Apple Blocks App Sales Except Through AppStore

To avoid anti-competitive business practices Apple allowed developers to distribute software outside of the AppStore, until now...

Previously if a developer didn't want to sell their software on the App Store, they could still sell it to customers directly. Last week Podcaster, an application barred from sale on the AppStore, began selling to customers directly. Today Apple removed the developer’s ability to do this, according to PhoneNews.com

This puts Apple in a dangerous legal position. Before today, Apple had rights to assert that the App Store was only one sales channel, which they had every right to control. Now Apple is asserting rights to control any and all sales channels of software to iPhone and iPod touch owners. Apple appears to be betting on the legal precedent of time; it would take years, and hundreds of thousands of dollars, to challenge such an anti-competitive business practice.


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