Apple Rejecting ‘Basic’ Apps

Adult-focused applications and Wi-Fi finders don’t seem to be the only pieces of software that aren’t worthy of living in the App Store, new reports suggest. Apple has reportedly started rejecting "basic applications" altogether, citing little to no relevant functionality outside a web app.

A report by TechCrunch reveals that Apple has begun to sift through submissions to the App Store regarding "basic applications," rejecting some of them, for being "little more than RSS feeds or glorified business cards." The tech-site adds that, "In short, Apple doesn't want people using native applications for things that a basic web app could accomplish."

It then goes to cite Medialets CEO Eric Litman, who reportedly said that the core issue was with iPhone applications built with "templates." These titles are available from a number of software-generating services, and Apple knows this.

"Apple wants iPhone apps to be superior to Web experiences because they are extremely sticky and drive people specifically to buy the iPhone over competing smartphone platforms," Litman said. "Apps that are too simple or largely indistinguishable from the Web, other apps or particularly other apps on other platforms send the message to end users that the iPhone app ecosystem might not be particularly special."

"Now the challenge for Apple is that the app building platforms are extremely attractive to a wide swath of the market that would otherwise be reluctant to bear the cost and complexity of developing an app from scratch," he added.

With over 150,000 applications in the App Store, the company headquartered in Cupertino, California doesn’t mind doing some cleaning up, every now and then, especially when customers complain. It was the case with mature-content applications, which Apple was careful to pull one by one until around 5,000 such applications were no longer available in the App Store. Then, Apple looked at WiFi-finding apps, and discovered that some of them relied on unpublished APIs within the iPhone SDK. It pulled these too, leaving both developers and end-users baffled.