iPhone 3.0 software could relax Apple’s strict submissions policy
Parental controls to be included in new firmware
Apple recently rejected an application called Newspapers, which serves as an aggregate collector of stories from various news sources. The application was booted from the App Store when a picture of a Page 3 model was scraped up from the bowls of The Sun.
Apple’s rejection letter to the developer of Newspapers happened to mention that it “would be appropriate to resubmit your application for review once [the iPhone’s parental control] feature is available”.
The highly anticipated 3.0 version of the iPhone firmware will apparently come complete with built-in parental controls, which - although easily bypassed by almost any half-brained 10-year-old - are generally accepted to be an acceptable measure against mature material on a games system.
It’s too early to rejoice just yet, but this could be precisely what developers have been waiting for. If Apple, like most other manufacturers and retailers, deems the parental control system to be enough to allow more mature content onto the App Store (such as a bit of blood, the odd naughty word (such as f***, **n*, **l**c**, j*** mopper, Jonathon R*** and Russell B****) and an occasional flash of nudity) the games and apps we really want to see might finally become available.