[Thread] Hopscotch CEO details the rejection of a minor app update in the App Store and says this was “not even her worst run-in” with Apple's App Review team
oh, thank you so much Apple for that privilege. Apple is committing not to shoot down any carrier pigeons bringing word of outside-of-apps payment mechanisms. Unless the users don't opt-in to carrier pigeons. Then Apple can shoot away. What about smoke signals?" https://twitter.com/... Oliver Haslam / @oliverjhaslam : Apple is making a habit of dropping media briefings with a couple hours notice. In this case it was very much to put pressure on writers to get news out before it could be dug into. I've no doubt about it. Apple PR works for Apple, not us. https://twitter.com/... Rich Siegel / @siegel : I currently have a bug-fix update held up because of a profoundly incorrect rejection. The reviewer didn't understand a feature that's been in @bbedit since 2002. The behavior isn't what the reviewer claimed. Here's part of my response. Sounds like @SamJ0hn deserves a cake too. https://twitter.com/... @cabel : Also, sorry, one more rant. With the exception of maybe Uber and Airbnb, App Review isn't kidding when they say they treat all developers the same, as every good app in the App Store, no matter how beloved, has at least five horror stories just like this: https://twitter.com/... Samantha John / @samj0hn : A day later, the app was rejected again. At this point, I didn't know what to do. I was in a Kafkaesque universe where I had to blindly guess at what could be wrong and randomly change things until the bureaucrats let me through (with a one-day delay). Dermot Daly / @dermdaly : App Tracking Transparency rules seem a mess. We had an app rejected for claiming it's business model was enticing the user into tracking (it wasn't). We had 3 calls with the App Review team who eventually agreed and then expedited the review. That was 2 months back.... Ouriel Ohayon / @ourielohayon : @benedictevans @TechmemeChatter Had episodes like those above at least 3 times. No idea how many have but i talked to a LOT of developers with comparable issues. They are just not public about it. That said you can resolve most with some work John Gruber / @gruber : Must-read thread. The thing that really gets me about this story is that Hopscotch is a great, well-established, award-winning app. https://twitter.com/... Ouriel Ohayon / @ourielohayon : I think every mobile app developer would relate here. In particular in crypto. The app store review process is THE biggest tax on developing apps. Not the 30%. That said with years you learn how to deal. Plan and anticipate and resolve those cases. But it's painful https://twitter.com/... Martin Pilkington / @pilky : I sometimes get asked why I didn't put @coppiceapp on the Mac App Store. It's because releasing an app is hard enough, so if you can avoid the App Store then it's one less thing to stress about https://twitter.com/... Bryan Clark / @bryanjclark : (This stuff is why I very-rarely bothered to file radars, and a part of why I switched my day-job from iOS to web. Why waste hours building software to sell Apple hardware if they're going to have such systemic disrespect?) https://twitter.com/... Patrick Moorhead / @patrickmoorhead : Most iOS ISVs fear @Apple reprisal from speaking out. Not this one. Yet another nightmare Apple iOS App Store story. $AAPL https://twitter.com/... Dermot Daly / @dermdaly : .. and today, we submitted a minor bug fix. Guess what ? Rejected for the same reason as a couple of months back. I appealed. “A representative from the app review team will call you in 3 to 5 business days” Groundhog Day. Michael Tsai / @mjtsai : @siegel @SamJ0hn I think I've only heard of one case where the bug fix *was* allowed to go through, and it was still delayed in the sense that it got rejected and the developer had to apply to take advantage of the new “no delay” rule. Michael Tsai / @mjtsai : @siegel ... “For apps that are already on the App Store, bug fixes will no longer be delayed over guideline violations except for those related to legal issues.” ;-( @suchipi : Apple's App Store review process is marketed as a way to ensure only quality apps are in its store, but in reality it's a tool that gives Apple total control over the only app market available on a quarter of the world's smartphones. Apple cuts off its competitors to beat them. Thomas Reed / @thomasareed : There are so many stories like this about the App Store review process, I wonder if any developers at all have ever gotten through the process without any issues. And it really makes you wonder how all those apps offering $100/week scam subscriptions make it through. 😒 https://twitter.com/... Dawn ‘Yohosie’ Hosie / @yohosiefgc : Every app I have released on the app store has been rejected for Sillier and Sillier reasons. I honestly don't know who passes the first time**** ****Not Twitter, to be 100% clear. Not my role. https://twitter.com/... @suchipi : Had a similar experience as an app developer in the past. We couldn't fix a critical issue affecting our users for almost a month because Apple was rejecting every app submission with vague reasoning. A couple months later, Apple released a direct competitor to our product. https://twitter.com/... John Siracusa / @siracusa : Imagine how much things would improve if human beings read developers' email replies to app review. https://twitter.com/... Michael Sippey / @sippey : Kafkaesque indeed. 🧵 https://twitter.com/... Alex Chan / @alexwlchan : Apple's dismissiveness and hostility towards third-party developers is one of the big reasons I've never learnt how to write apps for their platforms. (Despite using mostly Apple gear for my day-to-day computing.) https://twitter.com/... @glitchtvbot : The Apple App Store Review process is totally broken and creates a worse experience for everyone who uses Apple products, but nothing will change until Apple is forced to allow competition through anti-trust lawsuits. https://twitter.com/... @theslinker : This is from an “A list” developer with a great Apple relationship. Imagine what happens to the “nobodies.” https://twitter.com/... Ivan Reese / @spiralganglion : Imagine how many more beautifully-crafted tools, like @MuseAppHQ, we'd all have... if living on the most advanced portable hardware didn't mean living through the most advanced kafkaesque nightmare developer story. https://twitter.com/... Joe Rossignol / @rsgnl : I'm tweeting a lot about this $100M settlement from Apple to US developers but I think there are big implications. If you accept $/don't opt out, you agree the App Store is not a monopoly as defined in the lawsuit. Apple said the class encompasses *99%* of developers in the US. Jeff Johnson / @lapcatsoftware : Yup! Apple's “system” for developers is one of the most dysfunctional bureaucracies I've ever encountered in my life. And I'm sure you all have encountered some really dysfunctional bureaucracies. This one takes the cake, and eats it too. https://twitter.com/... Danny Roa / @dannyroa : I would love to see governments levy heavy fines on Apple and Google but not tell them specifically what they violated just to give them a taste of their own medicine. https://twitter.com/... @therealfitz : The App Store review process is so so broken. https://twitter.com/... @jesse_squires : Relevant thread for every iOS developer 👇🏼 App Store Review in 2021: still garbage https://twitter.com/... David / @chalupabatmangg : @SamJ0hn this triggers app submission ptsd. The worst thing is if an app gets rejected (even if it's their mistake) now you're stuck in a week long loop of back and forth until they realize they had a typo on their login 🤦🏻♂ ️ Deniz Palo / @denlopalo : @SamJ0hn I can feel your anger. Didn't have this experience with Apple explicitly -but with enough other ‘gatekeepers’ like FB Marketing, Google Ads, Linkedin Marketing. It just drives you nuts esp. when you're playing by their rules & still get ‘disqualified’ because they said so. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Make it easier to leave feedback. Filing a radar sends my blood pressure through the roof. Not to mention the brain damage I get from trying to navigate the system to reply to a months-old issue that I've already worked around by that time. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Update: to Apple's credit, they called me last night to apologize and ask for feedback. Who knows if they'll actually implement it, but at least they are listening. What would *you* change about the App Store review process? Samantha John / @samj0hn : Per the new guidelines: if an app is held up for a reason unrelated to the update, let the app through and ask the developer to fix it in the next release. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Or some person named Leo continually pressing the reject button without ever bothering to read my message because the automated system said that I was wrong. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Measure success by the time for an app to get approved, not just the time for the developer to get a response. Samantha John / @samj0hn : It's just the last straw. The combination of fear and the fact that I actually really *like* the people we work with at Apple kept me silent in the past. Samantha John / @samj0hn : But this time, I needed to get it off my chest. Perhaps another developer will read this story and feel a little less alone. Or even better, maybe someone at Apple will read it and feel bad enough to make some change. Thanks for listening. Samantha John / @samj0hn : My ideas: Samantha John / @samj0hn : Fix App Store Connect. I didn't even mention this in my thread, but an additional hurdle was having to accept a new tax agreement before I could resubmit. The ~30 second load time + the number of clicks it takes to accomplish anything is the icing on the cake of despair. Samantha John / @samj0hn : I don't know what's worse: an automated system with zero human oversight continually telling me (falsely) that our app is out of compliance. Samantha John / @samj0hn : I don't have a big point in sharing this story, except to shed some light on the horrible absurdities you face as an Apple developer. This was not my first, or even worst, run-in with App Review. Samantha John / @samj0hn : She paused for a moment while presumably looking at our case. Then said, “oh, I think the automated software must have had a glitch. It just got escalated to me, but I saw that your rejection was a mistake and wanted to call and tell you.” Samantha John / @samj0hn : There's a lot of talk about the 30% tax that Apple takes from every app on the App Store. The time tax on their developers to deal with this unfriendly behemoth of a system is just as bad if not worse. Samantha John / @samj0hn : But then I noticed that I had another email from Apple with the subject: Your app, Hopscotch-Programming for kids, does not follow the App Store Review Guidelines. https://twitter.com/... Samantha John / @samj0hn : The people I've met who work at Apple are lovely and have been incredibly supportive of Hopscotch. But there is something rotten in a system that treats developers in this way. Samantha John / @samj0hn : She had first called me at 3:14pm, I had received an email at 3:16 later telling me that Hopscotch was still out of compliance. Now it was almost 4pm. It seemed unlikely that she had figured this out before that very moment. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Finally, they called me back, and I talked to a representative. She asked if I planned to update my app to correct the problem. Samantha John / @samj0hn : I'm certain that nobody on the app review team wants me or anyone else to have this type of experience. But it feels like a system optimized for the reviewers, rather than the developers publishing their apps. Like, this was an acceptable side-effect of their process. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Hopscotch is a small company, I'm the CEO, AND I write code. And that's how a lot of the best apps work! My time is limited and precious to me. The way that Apple wasted my energy, gaslighted me, and sucked my time away made me furious. Samantha John / @samj0hn : When I looked at my voicemail, I realized the spam caller was someone from App Review. I called them back. No answer, so I left a voicemail. Samantha John / @samj0hn : I told her as nicely as I could, that I did not know what the problem was. Our promoted in-app purchases had different titles and descriptions, contrary to the complaint from App Review. The purpose of the call was for her to tell me what I needed to change. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Now we were three days after the original release date and I was still in suspense as to what we did wrong. Throughout this time, Apple continued to send me emails reminding me that Hopscotch was not following their guidelines. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Makes sense as a guideline, except our titles and descriptions were different! Nonetheless, I changed the descriptions to be even *more* different than the titles. I replied to the message and resubmitted the app. Samantha John / @samj0hn : So, I submitted an appeal complete with screenshots. I had two things on my side: 1. The rejection made no sense and 2. The rejection was unrelated to my app update. Samantha John / @samj0hn : The app was rejected because “our promoted in-app purchases had identical titles and descriptions which could be confusing to users.” Samantha John / @samj0hn : We submitted a bug fix update to Hopscotch this weekend. We wanted to get it out quickly to get ahead of the school year—schools don't update their apps very often after downloading them. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Today, I got a call from “Potential Spam” in San Jose California. I ignored the call, as one does with spammers. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Luckily, I had a contact at Apple! I emailed them for help and carefully explained the issue. They told me to submit an appeal. Samantha John / @samj0hn : Here's the reply. They let us release the bug fix but told me that the rejection was valid and I would still need to update the app to comply with their guidelines. https://twitter.com/... Benedict Evans / @benedictevans : Only Apple knows how often this happens. At scale,it will always happen, unfortunately. But how often? Are there KPIs for mistakes? https://twitter.com/... Nilay Patel / @reckless : Look I hate to be a relentless cynic but *settling a lawsuit* is not “longstanding efforts to evolve the App Store” like this was all part of the plan. Without the lawsuit, there are no changes! https://www.apple.com/... https://twitter.com/... Ryan Jones / @rjonesy : 1. Apple's press release says “clarifies”, not “changes”. 🤔 This part *sounds* like Apps can use non-App-Store purchase options - but no. It just says Apps can email offers to the customers. Like this example email. That's literally all this says. https://twitter.com/... Joe Rossignol / @rsgnl : This is a major news publication getting this wrong. Developers can already collect payments outside of the App Store—i.e. Netflix letting customers subscribe through its website. Apple is simply letting developers email their iOS app users to advertise this payment option. https://twitter.com/... Steve Moser / @stevemoser : This model makes sense to me and should allow Netflix to expanding gaming to iOS as well. All games must be independent apps in the App Store (and go through App Review). Users will authenticate with their Netflix credentials inside the game. https://twitter.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
Hopscotch’s case adds a concrete developer account to scrutiny of App Review that had already included a former approvals chief’s discussion of rejections and developer competition and court records describing a review operation handling roughly 100,000 apps a week. The issue is not merely a denied submission: Apple later permitted the bug-fix release while maintaining that the cited compliance issue needed to be addressed in a later update.
That split outcome helps explain why developers characterize review as inconsistent: an update can ship, yet the underlying interpretation remains unresolved for the developer’s next release cycle.
First-order effects
- Hopscotch can distribute its bug-fix update, but must change the promoted in-app purchase titles or descriptions in a future submission to meet Apple’s stated compliance requirement.
- Apple’s decision leaves its review rationale intact while drawing further public criticism from iOS developers over how App Review rules are applied.
Second-order effects
- iOS developers shipping routine fixes must budget for review-related delays and follow-up compliance work when App Review flags metadata or purchase-promotion details.
- Apple’s review team faces greater pressure to make rejection rationales reproducible, particularly as public accounts contrast individual outcomes with the scale of the review operation.
Third-order effects
- Repeated disputes over small updates strengthen the platform-gatekeeper dynamic: developers’ release schedules remain contingent on Apple’s interpretation of rules that Apple also enforces.
- If comparable complaints persist, App Review’s legitimacy will depend increasingly on consistent explanations and usable appeal paths, not only on eventual approval.
The trend: App distribution is becoming a contest over procedural predictability as developers challenge the discretion held by platform review systems.