Yesterday's ban - tomorrow's exclusive

It is good to be a king in your kingdom.

And Apple deserves respect not only because it has created a completely new mobile software market in its App Store (which it single-handedly rules), but also because it uses an army of developers (who have written over half a million iOS apps) as an ultra-successful Department of R & D (Research & Development), thus incubating brilliant ideas that later implement some of the functionality of new versions of iOS. The only disadvantage of this behavior is that developers who implement new interesting ideas are sometimes cut off from the market, the audience and, as a result, profits.

For example, you can take the Camera + application, which brought its creator Lisa Bettany (Lisa Bettany) and her team more than $ 2.7 million in sales. On Thursday, at the conference AdAge Creativity and Technology , held in New York, Lisa told a very interesting and strange story that happened to her work, which was downloaded more than 3 million times directly from iTunes, making it overnight a rich person.
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Last August, Apple withdrew the Camera + application from iTunes because of a new feature called “VolumeSnap”, which allegedly violated Apple’s license agreement with iPhone developers by allowing you to take photos using the volume up button. As the company explained in its note to the authors of the application: “Your application cannot be added to the App Store because the iPhone’s volume buttons are used in a non-standard way, which could potentially confuse the user.”

This is unlikely to surprise you. One of the reasons for the success of the iPhone is that Apple strictly controls the use of the "iron" capabilities of the phone. Liza Bettani comments that she didn’t even think of making such an Android application, as the owners of the devices with the latest OS on board refuse to pay for what the iPhone owners are happy to give their money for. Apple became a benefactor and torturer for her in one person, so the version of the application with this feature was removed from the App Store and was never added. The application was allowed to iTunes after rechecking.

I am sure that there was no limit to Liza’s surprise when, recently, on stage, Steve Jobs proudly presented “a unique new feature” added to the iPhone camera control — taking photos using the volume up button. Jobs described it as "a fantastic new way to quickly capture the moment, without opening applications and not waiting for them to load." I'm sure you understood everything.

Another, perhaps even more ruthless example of Apple’s user relationship to developers, is the story told by The Register about a guy named Greg Hughes and his Wi-Fi Sync application, which Apple didn’t allow to go to the store because of its basic functionality: the ability to sync music from iTunes with iPhone over a local wireless network.

On Monday, Apple showed a unique opportunity (have you guessed it?) To wirelessly sync music from iTunes with iOS devices. Moreover, even the logo of the new application turned out to be almost the same as in the Hughes app (which, by the way, is available in Cydia ).

According to The Register, Apple even asked Hughes to send his resume after refusing to host the application, although there was no need to hire him. As we see, they appropriated not only the application, but also its logo, without paying a cent to the original author.

Good to be king.

The story is retold from the words of Wired , with the help of The Register