And... well, it rarely allows apps that duplicate built-in functionality on the App Store.
This is such an old meme and there are plenty of existence proofs that it isn’t true. There are third party apps for every single app on iOS including navigation, podcasts, mail, music players, calendars, password managers (with integration APIs specifically for them as of iOS 12), weather, notes, etc.
You can't make your own App Store, you can't ship your own browser -- https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#sof... -- you have to use HLS, you can't use background features except for approved categories: "VoIP, audio playback, location, task completion, local notifications". "Apps that create alternate desktop/home screen environments or simulate multi-app widget experiences will be rejected."
I'm not saying the rules aren't much improved from what they used to be -- it's been years since the simple advice was "don't ship something we ship," but ... at its core, it's still somewhat true. You have to ship an original app -- and all of the app categories you mentioned have truly original apps on the App Store already.
I'm not saying the rules aren't much improved from what they used to be -- it's been years since the simple advice was "don't ship something we ship," but ... at its core, it's still somewhat true. You have to ship an original app -- and all of the app categories you mentioned have truly original apps on the App Store already.
There is a difference between "I want to write a podcast app" and "I want to duplicate Overcast and just change a few icons"
And your first quote was "don't ship something we ship", which is quite different from "don't just reskin an existing app".
Don’t simply copy the latest popular app on the App Store, or make some minor changes to another app’s name or UI and pass it off as your own. In addition to risking an intellectual property infringement claim, it makes the App Store harder to navigate and just isn’t fair to your fellow developers.
You can't use background features except for approved categories: "VoIP, audio playback, location, task completion, local notifications".
Well unless you think that Apple added the APIs that I linked to and added settings to allow you to disable background processing (that doesn’t apply to the categories) you mentioned, which do you think is the more appropriate interpretation to what is allowed - the rules or the API documentation?
This is such an old meme and there are plenty of existence proofs that it isn’t true. There are third party apps for every single app on iOS including navigation, podcasts, mail, music players, calendars, password managers (with integration APIs specifically for them as of iOS 12), weather, notes, etc.