iPhone users can now pay a couple of bucks for a selection of images of women with no clothes on. And whatever your attitude to such images, it may be a good thing for Apple.
Until recently, the iPhone app store system has been plagued by inconsistencies: a yes to fake watches, baby shaking and “big toots”, but a no to the Kama Sutra, Nine Inch Nails and “wet farts“.
Fortunately for the sanity of those involved in the approval process, the new 3.0 edition of the iPhone software allows application developers to put an age rating on their apps. It’s a fairly farcial process: users are simply asked to confirm they are above that age when launching the app for the first time.
Of course, unless their allowance stretches to a pricy unlocked phone, it’s not clear how somebody who’d be caught out by age restrictions managed to sign up to an AT&T contract in the first place. It appears the only real practical use of the feature for users is that it allows adults to install a mature application but temporarily hide it with a parental control setting if they lend the phone to a child.
For Apple, however, it’s a different story. The firm no longer needs to waste time throwing out every application which might startle the children: as long as a product has the applicable rating, the vetting should now simply be a case of making sure the product is legally and technically sound. (“Should” because the firm may still choose to make moral judgments for the sake of its corporate image.)
A man named Allen Leung has taken advantage of the changes by “upgrading” his Hottest Girls app (pictured, via Macenstein.com). It used to feature a collection of women posing in swimsuits. The swimsuits are now gone.
Only one question remains: will Apple react to the publicity over this app by pulling it from its store?
OK, two questions: How long until somebody releases an adult images app which also incorporates the iPhone’s accelerometer to help avoid an articulatio radiocarpea imbalance?
Related posts:
- Apple approves, then pulls, baby shaking iPhone game
- iPhone App Vetting Still a Lottery
- Third Time Lucky in Apple Fart Saga
