Apple on Thursday announced to its developer community some changes to make the App Store experience better for customers. Starting on September 7, Apple is instituting two suggestions made by its developer community.
Quality apps
First, Apple will perform a bit of quality control of the apps already in the App Store. An app will be removed from the App Store if the company deems it “problematic” and “abandoned” after an evaluation process and contacting the developer, who has 30 days to update the app to keep it in the App Store.
Apple will remove apps that crash when launching, though the company’s documentation doesn’t state what devices are being used to test this.
Users who have an app that has been removed from the App Store can still use the app and make in-app purchases. It just won’t be available for new users to buy.
Shorter app names
Starting on Sept. 7, app names will be limited to 50 characters. This is to stop the practice of creating long app names in order to influence search results. According to Apple, “These long names are not fully displayed on the App Store and provide no user value.” Apple actually recommends that app names be 23 characters so the name is seen properly on each iOS device.
Why this matters: Apple likes to boast that its App Store has over 2 million apps. At first, that sounds great; who doesn’t want a wide selection of products when you’re shopping? On the other hand, when is a wide selection too wide? Perhaps at 2 million? For customers browsing the App Store, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by the selection, and with so many apps, it can be difficult to make a decision. Hopefully, these changes will make it easier to find the app you need.
Author: Roman Loyola, Senior Editor
Roman has covered technology since the early 1990s. His career started at MacUser, and he's worked for MacAddict, Mac|Life, and TechTV.