Recently Apple removed AppGratis, a discovery app, from its App Store after the Cupertino-based company found that the application has violated the review guidelines of the store. The move from Apple proved absolutely shocking for Dawalt, who is the CEO of AppGratis, as the California-based tech company removed the app just five days after it was added to the App Store. Later Dawalt spread the message through his blog post that by removing an application like AppGratis, Apple is destroying its ecosystem. In addition to this, the CEO also said that Apple should contact him and discuss the issues so they could sort out the problem but it seems that has never happened. Apple is now looking to expel a lot of apps from the App Store which have violated the guidelines of the store like AppGratis and Dawalt’s discovery app was just the first step in this direction.
According to the AllThingsD, “Sources familiar with Apple’s thinking,” tell the site “that AppGratis’ ouster was a first step in a broader enforcement action generally targeted at app-discovery apps that run afoul of clauses 2.25 and 5.6.”
“I’m told that Apple feels that these apps threaten the legitimacy of the App Store charts by providing a way for developers to spend their way to a high ranking. Apple did something similar in 2011, when it rejected a number of applications running incentivized app installs within their apps.”
The source also says that the exclusion of AppGratis was a straight forward compliance action rather than an error or a secret policy. It seems that iOS device maker is really worried about keeping such apps in App Store because it severely dents the integrity of the store because it mixes it with other platforms’ app stores. If truth be told, a number of these discovery apps create a situation “that’s similar to walking into Nordstrom and seeing a Walmart inside”.
Moreover, it is said that apps like AppGratis are also demeaning the integration of Apple with Chomp that is a discovery and search company, which iPhone maker has acquired during last year. Those, who think that removal of apps, which have violated the guidelines of App Store, might hurt Apple should think again because the current number of apps in its store at this point in time is 800,000 that is more than any other app store.
So if some offenders ‘fall through the cracks’ it will not bother Apple much.
Source: AllThingsD, iPhoneinCanada
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