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Comment by AlwaysBCoding | Hacker News Reader

I've always thought that Apple's horrific App Store approval process was the single biggest threat to the Apple empire. Glad to hear someone else speak out about this. It's seriously absurd that there's an arbitrarily enforced stopgate that prevents you from deploying code. It's a complete disaster. If someone could make a way to instantly deploy code to mobile phones every developer would switch in a second.

The Apple App Store approval process is like that one random weak spot on the Death Star. The only question is what replaces it?

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That's called the internet isn't it?! Mobile browser apps.

Plenty of people are OK with the strict curation that the App Store's approval process represents. It's the reason why we don't have to run AV apps on our iPhones and iPads, after all.

If there's a Death Star-level weakness to the App Store, IMHO it's the app discovery process. It consistently rewards the loudest marketers rather than the best developers.

"It's the reason why we don't have to run AV apps on our iPhones and iPads"

That's just not true. Android and desktop OSX are counter-examples. It is security measures like sandboxing of apps that prevent mobile devices from needing anti-virus software.

On desktop Windows, programs used to have unfettered access to the filesystem, including Windows DLLs that were major parts of the OS. Looking back, it actually seems incredible that it wasn't more of a disaster than it was.

There has been enough nastyware on Android platforms to at least somewhat justify Apple's approach. Sandboxes have a way of springing leaks.

I was 100% on the opposite side of this debate when the iOS SDK first became available. (This was what I had to say about their limitations at the time, if it lends me any street cred: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVkqbycvuKw ).

But at this point the restrictions I objected to have mostly been lifted, to the point where they don't interfere with the vast majority of developers who aren't looking to do something slimy. It's very nice to be able to download and install apps without having to wonder what the developer's real agenda is.

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