John Paczkowski

Recent Posts by John Paczkowski

French Minister Slags Apple Over AppGratis Ouster

The French government is taking exception to Apple’s ouster of AppGratis from the iTunes App Store.

In remarks to the media Thursday, Fleur Pellerin, France’s junior minister for digital economy, decried Apple’s move as “extremely brutal” and called on the company to “behave ethically” in its treatment of the French startup and others like it.

“This isn’t virtuous and dignified behavior for a company of that scale,” Pellerin said, adding that Apple’s removal of AppGratis should make European regulators “think about legislation.”

“The French are the world’s second-largest developers of software applications for mobile devices behind the United States,” Pellerin said. “What is the sense of investing if, overnight, your business model is jeopardized by a unilateral decision. … This is an issue of fairness.”

Apple, which rejected AppGratis from the App Store last week for violating two of its developer guidelines, declined to comment specifically on Pellerin’s remarks. But as I noted here earlier this week, the company feels it was justified in removing the app.

Previously:

Twitter’s Tanking

December 30, 2013 at 6:49 am PT

2013 Was a Good Year for Chromebooks

December 29, 2013 at 2:12 pm PT

BlackBerry Pulls Latest Twitter for BB10 Update

December 29, 2013 at 5:58 am PT

Apple CEO Tim Cook Made $4.25 Million This Year

December 28, 2013 at 12:05 pm PT

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Another gadget you don’t really need. Will not work once you get it home. New model out in 4 weeks. Battery life is too short to be of any use.

— From the fact sheet for a fake product entitled Useless Plasticbox 1.2 (an actual empty plastic box) placed in L.A.-area Best Buy stores by an artist called Plastic Jesus