Pulse Booted From App Store
Kara Swisher (via Dave Winer):
Kothari said that the pair plan to contact Apple in the morning and take [steps] to remove Times material out of the feeds.
It is not immediately clear why they need to, since Pulse draws from publicly available Times RSS feeds as many other apps do and does no scraping.
In fact, Pulse is little more than a really well-designed RSS reader, which is what the Times said it was in its write-up. You add feeds to it and it visualizes them in a way that’s easy to get through.
The app had been featured in Steve Jobs’ WWDC keynote and praised by the Times itself.
Update: Jason Snell reports that it’s back in the store.
The "whims" in this particular case put Apple in position to sell more News through the AppStore, and put Apple in position to make the case to the print content providers that Apple is a good business partner for them to have.
The short-term strategic value to Cupertino of a whimsical AppStoreReviewMonster is invaluable.
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Tangentially, this is why I continue to think it likely there'll never be a Verizon iPhone, given that both Apple's and VZW's core corporate aim is be the total vendor to the user.
And since it's about control rather than mere money, it's not like they can just make a compromise and split the revenues. VZW is determined not to be a "just a pipe", and Apple iOS is determined not to be a "just an OS". They both want to be the vendor with the ability to make a Pulse-booting decision in order to further their larger individual goals.