Small Scale Businesses on a complete whitewash from the App Store as Apple widens the ban on template apps
Among the different rules and policies being levied down in the worldwide developer conference, Apple released some guidelines with an updated app store matrix. The new set of rules included a new rule to ban apps which were created either by “commercialized template or app generation serviceâ€. This policy was adopted to clean the app store and get rid of all the accompanying bloatware and unwanted apps. But the things have been changed more drastically than it was desired. A range of companies which believed that they were in the safe zone is now being affected as well. Since, the implementation of this policy, many iOS app developers have lost tons of revenue and their businesses have been going through a stiff downfall.
Deadline
Deadline is what is given by all the major companies before proceeding for any kind of work and the same was given by Apple. Majority of the companies have been given a deadline of Jan 1, 2018. After which, any submission of new apps will be directly rejected by the App Store Review Team and the same is strictly levied by Apple. Even if we talk about the present scenario, many apps have managed to outlast despite this lash decision from Apple, but the question is, how long they will last.
In the Apple store, not many app developers focus on the high-end businesses and large-scale enterprises. Even today, a majority of the app developers focuses on making apps for the small-scale businesses, who got a major blow after this policy implementation. Their main focus is to build apps for businesses that don’t have enough funding, internal resources or even can’t afford to some developers to build an app from the scratch.
Help for small-scale businesses
Also, these companies help the small retailers, restaurants, nonprofits, churches, small fitness studios and other small organizations to develop an app using templates. Every one of us knows the simplicity of making an app using the template structure. There is absolutely minimum or no coding required and apps can be made in a jiffy as well as being in a jiffy condition. Also, certain drag & drop and various other tools are used for the making of such apps which can benefit any small scale business or an organization to a great extent.
Although, the small-scale apps may not be the most used apps that can create efficiency in servicing and customer satisfaction from their presence. In addition, if pizzas stall needs an app for providing its customers a higher level of satisfaction, these apps can come as a handy tool for them. This in return reduces the amount of money which is involved in paying for other big companies such as Uber Eats, GrubHub etc. As a result, the low scale business can save in tons of money and they can invest it in other essential stuff.
Yet another decision for online website building company
Coming to yet another decision effect, the web hosting company clearly stated that they wouldn’t allow the web pages which are built with WordPress templates or with online websites such as Wix or Webspace. The reason behind this decision was quite simple. These websites are built in a minimum time and do not require the hard work and dedication which other web developers incorporate in the making of a single website.
Congress View on Apple’s decision
Surrounded by a mist of chaos all over, this decision from Apple of blocking a large number of businesses caught the attention of Congress. Following by a letter dated December 1, 2017, Ted W.Lieu has told Apple to recheck on their decision of expanded reinforcement of their 4.3 and 4.2.6 rules and guidelines. In addition, the former also ban the apps which are made from templates. Also, Apple is using a new rule “catch-all for banning spam which Apple will be implementing if they fail to prove that the associated app was built by any sort of a wizard or drag-and-drop-system.
Recently, Lieu was informed about the Apple’s decision to strictly enforce its decision to remove every other app from the App Store which was made using templates. Further, he added that many small-scale businesses, religious places, research organizations do rely heavily on template apps when they do not have enough funding for developing app-in-house.
At last, the congressman suggested that Apple is now casting a more stringent effort in removing all the spam and illegitimate apps from their store.
With such a detrimental decision, it had a dampening effect on all the industries which helps these small scale businesses for an increase in their productivity.
Shut down of Shoutem
Among the different chaos going all over after this decision from Apple, a company “Shoutem†already shut down because only a handful of the team members remained to serve the potential customers. The CEO of that company, Victor Marohic explained the real reason behind the company shut down- They were not able to sustain the changing guidelines from apple as well as were facing challenges of handling the business in the workspace.
Adding further, “The 4.2.6 was just the final blow which made us move a bit faster for closing our company,†he said at the Shoutem’s Closure. This was definitely a threat to their company’s exposure as the next decision from Apple was also unpredictable.
Following from Shoutem, yet another company, ChowNow got affected which made apps for a different restaurant using simple components which offered services in online ordering and different loyalty programs.
ChowNow was known to be Apple’s favorite and the company was even named in the Apple’s documentation in terms of Apple pay because it was one of the few companies which integrated Apple Pay within their work module. But as of now, even ChowNow will be affected to a great extent after January 1.
Final Thoughts
Every one of us understands Apple’s policies and their motive behind the cleaning of such apps. But, they have just disrupted an entire ecosystem and many of the small-scale business has been already shut down because of their levied guidelines. On the Contrary, there were much easier and effective ways to deal with this issue but since Apple is on its firm hold, the nearby future for such business is to adopt more quality guidelines based development to be in the business.
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7 å¹´Move to android as an alternative :)