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Comment by mcormier | Hacker News Reader

As much as Apple's review process and curating can be a pain in the ass. This definitely shows the other end of the spectrum and what happens if you don't have any reviewing.

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I'm not sure anyone objects to curating, per se, more the fact that Apple isn't transparent, fair, or consistent about what causes an app to be rejected.

Also, the fact that the curated store is the only way to get your software onto their device.

If Best Buy doesn't want to sell my PC software, I can sell it through other channels.

If Apple doesn't want to sell my iOS software, I can't.

Android lets you sell stuff outside of the play store - look how well the Humble Android bundles do.

selection bias. we of course inevitably hear about the cases where Apple is not fair or acts inconsistently. but we do not hear about the vast majority of cases where they either allow apps in the store immediately or work through the issues with the developer so the app is compliant with the rules.

Microsoft has a reviewing process for the WP Store. They don't enforce a "this is another FB web wrapper so it's not allowed" kind of rule, but the rules in place for quality and stability are pretty strict.

It's weird that Microsoft apparently doesn't give a shit about trademarks or IP in their app store admissions reviews. That seems like it would make them liable if they actually manually give these apps a pass.

How does Microsoft know if a trademark is being used with or without its owner's permission? I mean, you can make a pretty solid guess in these cases, but it seems like waiting for a takedown request from the trademark owner is reasonable. (Full disclosure: I work for Microsoft, but in a different division, and I'm definitely not a lawyer)

How does anyone know they are hosting illegal software? Seems like Microsoft is doing something worse than a file host or torrent site. They are actually paying the criminal and themselves. Its perfectly sane to bring down entire website/ecosystem when it is found to host a movie or song. Is software IP less important than Justin Bieber new soundtrack? Were are the suits to knock on Microsoft's door when they turn a blind eye to what they are hosting and profiting on.

For the smaller trademarks, I'm not expecting every Microsoft reviewer to know about them. But for Facebook and Twitter? Yes, I'm expecting them to know something about that.

How does MSFT define "quality" though?

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