Cabel Sasser: Untitled Goose Game rejected from the Mac App Store twice
social.panic.com
social.panic.com
I haven’t seen it.
Only the US DoJ or FTC could make a dent in this joke of a review process.
I feel like enforcement is rather random though. It seems like submitting updates draws their attention.
But you could be right. It may be it's a rule they abandoned.
In any case I don't think there's anyone around with the heart to try again.
Many Mac App Store games have not been ported to Apple Silicon yet (or ever, likely).
In any case, try downloading Steam Link, currently the #2 free game, and you should be able to see that it's Intel-only.
% file "/Applications/Steam Link.app/Contents/MacOS/Steam Link" /Applications/Steam Link.app/Contents/MacOS/Steam Link: Mach-O 64-bit executable x86_64
In a way it's kind of good to know that there is no special treatment, but this is poor behaviour towards the developers who made your platform.
This is because App Store reviewers are ignorant of Mac history and of most everything else, as evidenced by their frequently brain-dead rejections. (I say this as an App Store developer myself.)
Microsoft's App Store reviewers are vendor staff from the same agencies that provide fungible CSR staff - the App Store reviewers I personally know are all good people (and it's unfair of me to put them in the same category as CSR workers) buuuuuut they aren't all computer culture historians. So I assume it's similar at Apple (though I gather Apple prefers to have FTEs under their direct control instead of using agencies?)
Now I'm curious how Apple handles the reportedly higher-than-average employee churn in those roles, as I heard that 6-18 months was a typical stint at MS's App Store reviews office at TEKSystems on Willows Rd - though I know people that stayed in that job for over 6 years, but they were never able to transition into a blue-badge role and were stuck as Orange Badges - which just isn't right.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/23/15399438/apple-uber-app-s...
And why shouldn't they get the same treatment? Fair's fair.
So if I were Tim Apple, I would be a little worried by someone like Sasser saying "we tried to launch our crazy popular game on your App Store and ultimately didn't because one of your idiot reviewers gave us the runaround." That's a little like, I don't know, some record label passing on Nirvana because a junior talent scout thought that "the guys looked kind of greasy and the name sounds stupid."
(Mac & iOS) [1]
2003, 2004, 2005(x2), 2013, 2021
Perhaps Apple was overselling how good they are? /s
At least, Apple certainly thought so. Not every developer gets a spotlight.
The bigger piece of background is that Untitled Goose Game is (previously unbeknownst to me) a wildly successful game. I think the point he's getting across is that first the game was rejected for something trivially stupid (not being able to skip credits, which you could actually do), and then again for something probably equally trivially stupid (point being Cabel couldn't even remember it, and they apparently took a "this is BS, why bother?" approach). It's like if some NFL team had the ability to pick a star quarterback in the NFL draft but decided against it because they didn't like his shoelaces or something.
Point of the post is that the Mac Store review process is so arbitrary that successful developers just take the approach of "Why bother?"
Delete your Apple ID. Opt out.
It would be interesting to hear Panic's input here. They're a long-time Mac studio, surely they've got some suggestions for regulators.
Cabel Sasser emailed Phil Schiller ideas on the app review process in 2016. A good chunk of it wound up getting implemented. I'd love to see a sequel.
Unrelatedly, I think the tone in his email is a perfect example of giving successful constructive criticism.
It did?
1) "When we decided to pull Coda from the App Store (due to sandboxing)"
Sandboxing is still required.
2) "we regained our ability to release software the moment we need to"
Nope, nothing has changed there.
3) "we could fill a small book with frustrating and tragicomic App Review anecdotes"
This was written before the Untitled Goose Game rejections.
4) "Reviews are often the dumping ground of the uninformed"
Still painfully true!
5) Refunds: "And when this happens, we can do nothing."
Still true. Developers can't issue their own refunds, and the App Store doesn't even have an official refund policy. I've been seeing more and more people get their App Store refund requests rejected by Apple, for no apparent reason.
6) Low app prices
Still a problem of course!
[0] https://developer.apple.com/app-store/ratings-and-reviews/
After their initial announcement of the policy, Apple clarified that they would still reject bugfixes if the app violated section 5 of the guidelines, the section titled "Legal". On the surface, this would seem reasonable. After all, can't go violating legal requirements. However, this is still counter to the spirit of what they had promised. If it's up on the store already, if it's violating the law (e.g. for scamming users out of money), it should be taken down. If it's not violating the law, it's better that customers get the bugfix.
They also copied a bunch of rules from the other sections into section 5, to give themselves more leeway.
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#leg...
This was just about the least Apple could do. You can't have a conversation, you can only post one reply. And in my experience, App Store reviewers almost never correct their bad reviews, even if you reply with info that will fix their problem.
> Apple moved away from the "no refunds" policy
Apple still has no official refund policy. You can request a refund, which Apple may or may not grant, as I mentioned, at Apple's own discretion, for any reason or no reason. So I don't see how anything has changed from Cabel's email.
> completely stopped holding up bug fixes over guideline infractions
Completely wrong. What happens is that App Review still rejects your bug fix updates. But then you can request that App Review let your update go through, and fix the problem in the next update. The problem is that this can still take an indefinite amount of time, because App Review can reject you at any time, even when you're asleep, then you have to contact them, then they have to see your message and respond, all of which can take half a day or more. It's a joke. We're still delayed.
The other day my app got a 1-star customer review titled "Monthly subscriptions ain't it" and saying "0/5 now that it's subscription based."
My app is not subscription based, it's upfront paid.
This is the crap that developers have to deal with all the time in the App Store.
The crowdsourced rating/review system is a blight.
Nothing about apples behavior is "win win". They're a corp that benefits from special protections against both civil and criminal liabilities as well as benefitting from masses of intellectual property. It's not some sort of balanced game, the scales were tipped completely into corpo land since early 2000s
I guess even when Apple close all the loopholes to running "unauthorized" software there will be people silly enough to buy their computers.
You help build one walled garden, you get kicked out of another.
The Mac App Store is not a monopoly. Mac developers can independently distribute their apps.
As I mentioned, Mac developers can independently distribute their own apps, signed with a Developer ID certificate.
It's annoying to be sure, but not a major hurdle for professional Mac developers, such as Panic.
It's fascinating you made a 180 on the issue while it got worse since you wrote it.
I could bet that in under 5 years Apple will refuse to "notarize" at least some software and prevent unsigned software from running altogether.
How so?
Now you're saying it's all good. Go figure.
I've been philosophically opposed to Gatekeeper since its introduction more than 10 years ago, and that hasn't changed.
The mostly good news is that Apple mostly doesn't prevent non-malware developers from distributing their apps on the Mac. I'm aware of only 2 cases where Apple has intentionally abused its authority there: (1) Apple canceled the developer account of Epic Games after the famous trial. (2) Apple canceled the developer account of Kapeli after an allegation of App Store review fraud. However, the account was later restored, and Dash for Mac is currently signed and notarized. https://kapeli.com/dash
A monopoly is not defined by 100% control. It is defined by whom has the overwhelming control.
You can do so the same way you always could. Perhaps you're mixing it up with ARM Macs requiring code to be signed by something? (it doesn't have to be by an Apple certificate). You can still run self-signed code on macOS even with Apple Silicon and the latest OS versions and there's no sign they'll ever change that. Our distribution tool Conveyor will self-sign apps for you out of the box and create a web page that tells users what to do [1], albeit we should make it less wordy.
> Apple developer license is apart of the app store
A Developer ID is separate from the app store, they're different certificate types. I distribute Mac software outside the store with one, no problem.
[1] example: https://downloads.hydraulic.dev/eton-sample/selfsigned/downl...
Which makes sense, if all I had to do is sign some malware, that doesn't prevent me from spreading malware.
So if there is some method of this, it would be cool to know. I'll have to do some experiments.
Government regulators aren't going to get involved over $100.
> As of Ventura you cannot bypass gatekeeper without a signature for a number of popular solutions. Electron being one of them.
I'm not sure what you mean. I'm not sure you technically understand what you mean.
Mac Ventura only allows for "App store and identified developers". Meaning the application must be signed with an apple developer cert to go through gatekeeper.
This has nothing to do with Ventura. It's been true for many years.
Keep in mind that I am personally a professional Mac developer. You're out of your depth here.
EDIT: Guys, you can literally just install using Steam or Epic. It's really not a problem.
This whole strange fascination with claiming Apple is a monopoly is just silly. There is at least one major competitor to Apple in the mobile market (said competitor actually dominates that market by a huge margin) and literally dozens in the PC market. Apple isn't a monopoly, and it doesn't have to let competitors distribute their products within its own ecosystem.
Let's keep following in this thread. So if Ford created a 3rd-party battery pack, Tesla isn't legally allowed to prevent customers from replacing their battery pack with the Ford (or an Our Next Energy (ONE), who actually sells a) pack. Similarly, Ford has no legal standing to stop you if you buy a gasoline F-150, gut the motor and fuel tank, and install a Tesla motor and battery from a salvage title Model S.
This goes even further. The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act from 1975 explicitly says Tesla isn't allowed to deny warranty coverage just because you used aftermarket or recycled parts, or went to a non-Tesla authorized auto shop for routine maintenance or repairs.
You don't own the iPhone you paid for, and the inability to install apps, with root permissions, is reason number 1 why. Meanwhile, you can actually take a wrench to a Ford F-150 all you want.
Not really. The point is less about market positioning and more about building fair platforms. Apple wants to frame themselves as an underdog competitor in the global economy, but they fail because they can't even build a fair or open platform when given total freedom to do so. This "failure" has made them a lot of money, but it's also come to the detriment of users everywhere, whether they know it or not. The law exists explicitly to push companies like Apple along when they get too fat and rest on their Carnegie laurels.
> The alternatives to going through the App Store are really not viable.
Someone ought to tell the Mac people this, they'll be heartbroken.
> In this one small market Apple exerts its market dominance influence to take a lot of money from 3rd party developers. Of course this is small potatoes compared to all the other markets that they compete in and even as a fraction of their revenue.
Last year Apple made more from services than they did from iPhone hardware. That's not just a "fraction" anymore.
I guess it's not exactly a laptop monopoly, but a walled laptop monopoly alright.
Regulators?
On iOS, if Apple's store rejected them, there's no recourse. Apple blocks other stores from existing, and there's no competition in distribution, review, and of course payments and the cut.
Which is why I was asking about regulators.
> On iOS if Apple's store rejects you, that's game over.
Everyone knows this, it doesn't need to be said. But fewer people are familiar with the Mac situation.
... But also, Apple's space to lose in.
Imagine having to ID yourself to be allowed to install and use privacy software. What the actual fuck? "Privacy is a human right" is about as sincere as "don't be evil" these days.
Apple is slowly boiling the frog; every year there are more APIs in the OS that you can't use unless you are distributing via the MAS, which demands a phone number for an Apple ID even to download free apps.
I wish the FTC would come down hard on them, but unfortunately Apple has too much money and is too important of a bargaining chip in the coming Chinese trade war.
People don't want a computer or smartphone, they want the things those devices afford them.
From a security perspective, the much vaunted "general purpose computing" reduces to "arbitrary code execution". It's very dangerous, and without some sort of allowlist-based restriction on what may be run on the average consumer's hardware, it becomes a playground for hackers, thieves, and malicious state actors.
The era of general purpose computing with consumer hardware is dead. Millions of customers are delighted with their restricted devices. Stop whining and move on with your lives, people.
They're entitled to it, I say. Hell, I even think other companies are entitled to make it for them.
What they cannot do is turn this layer of abstraction into an excuse for infinite profitability. People don't want coffee makers, they want coffee! That doesn't mean Keurig is necessarily allowed to stop other people from selling pods, though. Especially if they become the primary way that people get their coffee. We have a democratically controlled legal system that holds these people in check - particularly when the market doesn't behave. You can still be right here, but if Apple is taking advantage of this situation to fleece people beyond what can be considered reasonable, then we have to litigate them regardless. Hopefully in the future, Apple finds a way to prioritize things like security while also respecting the user's choice and agency.
It's time for armchair analysts and AAPL investors to take a hike. Some of us want Apple to succeed regardless of their monopolistic intent, and helping them requires us to prune their ugliest branches. We staved off half a decade of change with this "free market will fix things" mantra, and nothing improved. If Apple won't do what's right, then we'll be forced to.
The market is "computers" and if Apple tightens its grip too far, they run people off to another solution. Everything else is economics as far as the American system is concerned.
The American system led us to a situation where Apple's global presence is exploitative. If Apple wants to get increasingly petty with their compliance, global regulators are apt to get increasingly petty with their regulation. Considering how Apple shrugged off Dutch regulators, it shouldn't surprise people when EU commissions move in with bigger demands. If those demands are unreasonable, then maybe Apple can run off to another market.
Nobody will stop you from framing this as a free market issue, but it's a comically small piece of the puzzle.
This leaves us with your previous observaation
> If Apple won't do what's right, then we'll be forced to.
And I agree. And in a (mostly) free-market system structure like the US, the solution is obvious... There's a reason I haven't used Apple as my primary compute platform for approximately 15 years.
Without a GP computer? That's a pretty large ask on a developer's site.
If anything, they should make iOS more like this with the App Store only being the best content.
If I have the choice of delivering my product for free versus paying Apple a 30% cut, I'm going free every time.
The only people who would willingly pay the vig are those who are desperate for publicity.