Watch does not alter Apple’s rule in any way. Apple was just lax about enforcing it, it seems.
01Michael10 – yes, resort to childish name calling rather than addressing the arguments. It’s not Apple’s job to promote competing products, I don’t know why people expect them to. Really, Pebble should provide a directory of apps that supports Pebble, even if they have to link to the AppStore to actually install them. It’s their product, it’s their job. (Maybe they already do that, I don’t know, or care).
Apple fanboy counts as childish naming calling? I think the Internet may be a little to rough for you.
You want me to address the argument? OK… No one is expecting Apple to promote other products. Who said that? This is not about Pebble either but them allowing independent developers to be able to promote their own apps that they pay Apple to have in their store.
This is NOT an issue in the Google play store –> https://play.google.com/store/search?q=peeble
You are really defending walled gardens (the tallest walled garden anyway)? Not to mention Apple’s anti-competitive practices. This is the kind of ignorance that has lead the EU to investigate Google and not Apple or Microsoft about their mobile ecosystems.
Edited 2015-04-23 16:39 UTC
Yes, calling someone a derogatory term is name calling, and using the word “fanboy” is childish. An adult knows that other adults have a complex mix of views on any given subject. I think, for example, that Apple’s dev tools are garbage.
When you sign up to a developer account, you agree to the terms and conditions before you pay. Apple allows you to promote your apps according to the terms you have agreed to. Why don’t you get this? Why should Apple advertise features in their App Store that requires customers buy a competing device in order to avail of those features?
Anti-competitive? Apple is not close to having the kind of market share that would lead a neutral commenter to say they were being anti-competitive. Don’t twist the laws to suit your own bias. Those laws are to prevent a single company dominating a single business area. None of that applies here.
Whether or not the Play Store allows this is irrelevant. Apple is not Google and is free to make its own decision. Prefer Google’s approach to Apple’s? Use an Android phone over an iPhone.
Edited 2015-04-23 16:49 UTC
I am sorry you wrote so many words but weren’t able to make your argument. I understand you don’t realize that…
Nobody cares what the developer agreement says dude… What everybody else and I are saying is their policy is WRONG (and probably illegal) and maybe developers should concentrate on Android and Windows apps instead. Apple is not being asked to advertize other products but to support developer’s apps. What don’t you understand?
Yes, anti-comparative and worse anti-consumer… Google does not dominant the mobile market in the EU. They do sell the most phones but not because they are taking advantage of their position (off-topic discussion).
I don’t buy Apple products and thanks for playing.
Edited 2015-04-23 17:14 UTC
I’ve explained why it’s perfectly legal, I’ve explained why Apple is objectively within its rights to do this. My original post (which you replied to), and all subsequent posts have been on these terms. You can take a different angle and talk about if the policy seems subjectively desirable to you or not, that’s a different discussion.
As I said, it’s not anti-competitive when they have many competitors. It’s not anti-consumer when the consumer has a choice. And we’re talking here about whether or not a developer can mention “Pebble” in their app description – you might want to take a step back and see this in perspective.
Comments like “thanks for playing” show you to be rude and immature. If you’re incapable of having a polite debate with someone, perhaps should refrain from getting into debates.
It all depends on the definition of mobile platform, Two years ago, it apparently ment an operating system of what s commonly called a mobile, or a smartphone or a handset/tablet, considering a smartwatch to be one wasn t in their interest then. Now that they have a smartwatch platform themselves, it falls under the same definition all of a sudden. Now there seems to be something really fishy, legally speaking, about changing your own definitions after the contract has been in place for Two years.
How would you react if pebble called its os I.e. TIME OS would mentioning Pebble (since it references to a device rather than a platform) still be reasom enough to have it removed?
Using ones presence in one market to influence another markets sure is anti competitive, whether that is illegal depends on your dominance, but It remains anti competitive.
terrakotta,
Absolutely right. If google did this, it would be a clear antitrust violation. Apple does have a lot of influence to hurt competition (such as undermining the efforts of 3rd party developers to publish certain apps), but with respect to apple it’s not clear that they would be subject to antitrust law given their market position.
You just madethose illogical rules up.
Because Apple *also* agreed that contract with this developer. Since 2 years.
Any contract is binding at least *two* parties, not only one. A contract where only one party has duties is void.
Real issue here is one well-known party consider itself being above, well, everything.
It’s not getting ridiculous, it *behind* ridiculous.
And there is only one solution: avoid this *party*.
Period.
As I’m pretty sure Apple can’t produce every device, every feature, every thing every people may possibly need, their golden jail is showing more and more its limit each time they fail to do it while, on the other side of the fence, there is other offers, sometimes even better, earlier, and/or cheaper. They just can’t be used from this *side* of the fence, because of the fence. Because of the fence builder, to be precise.
The more Apple interoperability is broken, the better.
For alternatives.
That’s how lock-down policy is actually helping competition: by getting ridiculous locked-down.
Please continue Apple to NOT take my money. You deserve it all.
Edited 2015-04-23 17:20 UTC
Yep, both parties agreed to the contract. The contract that prohibits developers from mentioning competing mobile platforms. That’s my point. The contract hasn’t changed.
Edited 2015-04-23 17:48 UTC
And since 2 years Apple agreed to publish that application on their AppStore under this contract terms. Without any issue raised.
Same applied to the official Pebble app.
According to this 3.1 rule, Apple should have not.
Apple is violating it until it becomes in their self-interest to stop violating it.
Let developers thinks since 2 years that because they need to have some iOS apps to show (and by show, I mean publicly advertizing that it does, not hidding it in pure hypocrisy!) good interoperability with a third party device, they will keep agreed to violate this rule when Apple will want to show iOS apps that communicate *only* with one smartwatch, *their*.
I really can’t understand how people could even give any money to such company, actually.
Are you saying that a car is not “mobile” ?
Nope. I’d expect them to reject Android Auto apps too.
what about a notebook? Do you think you could advertise that an IOS app works with Windows? What about windows RT?
Basically, I’m really wondering what the limits of a “mobile platform” are. If its not defined in the contract then its open to interpretation on both parties.
That’s been every commercial platform’s pattern since the creation of platforms..
Are you kidding me? You are trying to say one can have an app that supports the Pebble watch in the store but you can’t say the word Pebble? How would anyone know what the app is for or be able to find said app? You don’t see a problem with this?
You sir are the highest order of Apple fanboy…
It’s Apple’s app store and its platform – they can reject whatever app they want for whatever reason they want. Don’t like it? A solution has already been given in these comments – stop buying Apple products. It ain’t that hard. No need to get the Nanny State involved.
For better or worse, this is the way Apple has ran things since the beginning, so you’d think their developers and end users would’ve learned by now.
Exactly. If you really care so much about this, get people to stop buying from Apple. If they see their sales drop, they’ll cut this crap out faster than the nanny state ever would. I don’t buy Apple anymore, even though I like the products themselves. I’ve had enough of things like this and I’m damned if I’ll support it. To everyone screaming about this, shut your wallets to Apple. If enough people do that, then and only then will this stop.
So why could earlier version talk about Pebble support?
This is Apple trying to prevent possible new buyers of the Apple Watch doing a search of the apps and finding out about the Pebble.
Well, they kick the sh*t out of Google for their preferential treatment of their own services – but hey, at least you can find competing services with Google (maybe lower on the list, but still). Apple seems to simply eradicate any indication to competing products, even when their support is secondary. Well, let’s just say I’m not holding my breath for any Apple-related investigation anytime soon.
No need. the EU started investigating Apple a LONG LONG time ago, long before they started investigating Google.
Maybe you remember one of the fall outs, something about an eBook cartel they nailed Apple on? They have had ongoing investigations on Apple behavior since.
AFAICT, Apple’s AppStore don’t sell smartwatches but, well, applications!
One will expect that for an application that can communicate with another device, the applications store will somehow expose that fact.
Kinda central point. You know, so that people could know what can do this application without having to pray that it may also communicate with this specific device but maybe they can’t tell it on the box because the store forbid them.
Plus, how Apple could explain that the official Pebble app is *still* available on AppStore while its description clearly say it works with a Pebble, a smartwatch NOT made by Apple?
Give me popcorn, next days should be really fun.
One remaining inconvenient thorn for Apple must be the web browser that they also include with their devices. Maybe they should make their browser return a 404 error every time a webpage mentions Pebble, Android, LG, Samsung, Microsoft, or Motorola. That way their users will be continue to be blissfully ignorant of the alternatives!
Edited 2015-04-23 18:54 UTC
phoudoin,
I’m curious what will happen, but I’m sorry for the devs who are going through it. If they try and fight this there’s a very good chance they’d face retaliation and expulsion by apple.
So, It turns out is more about banner waving pebble support then about actual support.
They simply need to not explicitly state they support other watches.
Edited 2015-04-23 15:08 UTC
Simply? Wow! Another head in the sand…
Exactly how will customers who may have a Pebble know which apps will support it then?
Well, Apple is doing that because it’s better for them just like most companies.
What you can do is to stop buying Apple, until it stops being better for them to block pebble.
…almost as lame as the Apple Watch itself …which believe it or not is a compliment in this case.
If Bakers can be forced to bake cakes which they find offensive, the Government should force Tim Cook and Apple to end this rampant and bigoted discrimination against things which they find offensive!
Repeal the Rock Freedom Restoration Act so he can’t discriminate against pebbles!
We should all boycott California until they end this prejudice!
Until they have their own, lock-down smartwatch ready, Apple was happy to ignore their own 3.1 guideline and accept any iOS app that could allow their customers to say “hey, there’s an app for that Pebble thing too, I’m not locked in Apple jail, see!”.
Even the official Pebble app was accepted without issue to that “3.1 – Apps or metadata that mentions the name of any other mobile platform will be rejected” contracting term.
For Apple, there is an app for “that” only when “that” is sold by them or NOT YET sold by them.
For a company who survived once thank to anti-competitive laws, it’s beyond ironic.
Pebble wants access to Apple’s market. Apple wants to feed their market the Apple watch.
Apple is using their position to make life easy for the Apple watch and difficult for the pebble people.
Sort of same kind of fun we saw with Microsoft when office95 was released. Early access to windows95, full access to undocumented APIs. Not a lot of motivation to give the other software vendors much help with their own migration from dos/win311 to win95.
So, just thinking aloud here, when and how exactly does someone making an app that supports Apple and Pebble watches translate into Pebble wanting access to Apple’s market share. (yes, I deliberately didn’t end that with a question mark)
This is not a change in Apple’s policies, it’s a fluke. The reviewer is interpreting the rule incorrectly.
The rule is intended to avoid descriptions which refer to future plans for alternative platform support, or different ports of the app available on other platforms. The rule does not intend to withhold information on platform support for this app instance, or ban said platform support.
For example:
– “Also find our app on the Pebble Watch Store” (violation)
– “This app syncs with Pebble Smartwatch” (not violation)
Other examples:
– “This feature is only available on our Windows Phone version of Office” (violation)
– “We’re moving to the Google Play store for Android” (violation)
– “This app allows you to share files on all popular mobile platforms” (not violation)
– “Tap together your iPhone to another iPhone, Android phone or WM phone to share contact info” (not violation)
My guess is Apple will be reversing decision on that rejection soon.
Right, so the problem is that Apple is misinterpreting what the Pebble store provides. It allows you to install, on your watch, the necessary part that allows *this* app to work. It’s not a port, it’s not an alternate distribution of the same app.
If the problem is that Apple is blocking apps based on a misunderstanding of how the Pebble works, then the story remains one of how Apple is blocking Pebble apps.
Ok it’s apple’s platform, but iOS has grown and is the number two widely used mobile OS in the world, with that install/use base certain responsibilities arise in that the method in which the device can get apps should be open in it’s approach,
This is akin to Microsoft denying iTunes or if apple was to port Pages, Numbers and Keynote to Windows, Microsoft blocking it because it cuts into Office sales.
I hope there is a big uproar about this as this is really poor, if anything it makes the subpar/meh Apple Watch even less inviting.
Title: “Apple now rejecting applications with Pebble support”
1st paragraph: “Apple seems to be rejecting applications from the iOS App Store that mention “Pebble”
Error 1: Only 1 application seems to be affected
Error 2: Supporting Pebble seems to be allowed, mentioning Pebble seems to got this developers app suddenly rejected
Conclusion: Title is linkbait, Apple(‘s appstore-reviewer) is a petty SELF-SENSORED
So they’re specifically blocking apps even on the grounds of them *interacting* with a competitive product. Isn’t that what makes governments come down on like a ton of bricks, calling it ‘anti-competitive’ behaviour ? I suppose Apple will get away with it though because either
a) Their ‘influence’ may make it very uncomfortable for any official to go after them.
or
b) It would be difficult to prove that the apps are being blocked specifically for this reason, as all Apple have to do is invent a more innocent sounding reason.
Or maybe both the above reasons of course ….