[Macworld]

Post your comments for Podcaster: What all the fuss is about here

[jrandersoniii]

When I first heard about this product - I was thinking about when I travel. I'll refresh podcasts et al. in the airport. But that currently requires digging out the laptop and going through that whole mess. This sounded like a perfectly good solution, and as noted - offers a solution not currently offered by iTunes or the iPhone software.
Apple needs to loosen up!

[vudoo]

This is distribution method sounds awesome! Can I get other applications this way; have other developers set up something similar?
I've given up on buying apps through iTunes' App store, but I would love to pay the developers directly for some cool apps.

[booga]

Unfortunately, vudoo, while the original Podcaster in no way violated Apple's SDK agreement, this method of distribution does, in fact, violate section 3.3.3 of the agreement. I'm not sure what Apple is going to do about it, but I suspect no developer that hasn't been rejected by the App Store after spending long hours developing an app would risk Apple's wrath doing this.
I'm afraid you're stuck with the App Store, which seems to be getting better anyway. The stuff in featured, hot, and staff favorites always seem reasonable, and there's enough good stuff that the top 50 is usually not bad either.

[Uncommon]

booga said:

Unfortunately, vudoo, while the original Podcaster in no way violated Apple's SDK agreement, this method of distribution does, in fact, violate section 3.3.3 of the agreement.

Actually, section 3.3.3 refers only to distributing "additional features or functionality", but that's a potentially stifling restriction in itself.

[richcon]

Unfortunately booga, DED (Roughly Drafted) is wrong, and John Gruber (Daring Fireball) is right. The SDK license agreement does not forbid Podcaster.
3.3.3 banns non-iTunes feature distribution, not content distribution. I'm surprised Roughly Drafted doesn't know the difference between features (things a program does) and content (data a program uses). The feature here is the ability to download podcasts, and that particular feature comes with the original program. So 3.3.3 is definitely not violated.
(And for the record, Apple never said 3.3.3 was violated, that's strictly Roughly Drafted's interpretation.)

[Chris Breen]

Putting on my moderator's hat:

To comment on the righteousness (or not) of Apple's decision and the world's reactions to it, please use this thread where we already have a lively discussion going.

Thanks!

[richcon]

Sorry Chris, I've moved to that thread.
More on topic, I do think Podcaster looks like a cool app and I hope Apple revisits their acceptance requirement for it.

[ibeetle]

A few of points.

While one cannot entirely duplicate the downloading of a podcast without going through Apple it is possible, and maybe why Apple got upset with this App that Apple has been working on this function and currently has it in the pipeline.

It is also may not be entirely up to Apple. AT&T may not want users downloading gigabytes of podcast data.

While one cannot download podcast there are many podcast that can be streamed over even Edge. Most Podcast are in mono and do not requrire a lot of streaming bandwidth. The Podcaster people even have such a web app for those that really need a Podcast fix on the go.

Doesn't it bother anyone else that Podcaster is still being charged for? By their own admition on their site. It will only function for a year and Apple could quite easily use it's remote "Kill Switch" capabilities. I would feel seriously burned if I dropped 10 bucks on a App that stopped working in a few weeks or everytime I turn on my iPod/iPhone I wonder if today is the day it is disabbled. Certinaly there will be updates to the Mac OS, iPhone and iTunes over the next year, and it is a fair bet that anyone of those updates will disable this software.

[Bonaldi]

Apple rejected it for duplicating functionality of "iTunes" -- ie, the store -- not of the iPod apps. Confusion over this has been mighty.

[Uncommon]

Podcasts are not available through the iPhone's iTunes Store app, only through the desktop iTunes app. That's what makes Apple's stance confusing.

[LowededWookie]

The method supplied by the programmer is in fact valid and is called ADHOC distribution.
Normally ADHOC would be run from a Mac OS X Server but obviously with a bit of working can be done legitimately without such a server.
I think the real issue with this Podcaster app is the load that such an app would put on the 3G/EDGE network. Some of these podcasts, especially the video ones, pull through a lot of data across the network so that may be where Apple's issue is.
Does the app save to it's own space or does it add to iTunes in this case it would violate the agreement because it is trying to write to another apps space.
There is a dubious lack of information coming from the programmer about how this app works and I'm pretty sure Apple isn't really the bad guy here but someone trying to push through an app that breaks the rules and getting caught.
Daniel Eran wrote an interesting article about this very thing:
http://www.roughlydr...-surprise-myth/

[Bonaldi]

"Podcasts are not available through the iPhone's iTunes Store app, only through the desktop iTunes app. That's what makes Apple's stance confusing."

Yes, because it's not about an app at all. They allow copies of apps. PCalc pwns the calculator, there are stocks apps and weather apps etc. What Apple is talking about must be the iTunes store itself -- nothing else makes a lick of sense.

But it does make sense to say you're not allowed to create a potential rival to the store. They stop Podcaster just like they'd stop an Amazon music store app. This would mostly have gone away if the damn employee had taken time to write a halfway decent rejection note.

[Chris Breen]

AGAIN:

Please, please, please, discuss your support or objections to Podcaster in THIS THREAD.