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Trillian's 75-day limbo: the App Store, Freewill, and the pocket veto
What do United States politics, a Canadian rock song, and a California computer company have in common? Here are some hints: the Pocket Veto, Freewill, and the App Store. When the President of the United States is presented with a bill, she or he has 10 days to sign it, or veto it. If the President does not want to be seen as having acted in favor of or against some particular piece of legislation, he or she can simply put it in a pocket and wait for the clock to expire. Or, as the Canadian rock band Rush once said: "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice." Back in late August, Apple claimed not to have rejected the official Google Voice iPhone application. The company claimed it was still "studying" it. Around that same time, Cerulean Studios submitted the amazing-looking Trillian for iPhone instant messaging application. Over two months later, Apple has not taken action on either app. Neither app has (officially) been rejected, but they have not been accepted, either. In the case of the official Google Voice app, it feels very much like Apple has simply "pocketed" the application.
Apple rejects another app for duplicating functionality
Apple has rejected another app from the app store because it considers it too similar to one of Apple's own apps, and thus would cause "user confusion." The app is a front-end for Gmail, called MailWrangler, and allows users to check many Gmail accounts at once (unlike MobileSafari). It offers a similar interface as Gmail's iPhone-optimized web interface, which shows conversation threads in context, and allows for starring conversations (unlike Mail). The app developer says it works much like MailPlane on the desktop. Nevertheless, Apple rejected the app because of the similarity, in Apple's view, and also due to other issues related to editing account information. This app's rejection follows that of Podcaster for allegedly similar reasons. As we mentioned in the Talkcast two weeks ago, this could be related to the user backlash from I Am Rich. Whether it's too permissive or too strict, Apple will always have unhappy people when it issues rejections like this. [Via WebMonkey.]
