Send to KindleTweet Apple, AT&T and Google have filed their letters to the FCC for the investigation on the App Store rejection deal. TechCrunch revealed some interesting tidbits on Apple’s letter, which shines a bit of light on the mystery of the App Store rejection process; On general app rejections: We created an approval process that reviews every application submitted to Apple for the App Store in order to protect consumer privacy, safeguard children from inappropriate content, and avoid applications that degrade the core experience of the iPhone. Some types of content such as pornography are rejected outright from the App Store, while others such as graphic combat scenes in action games may be approved but with an appropriate age rating. Most rejections are based on bugs found in the applications. When there is an issue, we try to provide the developer with helpful feedback so they can modify the application in order for us to approve it. On the app approval rate: 95% of applications are approved within 14 days of their submission. On the Google Voice rejection: Contrary to published reports, Apple has not rejected the Google Voice application, and continues to study it. The application has not been approved because, as submitted for review, it appears to alter the iPhone’s distinctive user experience by replacing the iPhone’s core mobile telephone functionality and Apple user interface with its own user interface for telephone calls, text messaging and voicemail. Apple has a problem with Google Voice’s phone icon, voicemail functionality and SMS functionality: Apple spent a lot of time and effort developing this distinct and innovative way to seamlessly deliver core functionality of the iPhone. For example, on an iPhone, the “Phone” icon that is always shown at the bottom of the Home Screen launches Apple’s mobile telephone application, providing access to Favorites, Recents, Contacts, a Keypad, and Visual Voicemail. The Google Voice application replaces Apple’s Visual Voicemail by routing calls through a separate Google Voice telephone number that stores any voicemail, preventing voicemail from being stored on the iPhone, i.e., disabling Apple’s Visual Voicemail. Similarly, SMS text messages are managed through the Google hub–replacing the iPhone’s text messaging feature. Apple believes Google Contacts may be a security risk: In addition, the iPhone user’s entire Contacts database is transferred to Google’s servers, and we have yet to obtain any assurances from Google that this data will only be used in appropriate ways. These factors present several new issues and questions to us that we are still pondering at this time. On a Google Voice web app: Google is of course free to provide Google Voice on the iPhone as a web application through Apple’s Safari browser, just as they do for desktop PCs, or to provide its “Google-branded” user experience on other phones, including Android-based phones, and let consumers make their choices. On AT&T’s role in the Google Voice app rejection: Apple is acting alone and has not consulted with AT&T about whether or not to approve the Google [...] Read more »

Send to KindleTweet According to  a site called “macenstein” with “reliable sources in Elk Glove” Apple’s training it’s staff for Snow Leopard (or Snow Leopard support).  Macenstein’s sources are saying that this signals a very soon release of Snow Leopard (which they claim is August 28th). Read more »

Send to KindleTweet Any of those emails you deleted for whatever reason are now back and readable, thanks to the Spotlight iPhone 3.0 bug.  If you know the subject line in the email, by searching it in Spotlight, you can pull it up.  This is diffidently not an “okay” bug to live with,  but hopefully Apple will give us a fix soon. (Thanks to Matt Janssen for discovering it!) Read more »

Send to KindleTweet Microsoft’s “Laptop Hunter” ads appear to be working. But apparently Apple doesn’t like them. Kevin Turner, Microsoft’s chief operating officer stated that the Apple legal department called Microsoft and asked them to stop airing the ads. “Two weeks ago we got a call from the Apple legal department saying “Hey, you need to stop running those ads, we lowered our prices.” They took like $100 off or something. It was the greatest single phone call in the history that I’ve ever taken in business,” Turner said. Read more »

Send to KindleTweet Can’t get your hands on the new iPhone? You can now check the availability of the 3GS courtesy of Apple. A list displays the different Apple stores and a color graph shows which models of the 3GS are available at that store. You can check it out right here. Read more »

Send to KindleTweet A whole gallery of Snow Leopard pictures were released by someone named Michael Flux. They include shots of Quicktime X, new wallpapers, updated stacks, and a new System Preferences. People who attended WWDC got a “near final” copy of the OS. This is Build 10A380. Check it out at: http://michaelflux.com/snow-leopard-10a380-part-2-screenshots Read more »

Send to KindleTweet According to the site iPhones.ru, the next firmware of the iPhone will be able to take much better photos.  On the image seen above, the right image is the 2.21 firmware, and the left is the 3.0 firmware.  It seems to improve the coloring and noise level. Read more »