App Store Spam - 28 identical apps, one developer | Hacker News Reader

App Store Spam - 28 identical apps, one developer

objectivesea.tumblr.com

59 pointskennywinker32 comments

Apple's been fairly lax lately with its checking. A friend's game that we were able to get crashing on launch 100% of the time passed through the original submit process without a peep.

The same friend, just for kicks, submitted a deliberately broken app that didn't crash but showed a blank screen after launch. It also got approved without incident. It's like Apple just ran automated tests, but no human ever saw it.

I have a feeling that Apple's process varies depending on the kind of app (free vs. paid), the platforms you're targeting and your past history.

It's hit or miss. Once I made a free app that displayed a picture of a cartoon cow and made a "Moooo" sound when you turned the phone upside down. I had a toy like that as a kid. Okay, don't judge me -- but I thought I would be a fun quick idea and any kids (and even some adults) to whom I've shown the prototype loved it. I had an artist draw the cow, and bought rights to a sound I really liked.

The app was rejected twice for having "limited functionality." After I resubmitted it with various tweaks, someone actually called me personally to reject it. They were classy, communicated well, and were very polite, but ...

There are plenty of apps in the store, often in Top 100, that do less, or actually do nothing. My favorite is "traffic light changer" that claims to change traffic lights. Or a "fingerprint scanner." Also, there's "lockify your screen" that claims to give you Android-like screen unlock, and yet just displays a wallpaper with dots. Yes, they all have oodles of 1-star reviews from upset buyers, but they did get approved somehow. It seems like I just got unlucky with reviewers.

I had a toy sheep like that as a kid, so it seems like a legitimate app to me, sorry to hear it was rejected. I noticed those fake fingerprint scanners -- at least two of which were consistently in the top 100 -- last year when I was creating an app that performs real 3D scanning. I thought "Surely if a fake fingerprint scanner is so popular, something that actually takes a 3D scan of your face would be even more popular." I was incorrect. (Though my app has done just fine -- it's just that those fake fingerprint scanners are disgustingly successful given what they are.)

I just bought your app out of curiosity. That is a very interesting concept -- would love to see how you keep innovating further! Good luck! It took a few tries/a darker room to get just the right effect. I don't actually know much about image processing -- I figured you would try to detect the face/cheeks/nose and "extrude" those when rotated, but it seems like it's doing something more sophisticated.

GrantS - Trimensional is fantastic; unpredictability is fun and inspiring. Thank you. It's also been my go-to wow demo for the uninitiated.

Damn, my Nixie Clock Radio app must have hit the zealous end of the pool. I was rejected 3 times, pretty much validly really, with 6 - 10 day review cycles. Yes, it took around a month to get in and accepted, during which I removed features, simplified others, and added and added and added resilience.

On the bright-side, the app is now pretty bullet-proof, works correctly with the AV panel controls, handles interruptions tidily etc., etc.

I'm totally grateful to the App store reviewers for being such hard-asses.

I have had the exact same experience, though my rejections were more legalese like: "we don't accept invitation request screens in apps".

But it did take 3 rejections spanning a month before I got through.

I have observed the same thing. On the other hand however, when I submit my apps, somehow I always end up getting allocated to reviewers who fancy a little argument / rejection cycle about the finer details of the more exotic parts of the Human Interface Guidelines. I suspect that it relates to the price tag of the app.

I've gotten busted for minor HIG violations on free apps (using a button incorrectly) so I think it's just luck of the draw.

Which category?

This is a common business model for mobile apps. I see blog posts here on the hacker news front page from iphone app guys describing the development of their app product line. In the end its quite literally make a tool that poops out apps that are just a little different.

This is rampant in the industry and is motivated by cross-promotion and social marketing with little development overhead. Their product is the eventual user base. Apple doesn't care because it feeds the market and they get their cut. To top all that off, its successful enough that there are armies of micro-companies out there doing this every day because to them it actually works.

App Store spam should be like web spam - if the search and browse tools are good, it should fade into the background. Instead, actually choosing a good app in one of these categories is intensely frustrating. Blocking noise like this at approval time is a lot less sustainable than making it less prominent than good competitors.

How can it be like web spam? Web spam is in hypertext and app store spam is compiled code.

THANK YOU. I wrote about this in September on my Tumblr, which ironically currently shares the same theme as his/hers: http://benguild.com/post/10435496115/attack-of-the-itunes-ap...

To those wondering "why"? He's creating artificial crowding in a very niche market, which will ultimately deter competitors, effectively creating a monopoly for him in that niche.

I can understand how 28 identical apps does seem like overkill.

But what's the difference between this and Colgate releasing hundreds of different variations of toothpastes every year? Or Unilever utilizing multiple brand names to sell thousands of different variations of soap and shampoo. It's all pretty much the same product, just marketed differently. This is just a classic sales technique to increase sales and keep customers coming.

It seems to me that there is a large luck factor involved. I submitted an app a month ago, and it just got approved today.

The reason for the delay?

My service is invitation only. I had a 'login' and a 'request invite' screen in the app. The 'request invite' screen accepted the email address of the user requesting the invite.

Apple said 'We do not permit invitation only apps on the app store. Please remove the request invite button'. I tried arguing with them, citing popular apps (like pinterest) which behave identically.

But to no avail. I had to remove the button before they approved the process.

Apple were really thorough. They actually logged in using the credentials I provided and played with the whole end to end service.

They even called me to explain their original rejection.

So I was both impressed by their thoroughness, and miffed by their lack of standards.

On the whole, I don't like this approval process. It seems whimsical and is not good for the small-guys: sometimes they land hard on us, or at other times let total crap in, which devalues the trust people have on non-popular apps in general.

Brighthouse Labs had over 3,000 apps for sale at one point. I'm not sure how many are left but Apple has pulled the plug on at least some of them.

http://www.google.ca/search?q=brighthouse+labs+site%3Aitunes...

Interesting. It seems even if Apple does something about it, the next step would be to slightly tweak each of them to be non-identical to the others.

I wonder if the developer is making a lot of money because that would be the real indicator of whether or not we will see a lot more of this.

The developer is ultimately hurting himself here. Each of these apps is competing against the other for attention.

If he had a single app, and if that app were useful it would garner all the downloads and help it rise higher up the popularity ladder.

I disagree. With an app like his, a white noise generator, he is unlikely to ever rank highly or be featured by Apple. But if you are searching for white noise/pink noise/relaxation/relax/sleep/dreaming/rest/calm/tranquil/tranquility/peaceful you're guaranteed to encounter one of his apps. Classic SEO stuff.

Seems like a good way to do some experiments with what catches people's eyes and how much they're willing to pay for a white noise generator. If Apple's going to let him do it, more power to him.

This is hacker news, some respect for people who find loopholes in a system is due, of course. But basically I think the point is that Apple shouldn't let him do it. The app store is worse for users and developers because of it.

If it was just about science, he could have pulled 27 of the apps a month ago.

I wouldn't say no to a peek at his download stats though. ;)

I'd be interested to see the analytical results from his research. It should prove to be quite illuminating.

While this is obviously spam, it'd be interesting to know the results of this from an A/B testing perspective.

You mean ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ testing?

"competing" against spooge like that was one big thing that turned me off iPhone development. So many apps that don't have to actually be apps, could have just been a web app, or could have been an MP3 file you listen to in iTunes, or a PDF at some HTTP URL, or whatever.

Few years back, I found a bunch of News Apps from a single Developer - http://brajeshwar.posterous.com/one-devs-news-iphone-apps

When profit motives meet user-generated content, you're going to see SEO.

He is probably doing some kind of research

This is the same strategy Android device makers use to compete with the Apple. Fill the shelves with crap and plenty of people will never see the good stuff.

It's a strategy made by bad manufacturers, not necessarily those that use Android.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com