App Store accused of censorship

Life

The approval process for Apple’s App Store has come under renewed scrutiny after a dictionary application failed to pass muster.

An updated version of Ninjawords was turned down on the basis that it contained profanity, thus contravening one of the App Store’s terms. The same rationale has also applied to e-book readers, despite there being age limits to protect minors from obtaining objectionable content on the basis they too could carry inappropriate material.

Users have responded with frustration at the targeting of e-readers, with accusations of censorship being levelled at Apple.

Apple’s senior vice president, Phil Schiller, in an e-mail to Ninjawords developers, Matchstick, backed his reviewers’ decision on the grounds that parental controls that would have allowed for the app to be released were not available at time of submission.

This is not the first time Apple has come under fire for its App Store process. The withdrawal of the Google Talk application was withdrawn, in a move rumoured to be more about the departure of Google executive Eric Schmidt from the Apple board of directors as any specific fault with the product.

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