Feel Like Being A Neighborhood Snitch? There's An App For That!

from the pay-to-spy dept

Remember how Homeland Security was working with Walmart to post creepy video messages urging you to spy on your neighbors? Well, the folks at Homeland Security ought to be thrilled with the new "Patriot App" -- which is a special (not free) iPhone app to help you spy on your neighbors. It's not put out by the government, however. Instead, it's just some company that thinks people are crazy enough to pay $0.99 to make it easier for you to "report suspicious behavior." Surprisingly, the app does also have a "whistleblower" section, where you can report government waste, or discuss whistleblowing with others -- just be careful not to pull a Wikileaks with it, or someone might report you to the authorities with the app as well. Still, while some folks are up in arms about this, it really seems like a silly app that I doubt too many people would actually pay for. Of course, with a name like "Patriot App," perhaps the US government could claim a likelihood of confusion that it actually had something to do with it... (and just to cut it off before it shows up in the comments: that last sentence is a joke).

Filed Under: iphone apps, patriot app, snitch

Man Creates Useful City Parking iPhone App... And City Doesn't Get Upset

from the yes,-dog-bites-man dept

It's really tragic that this even seems like it's worth a post at all, but we've seen so many ridiculous stories of people creating cool and useful apps for their cities or universities -- only to have officials freak out that outsiders are somehow violating intellectual property laws, and only official city/university apps should be allowed. So, when we heard about a guy in Elgin, Illinois who created a simple iPhone app to help people avoid parking tickets, it just felt likely that city officials would be upset about it. But... instead, they actually seem happy about it:

He just start selling his Elgin Parking iPhone application last week, but already city officials are commending him. For a download price of $1.99, it helps people comply with the city's odd/even parking law.

Hopefully, this means that common sense is making a bit of a comeback. I half expected officials to either be upset that he was "making money" by selling an app that helped people avoid parking tickets, or be upset that, with fewer parking tickets to give out, they'd have less revenue -- but it's great to see the city endorsing this sort of thing, where a citizen is free to help make life better for others in the city. And... since people sometimes complain that too many of the stories on Techdirt are negative, it seemed worth a post to give kudos to Elgin for not doing the stupid things that many other cities have done. In this day and age, that's progress.

Filed Under: elgin, iphone apps, parking

How Many Questionable Assumptions Can You Layer On Top Of Each Other To Estimate Bogus 'Losses' From Unauthorized iPhone App Downloads?

from the let-me-count-the-ways dept

A while back someone had sent me to a website I'd never heard of called 24/7 Wall St. that had a post claiming how much certain top blogs were "worth." The reason someone pointed me to it was because it had Techdirt in the list. What was amusing was that whoever wrote the article made a bunch of assumptions and every single one of them was wrong -- and some of them could have been checked with a simple look at our website. Given that every single assumption was wrong, the conclusion was equally laughable. I actually emailed them to point out a few factual errors in the post -- none of which were corrected. Since then I tend not to trust anything from that site -- though it has a habit of getting attention for similarly ridiculous "estimates," and people repeat them as if they were factual.

Allison K was the first of a whole bunch of you to send in the fact that the site is trying to "estimate" the "impact of piracy" of iPhone apps on Apple and app developers. While I commend the site on at least explaining its methodology, the more you read it, the more ridiculous it becomes. They simply layer questionable assumption upon questionable assumption upon questionable assumption, and when they get stuck, they pull out a random number. It's almost comical to read. As Allison noted, it reminds her of xkcd's famous comic of the Drake Equation, where one of the variables in the formula is defined as "Amount of bullshit you're willing to buy from Frank Drake": It's nice to have some sort of concrete numbers, because people like to have numbers to discuss. But when they're based on so many layers of questionable assumptions, they tend to do a lot more harm than good. People will assume there's some real basis for them when there is not.

And, of course, as everyone should understand by now there's no such thing as "losses" from unauthorized access. There is only a failure on the part of the company to convince people to buy. There is no line in their financial reports on "losses" from such activities -- with good reason. The only issue is a business model issue, which is that the company has not given users a good enough reason to buy, so they chose to get the product elsewhere.

Update: And it gets more ridiculous. 24/7's response was a comment below that did not address any of the concerns but simply says that I must not have made it through my high school math class. Classy. Meanwhile, Dark Helmet points us to TUAW's takedown of the numbers, where they note that based on the assumptions, 24/7 appears to be assuming that there are 510 pirated apps per device. Uh. Yeah. Check those assumptions, folks.

Filed Under: iphone apps, losses, piracy
Companies: apple

Will People Pay CNN To Help Them Report The News?

from the shouldn't-that-work-in-the-other-direction? dept

I've been seeing good reviews for CNN's new iPhone app, that's apparently well-designed. Lots of people are pointing out that the app is being offered for $2, as they wonder if people will "pay for the news." Except, of course, anyone with an iPhone can access cnn.com for free via their browser. So, if they're paying for anything, it must be additional features or convenience that the app allows -- not the content itself. And, for all the good reviews of the app, there's one "feature" being promoted that I'm not so sure I understand. Everyone keeps talking up how the app will turn anyone with an iPhone into an on-the-spot reporter:

Among the high points of the CNN app: It offers the chance to essentially join the CNN reporting team. Readers are invited to submit their own photos and video clips to iReport, a feature CNN already uses on its Web site for gathering material from the public.

Reading this, all I can think is that CNN is asking people to pay it to work for CNN. If it works, bravo for CNN, but that does feel a little backwards, doesn't it? I can totally understand user-generated content sites where people do work for prestige rather than money, but I'm not sure how enticing it is to get people to pay to do work for you...

Filed Under: citizen journalism, iphone apps, news, reporting
Companies: cnn

Do Morons In A Hurry Play Games On Their iPhones?

from the use-in-commerce? dept

A whole bunch of people have been sending in the story of a guy named Tim Langdell, who claims to own the trademark to the word "edge" when its used in the name of any video game, and has used that to force a popular iPhone game, called EDGE, out of the app store. As the article points out, Langdell's last game was released in 1994, which makes you wonder if the name is still being used in commerce (a requirement for a trademark claim). And, of course, there's the question of confusion. Considering how few people have heard of Langdell's company, was there really any chance that "a moron in a hurry" would confuse a fun block game with Langdell's title's like "Snoopy: The Case of the Missing Blanket." Kotaku points out that Langdell appears to spend a lot more time these days talking to people about how he owns the word "edge" in any video game than producing or selling video games...

Filed Under: app store, edge, iphone apps, tim langdell, trademark, video games

A Tale Of Two iPhone Apps... And An Irrational Fear Of Piracy

from the compare-and-contrast dept

Reader Terry writes in to point out a rather amusing contrast between two separate stories on a site about iPhone apps. First, there's a story about the massive success of the iPhone game iShoot (which was just profiled in Wired as well). That game, which is basically a copy of the old Scorched Earth (a personal favorite), used a free "lite" version to convince people to buy a more complete $3 version to the tune of over $600,000 in a single month. It is an example of using "free" to sell something else.

But, as Terry points out, it's rather maddening that the very next post on that same site, repeats without any hint of skepticism, the complaint of another iPhone game developer that thousands of dollars were being lost to "piracy." Of course, the article seems to have no problem assuming every single unauthorized download is a lost sale, never once questioning whether those folks would have bought the game in the first place. It also fails to mention that the only way to get the unauthorized free version is to have a jailbroken iPhone -- which is a very small percentage of iPhones out there. More importantly, though, the first story makes it quite clear that if you build a good game, give people an easy way to try it out for free, they seem more than willing to pay for the app in large quantities. The problem (once again) is not the "piracy." It's not a "loss." The problem is simply the use of a bad business model by the second developer -- and, perhaps, making the game not worth purchasing.

Filed Under: business models, iphone, iphone apps, piracy

Fart Apps Prove, Once Again, That The Market Is The Best Decider Of Value

from the economics-101 dept

Over the couple months of existence, Apple's iPhone App Store has received a considerable amount of attention. The successful phone has created an exciting new platform for developers seeking to leverage the advantages of mobile devices. The only problem was, Apple has insisted upon managing the applications in the store - oftentimes without clear guidelines or enforced through NDA.

Apple was in the practice of individually deciding which applications to allow and which to ban, regardless of customer demand. The most curious and paternalistic of Apple's App Store policies was the ban on applications of "limited utility." As a result, developers weren't sure if their hard work would be deemed useful enough to warrant acceptance into the store. Yet, like so many centrally planned economies in the past, this policy failed and Apple began letting in silly applications. However, what may be silly to Apple's gatekeepers may actually prove to be valuable to consumers. Such is the case with a suite of applications that simply produce fart sounds. Dozen exist, and one developer of a fart application is reportedly making nearly $10,000 per day with his crass software. That is the beauty of free markets - consumers and producers can better decide what is valuable than any individual person or firm. The distributed intelligence and preferences are far more capable than Apple's gatekeepers.

Filed Under: apps, free markets, iphone apps, value

MLB Threatens Guy Who Made A Cool iPhone App For Baseball Fans

from the there's-thick-headed-and-then-there's-mlb dept

It's really disappointing watching various sports leagues abuse intellectual property law over and over again. Perhaps the worst offender has been Major League Baseball. MLB wants people to think that it owns absolutely everything having to do with baseball, even though the courts have shot it down repeatedly. Even when it may be legally correct, its moves tend to do more to harm the game than to help it. It's as if MLB wants to keep shooting itself in the foot. The latest example was sent in by William Jackson, who points out that MLB is threatening the guy who made a neat Baseball app for the iPhone.

MLB has its own baseball app for the iPhone, which costs $5, that shows scores and highlights -- but this free app doesn't compete with that one. Instead, it's basically a baseball encyclopedia, allowing fans to look up all sorts of interesting historical stats and information. In other words, it's the sort of thing that helps fans feel even more connected to the game. So what does MLB do? It complains that the guy has the actual logos of Major League teams in the app. MLB argues that this is trademark infringement, but that's questionable. This is helping to promote those major league teams, not harm or dilute their brand in any way.

Filed Under: baseball, iphone, iphone apps, trademark
Companies: mlb