Don't get me wrong, I like Apple, but its about time someone came down on them and AT&T.

This pleases me greatly. Someone at the FCC must want to use GV on their iPhone.

Apple and AT&T are just abusing iPhone users with this BS. Blackberry users on AT&T can use the official GV app, but AT&T can't control what they do. They're just taking advantage of the Apple walled garden because they're scared of consumers having more choices.

The difference between Apple/at&t and nazis is that nazis dont require a two-year committment before they shoot you in the face.

Let's see if Apple says AT&T makes all the decisions and AT&T says Apple makes all the decisions.

@paulh_5: You like Apple? huhwhatwhyhow?

I like how the questions to AT&T also focus on things like Sling and Skype which other handsets can use without limits and the iPhone can't.

This is ridiculous. Those who bought iPhones did so knowing that they were a) stuck with ATT and b) Apple approved all APP store content. You don't have a right to an iPhone; there are other smartphones on the market.

Google Voice is great but it really needs an app to make it work well. It's time for the heavy hand of Apple to get slapped hard.

@zacox: Hyperbole much? The difference between AT&T and the Nazis is that Nazis actually, you know, SHOOT YOU IN THE FUCKING FACE.

I hope both Apple and ATT get slapped with huge fines. this news just made my day.

Score +1 for us users! I recently purchased an iPhone and while I like the product, Apple's draconian control on app development is already ticking me off. I'm going to enjoy my phone, but I've decided that this Apple product will be my first and last. By the time I'm looking for a new phone, I hope Android has matured into a solid (and more open) alternative.

About time!!!!!!!!

@Esquire99: You do have the right to have the telecommunications company you are paying for services from follow clearly defined rules. The FCC has every right, and duty, to investigate this incident. Even if you do purchase a product with known limitations to begin with you should expect the company to act responsibly afterward.

You either 1) know very little about your own rights as a consumer, or 2) are just anti-apple all the way around and like posting useless comments. This has nothing to do with users thinking they have a right to an iphone, and everything to do with them knowing they have a right to consumer protections in the highly regulated telecommunications sector.

@zacox: Godwin's Law violation! You're grounded from teh intertubes.

@zacox: Wow, Godwin's law three posts in? That has to be some sort of record.

@MessageinaBottle: Thanks! I shall now wallow in my crapulence!

@chauncy that billups: Now hang on there. To some folks, mass murders and concentration camps are just as bad as not being able to own the newest, trendiest phone.

But seriously, I don't get why people get so pissy about the iPhone and AT&T. Don't like AT&T? Then don't freaking get the iPhone. Problem solved, whiny douchebags.

I am so happy about this. AT&T seems to be making Apple break apps that challenge their revenue stream or makes them provide *more* (gasp) for the same money.

@outlulz: Finger pointing works well in unaccountable PR spins, but the FCC will demand an answer.

@Esquire99: But...but...it's the iPhone! Everyone NEEDS one! And since I absolutely need one, but hate AT&T, I'm going to complain about corporate partnerships until Apple partners with every phone company just to please me. Not buying one is out of the question!

With that said, I'm going to go complain about how I can't play any Nintendo games on my PS3. Exclusivity is so unfair!!111

@WebUser:
If you don't like Att/Apple's control, why did you buy one in the first place?

@Esquire99: I think the problem is that people were OK with both of those... with the understanding (or assumption) that Apple's approval/disapproval for applications wouldn't totally suck. That is, if decisions on approval were based more on the application itself (i.e. it doesn't work, it has inappropriate content, it has a legitimate security risk to the phone and/or cell network) and less on the business interests of the carrier, it'd be fine.

(Of course, let's not get started on the applications that have been approved that never should have been, and the applications that were declined for ridiculous or even non-existent reasons, without any real way of appealing those decisions...)

@supercereal: Seriously though... There has to be something said about fair play and neutrality, doesn't there?

I'm guessing this new-and-improved FCC will have lots to say about neutrality. I see a future where nobody gets to choose what kinda data you transfer other than you. Certainly not at&t.

If this means that at&t cant close off ports to Skype, Sling or any number of other services that use the Internet to which they are supposedly offering access, then at&t will just have to figure out another way to fleece its customers.

Better yet (and this goes for Verizon too) stop fleecing everyone! If they just adopted an all-you-can-eat like Boost, that didn't cost $600 a month for a family of 5, they would realize so much more revenue. But I digress.....

I can only hope that the answers are made public as well. (I say that because they probably won't.)

@LoadStar:
so you're ok letting them make decisions as long a you agree with them? Make sense. Can we do the same with the president? We can have him removed as soon as he makes decisions we don't like?

@supercereal: I smell an apple fanboi! (and it pains me so to write it with the i on the end like that... but thats how they seem to like it..)

holy shit! who woke up the folks in the anti-trust division?

$20 says google makes more political contribs than apple & at&t combined. anybody care to find the numbers?

@zacox: I certainly agree with the principle that, within reason, you should be able to have the majority of control on a device you purchased. Especially with regards to the transfer and accessibility of information, a la net neutrality.

I guess my main point was that far too many people think it's unfair that Apple has partnered exclusively with AT&T, thereby "forcing" them to use that network. A specific network is attached to the device, and if that is unsuitable, then one has the option to go elsewhere.

"What other applications have been rejected for use on the iPhone and for what reasons?"

That's going to be a loooong answer there...

@Esquire99:

I don't really think that is what is being said. I don't have the iPhone (I have the G1), but if I DID I know I would be buying it with the condition that Apple/At&t has to approve every app. That being said, I think it is reasonable to only expect them to block malicious/non-working apps, not apps that can interfere with their profits.

i'm gonna sound like a total geek here, but this is better than tyson vs. holyfield.

queue vince mcmahon:
"in this corner, we have dot-com busters, microsoft/yahoo. & in this corner we have the dynamic duo, at&t/apple. & finally, in this corner we have the angel that can do no wrong, google. cage match rules - only one leaves here alive. the winner marries my hot-as-hell daughter."

@supercereal: Think of it as if GM built a car that only ran on fuel only available CONTRACTUALLY with Exxon Mobil. It is a monopoly that should not be allowed to happen. If I purchase a product I should be able to use it at any other service provider. The technology can easily be applied just like the way cell phone companies bitched about number portability , until it was forced upon them

@supercereal: Not in any way the same. The airwaves that the cell phone companies USE, are owned my the American public. You would not accept Gm buying a car that runs on water but can only be provided from Exxon.

It's things like this that are scaring me away from Apple. Apple: I'd love to try to develop an app for the app store, but I feel like you'll randomly reject an app I put hours into, and you'll turn around and approve the next porn sharing app. If/when I get into programming, I'm probably looking at Android. It's not moderated so harshly.

Amazing that useful stuff like this gets rejected, but you can freely download a GPS based weed-finder, a porn app, and a coke-sniffing simulator. For a while you could even download a baby-shaking app! Gotta love Crapple- allowing you to do pointless shit with your iPhone but nothing truly useful :)

With every iPhone story I read on here, I love my HTC Touch Pro all the more. I can use my Google Voice account with it, and I don't even NEED an app to do it.

Windows Mobile = Freedom.
Iphone = Communism.

esquire, do you not feel this is paramount to microsoft limiting who and what you may view and use with their browser, including which apps you may utilize?

I feel if one buys a product it should now be theirs to do with as they wish as long as it does not mean tearing it apart to make the same item and sell it as their own invention.

Corporations need to realize WE are the ones keeping them in business not their stock holders. WE deserve rights also.

@Coles_Law:

Answer- anything truly useful, anything that's not as profitable as they'd like, and anything that allows you to use your iPhone in any way that THEY don't like.

@supercereal: You should have mentioned "censorship" too. They're censoring Google -- in the same way my freedom of speech is abridged when I'm told I can't duplicate and sell bootleg movies I download off the Internet.

@gaywolverine: But why shouldn't Apple have a right to reject any app it wants since it, you know, runs and manages the app store. It's the same thing as consumerist deciding what articles make this site. They control the site, they control what goes on it.

Apple shouldn't have to justify their denials to anyone, they are entitled to such control.

However collusion with AT&T is another matter entirely. But don't worry, I'm sure Steve Jobs and Co. will pay off the right people and make this all go away.

why would the FCC care what AT&T and Apple do? They're not breaking any violations as far as airwaves or swearing.

what magical function does the FCC think it has over an Iphone app?

I don't think it was "fair" what Apple did but that's their business decision.

There is no violation here, way too much government in my business.

How about they focus on why text messages have increased instead of decreased?

Or fix our damn health care system?

Or regulate or Federal Reserve system.

@supercereal: You had me at "option". It's true--if you don't like what a business is selling, don't buy it! I vote with my dollars all the time, and I encourage others to do the same.

I think what draws my ire, and that of most, is not how much they charge (at&t, verizon, et al), but how they charge it.

First, you have voice minutes. Choose wisely, because if we don't pick a plan with enough minutes, they will sock us. But, if we choose a plan with too many minutes, they don't let us return them, either. (In the interest of fairness, at&t does offer rollover.)

Second, we have all the add-ons and extras. Send texts? Add on a package or else they're .20 apiece ($1300 per MB!). Data? Add on a package or else it's gonna cost us anywhere from $1.99 to $199 per MB.

Third, they don't even have the stones to tell us to our faces that they are really charging us more than we thought. Federal Universal Service Charge is a euphemism for another word: profit. It's not a tax. It's corporate recovery (read: money grab) of fees they are charged by the government. But, instead of saying that our plan costs 111.33, they say it costs 99.99 with a 11.34% fee.

Fourth, when we decide that we don't like the service anymore or aren't getting the value we thought we were, we still have up to two years suckling their teat until they let us go.

No other type of business makes us decide up front how much we plan to consume without letting us take home the leftovers. And, no other type of business penalizes us for not buying enough up front! And, no other business charges us for not buying their crap if we believe their crap no value.

And, that's only half the reason why people hate the carriers.

The other half is that once we buy the equipment and pay the fees, we endure endless disappointment in the things that are disabled, hobbled and frowned-upon. Using your own ring tone should be a simple task, except that it's disabled by a carrier that wants the revenue from the tone sale (again, Verizon, I'm looking squarely at you!).

I could go on ad nauseum. And, I really want to! But you get the point.

I have no love loss for an industry so bent on extracting every single dollar from its clientele. And they wonder why there is so much churn.

Hmm would it be ok for Microsoft to dictate what software could run on its OS? Apple has clearly stated the iphone is not a phone its a computer that happens to make phone calls. Restricting apps on it is no different than if microsoft were to do an update to disable firefox.

@zacox: My last 3 verizon phones, I circumvented the "you only get ringtones from us" feature. Ah the wonders of the internet. I love the fact my BB asks me if I want to use every sound as a ringtone.

I'm confused as to how this is any different than, say, Walmart or Target making the decision on what products they want to carry in their stores. No one has a *right* to sell something in someone else's store.

I'm also quite concerned with the FCC's blatant overreach of power here. Who do they think they are, the Federal Reserve?

@jayphat: Oh, I never said it wasn't possible! In fact, there's a whole sector of the interwebs devoted to modifying your handset so you can get what you want out of it. Getting back to the original topic, I suspect jailbroken iPhones can use Google voice all day every day.

Its unfortunate that only 2 out of every 100 people know that they don't have to bend over for Verizon, Apple, at&t, etc, and can install new ROMs and seem edit, and re-enable functionality that they paid for.

voip will eventually destroy the phone companies... this is inevitable.

why should AT&T help speed the process along?

@Radi0logy:

I like to eat apples.

Actually there are laws that tell Walmart and Target what they can sell. There are laws against anti competitive behavior. While in most cases those laws dont dictate what products they have to carry if they push it too far an an anti competitive way. They would get a letter from the DoJ.

@kabuk1: I don't see what Apple's control over the iPhone has to do with communism -- fascism seems the better parallel. I wouldn't call Windows Mobile absolute freedom, either -- at least, not compared with an unlocked Android phone (where you-the-user can go as far as to build and install your own firmware at will); it's somewhere between the two poles.