Sounds pretty heavy-handed to ban the whole account for alleged review vote stuffing. Even if there was actual review spam going on, couldn't this be solved by just removing all existing reviews and blocking further reviews, so the app could be downloaded by searching the app store (or via a direct itunes link)? Brutal.

It also opens up a massive blackmail opportunity. Pay up or we will review-spam your app with 10000 fake 5 stars so Apple kicks you out. It's reverse xrumer all over again. Nice.

Lots of speciality and companion apps don't make any revenue from app store sales and don't care about rankings. I'm sure there's a fairly big subset of app store developers that would be happy to run their apps unlisted and possibly unreviewed, since there is no other way to deploy an ios app to the general public.

As I replied elsewhere in this thread - Bogdan is being requested by Apple to claim Apple was Correct in Banning him.

Apple found a Niece of Bogdan's for whom he bought an Apple Dev account & shared test devices, had fraud on their app review.

But Apple did not notify him they had "linked his account" to hers - and he got mysteriously banned.

I think Apple is making things worse, in this situation.

So what stops someone who is against X app, pays for clickworkers to leave fake reviews to get the app pulled? Would the same thing happen if fake reviews were left for a major company like Google/Microsoft/Dropbox in the app store?

Freedom to install/use is one of those cases where the web beats apps, hands-down. Check out devdocs.io in your browser for a free alternative. Works just fine on mobile, too.

I love it, and after hooking it up to Alfred, I can search 90% of my commonly-needed docs with a single interface.

Doesn't devdocs.io require you to open it before going offline to work?

Would this be the time to explore selling iOS apps outside of the app store?

Offer users a binary download (like when you buy the desktop app outside of the store). Then have a little tool that you run on your Mac, connect the iOS device, enter your developer credentials (since this is a developer's tool the user likely has them, otherwise registration is quick and free)... and the tool sideloads the app to the iOS device.

I build what I believe is currently the most popular (mostly for being free and solid: Cydia Impactor) simple tool for this, and will point out that apps sideboards in this fashion are extremely limited as you don't have access to basic iOS functionality that requires special profiles, such as push notifications, and you can only have up to three such apps installed on an iOS 10 device at a time, each of which will have a certificate that expires after only 7 days. (Apple has been slowly clamping down on these limits; it used to be such apps expired after 30 days, then they rate limited free app identifiers to 10 per week, then they made the apps expire after 7 days, and, most recently, you are limited to 3 total installed apps.)

Didn't F.lux try to do this and get promptly shut down by Apple for violating the Developer Agreement?

https://justgetflux.com/sideload/

Normally I would think this is a ridiculous approach, but given the purpose of the app is literally developer docs, it might just work.

Phil Schiller accuses Kapeli of fraud:

http://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/06/dash-pulled-for-app-stor...

"...

I hope that you understand the importance of protecting the App Store from repeated fraudulent activity.

Thank you, Phil"

I don't see anything obviously wrong in any of the Dash reviews (I think this is the correct app):

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:1e3kQGL...

It also seems somewhat unlikely that a developer with such great reviews would deliberately trash his competitors.

I wonder if Apple's automated fraud detection system detected it as a false positive, simply because he got so many good reviews?

Turns out a relative of his who he paid account setup for, and shared some devices with, had the fraud.

Now Phil Schiller (by name) wants to force Kapeli to post a blog saying Apple was right in banning him: https://blog.kapeli.com/dash-and-apple-my-side-of-the-story/

I bitch about it here: https://plus.google.com/+NickRichards/posts/H7iuMTcYLSn essentially saying Apple is not bold ("courageous") enough to notify _him_ about the upcoming fraud ban, only the guilt-by-association Niece's account.

Who are Dash's competitors anyway?

None AFAIK. Google search, Visual Studio / Other IDE Intellisense features.

Apple, how on earth is this good for existing customers? You're not protecting us - you're discouraging us. We've paid for the application and now can't get access to it. If there's an alternative channel, I'll never buy from an Apple app store again.

Yet some how my comment got -4 points...

I can only applaud Apple for doing this

He could embarrass Apple by releasing the app on Android.