Tech Crunch reported on the new Apple rules after Jon Atherton of Wobble fame, spoke to Apple directly. The link is at the bottom of this but here are the cliff notes: 1. No images of women in bikinis (Ice skating tights are not OK either) 2. No images of men in bikinis! (I didnt ask about Ice Skating tights for men) 3. No skin (he seriously said this) (I asked if a Burqa was OK, and the Apple guy got angry) 4. No silhouettes that indicate that Wobble can be used for wobbling boobs (yes I am serious, we have to remove the silhouette in this pic) 5. No sexual connotations or innuendo: boobs, babes, booty, sex all banned 6. Nothing that can be sexually arousing!! (I doubt many people could get aroused with the pic above but those puritanical guys at Apple must get off on pretty mundane things to find Wobble overtly sexual!) 7. No apps will be approved that in any way imply sexual content (not sure how Playboy is still in the store, but ) --------------------------------------- This is going to completely screw up about 7 of my clients games. One of which is Duke Nuke'em, anyone that gets sexually aroused by Duke is going to need lots of therapy. I am a big fan of IUGO, but does Apple honestly think that I go into the bathroom with my iPhone fully loaded with Daisy M and a bunch of wet wipes? Sorry Apple, but if that is what gets you off then you are pretty screwed up. I am simply stunned that Apple goes from their recent form of drastically improving the developer experience i.e. four hour approval times etc to this stuff. Honestly, this makes me as crazy as bat shit. Let's break the rules down: 1. No images of women in bikinis (Ice skating tights are not OK either) Apple are not even following ESRB guidelines on this one. Ice Skating pants? Really? 2. No images of men in bikinis! (I didnt ask about Ice Skating tights for men) OK I am fine with this one, the last thing I personally want to see is a dude in a bikini, thong or banana hammock. 3. No skin (he seriously said this) (I asked if a Burqa was OK, and the Apple guy got angry) I love Jon's comment on this one. So no skin, can we please, pretty please with sugar on top define what skin is? Like hand skin, neck skin? OK Foreskin I am fine with banning. 4. No silhouettes that indicate that Wobble can be used for wobbling boobs (yes I am serious, we have to remove the silhouette in this pic) @Steve Jobs, I would like to introduce you to other like minded individuals: Quakers meet Steve Steve meet Quakers In fairness the Quaker community is a huge demographic for Apple. 5. No sexual connotations or innuendo: boobs, babes, booty, sex all banned OK the work around here is that you build ugly chick models with the bodies of a thirteen year old gymnast wearing a snuggie. 6. Nothing that can be sexually arousing!! (I doubt many people could get aroused with the pic above but those puritanical guys at Apple must get off on pretty mundane things to find Wobble overtly sexual!) OK I know you guys don't like swearing on this board but WTF, ok some of the crazy shit that people get turned on with is stunning: Battle Bears is SCREWED guys! Plushophilia Perhaps liking one of your stuffed animals a little too much as a child can lead to this fetish. It is being sexually attracted to stuffed animals or people dressed in animal costumes. Some plushophiles like to masturbate using small stuffed animals, and some like to dress up in costumes and have sex with others wearing costumes. Someone who is into bestiality, but doesn't want to actually have sex with animals could also enjoy this fetish. Resident evil, yep that is toast also: Vorarephilia This is arousal by the thought of being eaten by someone, eating someone else, or watching someone eat somebody else. It is called "vore" for short. Perhaps this is related to cannibalism, but how someone develops a fetish like this, I really could not even speculate upon. It involves pure fantasy (at least hopefully it does), since it would be very difficult to make any of the aforementioned situations reality. /Chem stops working on his inflatable sheep game: Inflatophilia This fetish can vary in what the inflatophile enjoys. It can be an attraction to inflatable animals and toys, deriving sexual pleasure from wearing inflatable suits, or just being aroused from the thought of people inflating like balloons. Perhaps an inflatophile could enjoy the company of a blow-up doll a little too much. This is another fetish that any psychologist would probably have a hard time explaining. @IUGO Yo Toy Bot Diaries is screwed: Robot fetishism This is a fantasy that involves the thought of having sex with a robot, having sex dressed as robots, or having sex with a person who is transformed into a robot. I'm sure that there are many geeks out there who fantasize about having sex with a perfect android woman, but this fetish can also involve fantasizing about having sex with a non-humanoid robot. I guess someone who really loves technology or science fiction could be into this. OK now this last one has just eradicated 95.3438985% of the entire gaming category on the app store: Bonnie and Clyde Syndrome It is a sexual attraction to someone who has committed a gruesome crime. Many inmates who are imprisoned for outrageous crimes receive love letters from women. It's a very odd phenomenon. I guess the average bad boy isn't enough for women who are hybristophiles. Again my point is, is that the amount of crazy crap people find arousing is nuts. OK in fairness wanting to hump "patch" my stuffed bear is perfectly normal and healthy.........it is......shut up....no really. 7. No apps will be approved that in any way imply sexual content (not sure how Playboy is still in the store, but ) Imply is a lawyers word, they use it when they want to be as vague as humanly possible. This is just a stunning stupid piece of work by Apple. @Digigala Sources: http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/703251/top_10_weird_sexual_fetishes_and_paraphilias.html?cat=7 http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/20/app-store-rules-sexy/
Sorry to hear it affects you... but I am actually glad they are cracking down. Some of those bikini apps and what not are ridiculous.. and sadly they sell and take up valuable spots. They got away with it while they can.. Thanks apple for cleaning up the App Store ! My 2 cents. - Matt mehware
Robot fetishism seems a good idea for a replacement, and it would get around all those rules as well, particularly the 'no skin' one!
Bad move by Apple. I don't download these types of apps, but come on: we're not 10 years old. This is why we have parental controls. These types of apps sell because -- surprise -- people want them. If access needs to be more tightly controlled, so be it. But don't ban them. This is a good way to cause people to seek out platforms with less control (such as Android).
How is those age ratings going to stop a 10 year old with an iPod Touch from downloading those apps to their device?
i agree with mehware. it was making an already crowded appstore even more crowded. and most of the apps was spam apps. same as all the emails and popups we see everyday. on the other hand there are apps and games that are just aimed at a more mature audience. the best solution would be to create a section on the appstore for these apps and games and restrict access to them for the underage(something along those lines). reminds me a lot about the way Australia is handeling the whole game banning issue.
I'm a victim of the mass removals, but heres the thing: Apple is trying to bring in a strong customer base for us, if this is the best method, then whats to complain about? It says "Boobs" right in Wobbles title, of course they are going to remove it with this wave. Also, Daisy Mae's boobs jiggled -- way too explicit
"What's to complain about?" How about changing app store policy again with no advance warning whatsoever to the actual developers... for games that were already approved and with rules are vague and ripe for inconsistent application. There are tons of apps much worse than anything in Daisy Mae that have not yet been pulled. Apple's within their rights to do this - the developer's agreement gives them the right to pull stunts like this at their whim. But it should make people think twice about how they're going to build a business with a partner that doesn't keep them in the loop. The affected developers, even if they resubmit quickly, are going to have a tough time rebuilding momentum. I have not yet personally been affected, but wouldn't be surprised to see Pocket Boxer get yanked for having the audacity to include a ringgirl.
Great news, I just sent a mail to apple and also tweeted to my followers on twiiter that I found the app "water on my body" sexually arousing, seriously; I literally just came all over the place. According to the new apple rules "water on my body" is history! Once again, thank you for playing "name that rule, hosted by your friend and mine steve jobs". All joking aside, you actually looked at Daisy may's boobs jiggling? OK tell ya what, please post a video capture of which part of Daisy's boobs jiggling you found offensive. If you could also post a pic of your ejaculation on your mac book pro, I will be 1000% convinced that Daisy broke the rules lol I am only messing with ya man, listen; you are trying to earn some coin with your stellar app and so are a bunch of people. I talk to Apple on a daily basis and eerrr not under this tag. The bottomline is, is that I have had a number of my clients titles pulled down since Saturday, it aint really that bad because most of them are going to reuse the art to port over to Android for Verizon and the Pre Plus -for disclosure purposes, my clients are generally publishing on several platforms and are 23 person plus studios. Also for full disclosure, I do not work with IUGO, I just think they make tight games and I want to see more tight games published by indie devs- and the iPhone OS is just one platform. It is an important platform, but it is not the only platform. I just think it is a bit dumb to pull this crap after a loyal studio like IUGO put in time, effort and money into supporting the iPhone OS. OK "wather on my body" or whatever is not really that expensive to produce. but 3D models cost a fortune to do.
Sex = bad!!! Thanks for protecting us, Apple! Running over innocent people in Gangstar = hey, no problem!!! Welcome to America!
Honestly I sidn't care about this, but I just saw that SI Swimsuit edition is still on the AppStore, and is on the front page featured by apple!! No bikini's huh? It's just unfair to indie devs.....
there is a moral issue around developing applications that can be offensive to anyone; there are so many zealots focusing on religion, equal opportunity, feminism et al - just stay clear of all that junk. sure; there is money with these things; but just as opportunities arrive; they can also be stripped away in a flash. that's life
Part of the problem is that if you remove everything that someone might find offensive you probably won't have a whole lot of apps to sell. I would for instance imagine that the iPhone itself is fairly offensive to The Amish...
they would need a computer with itunes or be willing to use a mobile phone - so since they are probably not even going to access it, they wont be able to complain about it not relevant from apple's point of view i guess
No no, Women = bad. People shouldn't be able to look at a girl wearing small shorts, or a woman wearing a bikini, because it's completely unnatural. It's not as if you'd ever see these things in real life, simply walking down the street, or on a trip to the beach, so why should they be in the App store? Are Apple going to remove all the medical apps that include biological images too? Yunno, educational software? Makes sense… I should send a complaint.
I said this before, but don't blame Apple, blame the army of whiny and complaining mothers. Apple tried to push the limits with their sexual apps, but they realized it was doing a lot of damage to allow those, so they changed it. Keep us in the loop or not it was something that had to be done.
Its seems Apple will be quite busy for the upcoming months... I was curious to see how much of those they were (well I never search on the AppStore for those specifically, I just saw a few of them that pop up in one of the game section). I type in the following keyword in my search in the AppStore directly on my iPod touch : "sexy" Ohhh I was greeted with pages and pages of stuff. Of course I saw more famous app from FHM, Maxim which of course are magazine quite well known to have those pretty girl in small sexy swimsuit. Find a ton of those sex positions apps. As for games I saw a beach volleyball, a sexy poker game, etc... But I wont be surprised we again get in the same situation as many other kind of acceptance of the AppStore. Some people get lucky with a reviewer and its approved, while other get unlucky and get refused and removed from the AppStore. And like other have mentioned, I was also under the impression that the age rating that allowed developer to rate 17+ was exactly for those kind of apps. I guess we have to wait and see what is exactly the Apple new policy as right now the guideline aren't so cleared as they are still a ton of those "sexy" floating around. I am glad I have no plan to do those kind of apps, but who knows, maybe my upcoming puzzle game that let you move block and use your memory will offended some people
Yeah, but Daisy Mae is just a good game with a well designed avatar, there is nothing sexual about it.
