The curious case of our iOS app (Prey) | Hacker News Reader

The curious case of our iOS app (Prey)

preyproject.com

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My first job out of uni was for a startup in Melbourne, Australia. After 3 years the place was running out of cash. The company was betting its entire future on this iPhone app that we were developing for them (iPhone 3G era). It was finished in about 3 months and we submitted it to the app store. Apple had taken over 2 months to reject the application and the process to get it approved took almost 6 months. This was a voip app and Apple's reasoning was that it was potentially competing with their own products. By the time it was approved the company was pretty much finished and I'd taken up another job.

As crappy as the whole process can be it is still a million times better than pre-iPhone Nokia. We had to pay thousands of dollars to get a dongle license just to be able to develop for Nokia phones. After you finish you have to pay money and submit it to an "approved" test house so they can run through a bunch of test cases. If your app failed you had to pay again and resubmit.

Note that with respect to Nokia what you describe is no longer the case. Last I checked it took 1 Euro to register as a developer, and Nokia QA+signing is free. Developers get 70% cut as elsewhere.

He probably could have been a bit clearer but he did acknowledge that Nokia's procedures had been changed by putting "pre-iPhone" in front of Nokia's name.

> As crappy as the whole process can be it is still a million times better than pre-iPhone Nokia.

The iOS submission process looks terrible compared to the approval required to, say, launch a website - but fantastic compared to submitting to consoles, mobile carriers, etc.

Console submissions adhere to pre-established, well-known rules. There is a significant amount of certainty regarding what sort of content will pass muster. With iOS, approval is highly dependent on the individual reviewer, who may or may not make the decision based on the purported guidelines released by Apple.

Prey iOS app dev here,

The app is technically ready to be submitted I'm waiting on some last graphic details that need to be designed yet, so as the post says any day next week we will submit the app which will be diligently tweeted (@preyproject) and hopefully (with Apple's blessing) it will become available on the last days of this month.

In the meantime, you can check what we've been doing here: https://github.com/prey/prey-ios-client. *

*As you may note, it doesn't compile since the project includes the In-App Purchases classes which are private and part of a submodule. Delete those references and you'll be good to hack :)

That's frustrating. Especially since the Kindle app falls under the category of "paid content is available, but no references are available in-app".

With all of the great improvements Apple has made to the App Store submission process, it's frustrating there's still such inconsistency and so few ways to speak with someone reasonable. From what I hear the review team is busting their asses off, but it's still frustrating (and a bit baffling) for something that represents such a large part of the success of iOS.

It's easier to pick on prey than it is to pick on amazon, large companies in general are bullies but apple especially, watching continuous slow motion train wrecks like this makes my stomach turn. But hey, that's the way the world goes I guess.

I honestly think it's one of those Yahoo/Facebook-type deals. If Apple tries to frivilously deny Amazon's app, they risk pissing off the dominant player in the ebook market, who could sue for all kinds of random things relating to iBooks. Prey lacks that leverage.

Exactly, so as I said originally, Prey is a much easier target than amazon. Also more people would be actively angry they couldn't read their books on an apple device than would be angry they couldn't use prey on their apple device.

so i used to have a lot more sympathy for people who got fucked over by apple in this manner. and i guess i still do feel sorry for them, but my main emotion when reading stories like this nowadays is an intense sense of frustration that developers continue to deal with the apple/ios ecosystem at all. it's always been an abusive relationship, and nothing looks likely to change about that, so why do it? is the money really that good?

Aren't we always depending on some outside force to a degree?

Some outside forces are arbitrary, capricious, and driven significantly by greed (as demonstrated in this article). Others are not.

> is the money really that good?

apparently it is.

Anyway, iron hand on one side, chaos on the other. Choose yours.

Chaos? Really? I thought we were moving beyond this whole "Android is inferior" mindset finally.

But we are keeping the "iOS is inferior", right? The OP is just saying pick your poison.

It's definitely not enough to judge which platform is superior but Prey is available on the Android Market/Play.

I have to agree.

"We’ll probably include a bonus discount to users who upgrade via the App Store" Really? You didn't choose Apple, the users did. Please explain to me why it makes sense to reward people for making your job harder?

By all means have a sale, but at least run a parallel 'Thank you for using a dev-friendly platform' sale for android/laptop users.

It's not a reward for Apple. It's a discount to thank/compensate those who read about the iOS client being available when it wasn't.

The in-app purchases can be managed outside the app so probably this "discount" will be temporary.

Then again, it isn't a bonus because you are an iOS user but the fact that we had a broken promise.

They aren't making our jobs harder, we just want to make it up for all the people that have been constantly asking us about the iOS app.

The parallel sale does sounds good though, so thanks. :)

Oh come on! Why is everybody complaining about Apple when all major platform do this controlling this now. What about payment methods on Android? If you don't use Google Payment you are out. It's the same kind of rule so don't put this things in a argument like "Apple iOS have restrictions and Android has not. So why not use Android"

Ever thought about how good the iOS platform is for developers AND users? Give some credit man.

Android still has Prey published and working under those terms. Why the hell are you defending Apple here? Whatdo we iOS users gain from this situation?

You gain the trust of users to the platform. If I don't want to give out my data I should be able to do just that and this argument is really huge from user perspective. Apple says if you are using GPS coordinates please tell and show the user that you do so.

There are a lot of people who don't know anything about IT and Software like my sister. She just doesn't care about such stuff. So she doesn't know who is using GPS and who is not. Hell, she even doesn't know what GPS signals really are. And she only wants to know: a) are you using my data, ask me first so I can say I want it or I don't want it _and_ b) if you are using my data, show and visualize that you are using it cause otherwise it might be that I don't know it.

I'm certain that this rules can help gain quality and help people to get an understanding for the device and what is going on _without_ having IT background.

Did you try using Prey? Do you know when and how is the GPS used?

What other platform would bounce you for having a separately purchasable pro version or preemptively require licensing proof for something that isn't a core aspect?

So why do it? I have no idea why people do it. I'm just glad I'm not developing software for apple products.

We had a similar experience with an app last year. Submitted, rejected for small reasons, submitted again, no word for four weeks despite constant attempts to contact Apple, then a phone call. Turns out they also have some rules they don't publish. I asked for their explanation in writing and they were unwilling to give it so I had to go to my Board of Directors with nothing to show for why the app was not approved for weeks. Had to rip out a huge part of it and recode over a two week 18 hour day madness before being approved in 20 minutes after submission (they do help out when you bend over).

As for the rule.....basically, unless you are the New York Times, you are not allowed to use their recurring subscription payment model. It's "public" per se, but they don't let anyone use it unless you are a massive publishing company and fit into their preferred business model.

My app, Cocoyon is built explicitly for the purpose of tracking the location of your friends in real-time. We initially got the exact same "Your app does not include features that require persistent location." rejection.

What the really wanted from us a was a battery usage warning in the description.

Regarding the point about storm trooper imagery, these images have to be licensed by LucasArts etc. This is why even if I drew Donald Duck and put it in the public domain, you are unable to use it in your product without licensing the necessary rights for it.

Its instances like this that reveal the inherent problems associated with app stores tightly controlled by a single company.

Honest question here: Why would I use this product instead of Apple's free "Find My iPhone"?

The primary function is on the paid app that an admin can monitor many devices (iphones, android devices, laptops, etc) from a single interface, and even get periodic reports that a device is still functioning properly and at a known location.

If the only device you own is an iPhone, there's probably not an advantage. If you've got several devices or are in a small company IT department with a mixed environment, it unifies them in a very nice way.

Because Find my iPhone is only meant to help you find your phone if misplaced, not stolen.

Law enforcement needs static, printable data in order to do their job, because evidence needs to be shown in court and Find my iPhone's information is only real-time, not historical.

Or heck, you can always do what this guy did:

http://preyproject.com/blog/2012/02/lost-found-case-v93l

iOS applications must be bringing really huge money if people are ready to put up with this kind of abuse.

I love the complaint about data. Oh, the app is trying to conserve battery, but the explanation isn't explicit enough so we'll count that as a flaw.

Can someone please explain to me why Apple still has yet to be investigated for anti-trust?

Because the only monopoly they have is on Apple products. There are other phones, other laptops and other tablets available. No one is being forced to develop for IOS, no one is being forced to buy Apple products whether they want them or not. They may be the currently dominant player in the smartphone category, but unless both Google and Microsoft decide to abandon that market they can't be said to have a monopoly.

tl;dr: You may not like their policies regarding selling their software to their audience, but you are not required to participate in their marketplace to sell software.

Because they don't have a majority share of any major market, despite what their press releases say. They own a fraction of the cellphone, laptop, mobile markets.

And they are being investigated for anti-trust WRT price-fixing on e-books. Only letting apps they approve onto their own platform is not anti-competitive or monopolistic, in fact it's the reason they're losing to Android 2:1. They're weakening their position in the market with every one of these stories that comes out.

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