Apple's "Anti-Competitive" iPhone App Store Draws Developer Ire

Sam Gustin writes: This controversy is overblown, but Apple's got a problem nonetheless.

Apple's iPhone App Store is facing developer fury after news emerged that the company rejected a program that competes with one of Apple's own applications

The uproar mushroomed after iPhone developer Fraser Speirs announced in disgust that he would no longer write applications for the platform.

"I will never write another iPhone application for the App Store as currently constituted," Speirs wrote after news emerged that Apple had rejected a program called Podcaster, because "it duplicates the functionality of the Podcast section of iTunes."

As it turns out, Podcaster was actually superior to Apple's own offering, because it allowed users to update their podcast subscriptions wirelessly, as opposed to having to plug the iPhone into their computer.

As a result, Apple was lambasted for stifling innovation in favor of its own competitive interests. Reaction from the tech blogosphere was swift, and furious.

"Apple has gone too far," wrote O'Reilly's Paul Kafasis. "Rejecting an application because it might compete with Apple is simply indefensible."

Daring Fireball's John Gruber wrote that thanks to the ambiguity of Apple's App Store rules, "something is seriously wrong."

"Let's be clear: forbidding 'duplication of functionality' is forbidding competition," Gruber wrote. "The point of competition is to do the same thing, but better."

But some commentators called the flap a tempest in a teapot.

"Of course you'll keep developing for the iPhone," headlined TechCrunch's Michael Arrington, noting that the iPhone's explosive success will prove too tempting for anything resembling a widespread boycott.