I'm an indie, and I disagree. Big vendors can call Phil Schiller and ask what's going on. Small vendors can't.
Even putting that aside, companies like Google, etc., can afford to develop huge complex apps, and run the risk of them not getting in (look at their navigation app). I can't do that. At most, I'm willing to throw away maybe a week's worth of work.
After two recent pretty egregious (on Apple's part) rejections, I've got increasingly cynical about the platform. Needless to say, I'm not putting much effort into development anymore. Customers e-mail me and say "When is feature/app X coming?" And I have to tell them it's probably not coming, unless Apple gets their crap together.
This is true, but the scope is not really "indy developers" but "developers with a day job." I've got two apps I hack on on the weekends, and the review process has been frustrating and painful. (almost 2 months now.)
But, that's it. I don't worry about bills or lost funding or any of the highly stressful aspects of app development there'd be if this were my "real job."
As perverse as this is, this "review process endurance" stamina I have is a real competitive advantage, when you consider the fact that most iPhone apps that do well have a huge first-to-market advantage for whatever thing it is that they do. Ie, other folks who may have been building the same app as I have probably won't have the ability to endure the process, and hence my app will be the first to market with this capability, albeit much later than would have been possible without the review process.
"As perverse as this is, this "review process endurance" stamina I have is a real competitive advantage, when you consider the fact that most iPhone apps that do well have a huge first-to-market advantage for whatever thing it is that they do."
That is if you get your app first to market. Maybe the person developing the same app gets lucky and gets a more lenient or faster reviewer - bam there goes your first to market advantage. Or maybe there is already an app ahead of you that will get approved just a bit sooner.
Oh of course, I never said that the app review process wasn't a horrible mess. My only point was that the dynamic in the post is true: being able to survive two or three months before launching (after development stops) has become a necessary precondition for writing iPhone apps. This plays to hobbyist developers as an advantage, but the overall process is still a disaster and a crap shoot.
Seems like he means "hobbyist developer" not "indie developer."
The external forces on an indie developer -- someone trying to sell apps to make a living -- are much worse compared to developers on payroll for a large software house.
Wait, how is this "benefit"? Based on the above, App Store rejections are still bad for indie developers, but not as bad as for other people, so that for an indie developer the risk of getting rejected is supposedly more like a "pain in the ass" as opposed to a "prohibitive liability". But that's just saying you "benefit" because you're not being screwed as hard as that other guy.
Indie developers probably don't have as much time or money to burn as do "real" developers. So the possibility of rejection probably encourages independent folks to not take the gamble; if the app is developed but rejected, the code and the time spent writing it becomes completely useless.
I still don't see how any developer benefits from app store rejection. It's more that it hasn't been an issue for most developers because most apps get approved, but when it does hit it's still a pain in the ass to deal with - not a benefit from what I've experienced.
Even putting that aside, companies like Google, etc., can afford to develop huge complex apps, and run the risk of them not getting in (look at their navigation app). I can't do that. At most, I'm willing to throw away maybe a week's worth of work.
After two recent pretty egregious (on Apple's part) rejections, I've got increasingly cynical about the platform. Needless to say, I'm not putting much effort into development anymore. Customers e-mail me and say "When is feature/app X coming?" And I have to tell them it's probably not coming, unless Apple gets their crap together.