Apple may have been taking mulligans on its crazy, wacky, App Store mistakes.You know what I’m talking about, the fickle way they deny/accept an app or unapprove/reapprove an app, or change their policies on promo codes for games rated for mature audiences. But this time I don’t think Apple can play the “we’re still figuring it out game.” These guys are more fickle and hypocritical than family values politicians caught with their zippers down.
Earlier today, Apple pulled GV Mobile and Voice Central from the App Store. These are two apps that let you use Google Voice which is now rolling out to beta testers everywhere. Tonight comes word that Apple won’t approve Google’s official Google Voice app. Do you smell a rat? Yeah, I thought so. Of course AT&T is behind this and Apple once again has to bend to AT&T’s will (can you say SlingBox? Qik?) This time it is because AT&T smells declining revenue from SMS and phone usage. On the one hand you can’t blame AT&T for trying to protect its ill gotten gains. But on the other hand, with all of the deserved piling on AT&T has been taking for its complete and admitted failure of its lousy network, AT&T may have just pulled the plug on itself and Apple is helping yank the chain.
Apple is trying to hide behind the “it duplicates features found on the iPhone” ruse, but that’s a crock, given how many other apps do similar things to apps found on the iPhone. And, I may be wrong here, but I don’t see any big purges coming. Apple is covering AT&T’s butt on this one (and other ones) big time, and I think the tipping point may have been reached.
Earlier today I said this in blogging about the topic on GottaBeMobile:
I wonder what it feels like to wake up in the morning, get ready for work, and say to yourself. “Self. I think today I’m going to make a decision that will by and large tick off the overwhelming majority of my customers, infuriate the developers that are our lifeblood, and generally end the day looking like an idiot?“ Maybe the folks behind Apple’s iPhone App Store and at AT&T know how that feels.
I’m going to revise and extend those remarks slightly here:
“And after doing all this, I think I’ll pull out a gun, and shoot myself in the other foot, take out a knife and cut off my nose to spite my face, and then call my parents who supported me all those years and tell them they never did anything for me.”
But then again, there’s one more thing. Maybe all these latest Apple Tablet on Verizon rumors happening around the same time are not a coincidence.
I’m just saying.
