1. Google Voice is not a VoIP app, it uses your AT&T minutes. And the apps WERE approved and in the App Store for months. Only suddenly did Apple pull them, and Apple keeps the part of the app sale they received, so the developer got 70% of the sale, but must refund 100% of the price when granting refunds. So Apple changed the rules mid-game, which is what sparked this.

2. Apple can make any rules they want, but selectively enforcing them is the cause for “badwill” here. Sometimes they allow certain things, sometimes they don’t, and they refuse to provide any guidelines. So development, right now, is 100% a gamble, even for Google.

3. As much as I bitch about Apple, I’m much more productive with my Apple stuff than in Windows. So while I intend to continue to use my Apple stuff, I’m not giving them any more money until they get their act together. Your comment, which seems like an all-too-happy prove-me-wrong moment is lost on me, I’m afraid, because my blog is an honest reflection of how I feel at any moment in time.

I still think IE is a piece of garbage and Safari is based on the best rendering engine in existence.
I still think OS X has a much more solid foundation (in the form of userland) than NT.
And furthermore, I still think the tools provided to devs are better quality and therefore, the app landscape is so much nicer on the Mac side.

You may be free to do whatever the hell *you* want on Windows, but 99% of what’s out there is ugly, useless, poorly written shite. So I hope Apple pulls it together and keeps me a customer, because the grass is not greener.

Here’s the thing. Apple – while bewildering in their approach – is doing EXACTLY what they said they’d do. They’ve made it clear, no apps that circumvent the phone carrier, or uses VoIP – both of which Google Voice does. It allows for long distance phone calls routed on the backend over a VoIP system initiated through your voice phone. So yes, it doesn’t do VoIP directly ON the phone, it uses VoIP to provide low cost (free, at the moment) long distance, and a mechanism to redirect your calls away from the cellco.

Apple also made it very clear: they will determine which apps can and cannot be sold through them, and that they can change the rules pretty much at whim and without explanation.

So my obvious question is: were none of you actually *listening* when Apple was setting out the rules for the App Store? More importantly, why weren’t you bothered right from day one? Or was this a case of ‘well, it’ll never affect me so who cares?’

Finally, I enjoyed your snarky “How’s your Windows and IE working out?” Well, that’s a good comeback: it’s ok for my company to be evil as long as it’s not as evil as some other company. Let me guess – it’s ok to jaywalk because some people run red lights? As a long time Mac developer AND a long time Windows developer, I can tell you one thing: Microsoft treats its 3rd party developers with kid gloves compared to how Apple treats theirs.

And while Windows may not be perfect, at least I’m free to do whatever the hell *I* want to with it. I don’t need a subscription to write apps for Windows Mobile – I don’t need to get my apps approved by anyone – I don’t need a special certificate to distribute my apps – and I get some of the best, most advanced tools on the market. Yes, better than XCode.

So how it working out?

A lot better than iPhone OS is for me, that’s for sure.

Between their crude app authorization process, the no-background processes allowed, to selling only locked phones, doesn’t sound good to me.

And I am telling you, in a lot of that shit, there’s AT&T behind it. Think about it: ONLY Google Voice-related apps were removed from the App Store, while previously personally admitted by Schiller himself. Obviously AT&T is afraid of Google, fears the progress of the communication age and what that would mean in their old and arcane business model (just like with RIAA+MPAA). Apple has nothing to lose with Google Voice (if anything, if they add support for it officially they have everything to GAIN from it), but AT&T *has* a lot to lose.

And then there’s the other thing: AT&T *blocks* EDGE/GPRS support for iphone users with firmware 3.0 (iPhones that were not bought with a contract that is, but from third party stores just like so many other cellphones). This is a complete and utter disrespect of their customers, since the iPhone is just a freaking phone, and yet, they don’t block other phones! I mean, my iPhone is NOT unlocked (it’s still locked to AT&T’s network), and it is NOT jailbroken. And yet, just because I use “pay as you go” instead of their overpriced contract plans (that I simply don’t need), I am now disallowed from using EDGE (since last June)!!!!

AT&T and Apple both need a class action lawsuit, and I will be sure to contacting EFF about it. I wasn’t going to, but after the latest Google Voice fiasco (where AT&T is _obviously_ behind it), I can’t take anymore their business practices.