The Guardian’s Apps Blog reports that a growing number of non-US-based app developers are withdrawing their applications from the US versions of Apple’s App Store and Google’s Android Market for fear of patent litigation from companies such as Lodsys, the patent troll who has filed a number of suits against app developers. The article covers developers such as Scottish developer Fraser Speirs, who removed his products from US app stores and tweeted, “Screw you, Lodsys.” The growth of patent lawsuits over apps raises serious issues for all the emerging smartphone platforms, because none of the...

The Los Angeles Times has a feature on a new company called GENWI that offers point-and-click app development for a monthly fee—essentially you add template parts, insert your own content, and hit publish (although it's a little more complicated than that since you still have to deal with Apple's approval process and fees). It reminded me of Red Foundry, a cheaper service that's been around a little longer and offers pretty much the same thing. I think they're interesting solutions to the challenge of dedicated app development. Although both companies aim to help you produce a wide variety of apps for...

App store patent troll Lodsys (which has insisted app developers need to license in-app purchase technology from it despite being told by Apple that developers were covered in Apple’s own agreement with Lodsys) has filed more lawsuits against a number of developers and companies, including six companies (most notably, The New York Times Company) that had already filed preemptive declaratory judgment actions against Lodsys. It is seeking to have their declaratory judgment actions dismissed, and to have all cases involving Lodsys relocated to the troll-friendly courts of east Texas. It’s probably going to be a while before anything...

As a condition for selling in-app content, such as e-books, Apple requires developers to use its in-app purchase technology. As I reported a couple of weeks ago, developers have begun to receive threatening letters from Lodsys, a company that owns a patent on that technology. It turns out that Apple actually has licensed the technology from Lodsys for its own uses—but the license does not transfer to developers using it, who have to make their own licensing arrangements. Lodsys wants a bit over half a percent of any in-app purchase revenue until the patent expires, which isn’t really large...

As if the controversy surrounding Apple’s mandatory in-app purchase clause was not troubling enough, now independent developers who use Apple’s in-app purchase system are starting to be hit by lawsuit threats from a patent troll who claims to have patented the in-app purchase process. The developer of the iOS scientific calculator app pCalc recently received a patent-infringement lawsuit notice via FedEx, and a number of other developers are getting hit as well. The patent troll in question is a company called Lodsys. It’s not clear why they’re starting with small-time developers rather than big users (or potentially big users)...

Yesterday I mentioned an open letter from frustrated would-be PlayBook developer Jamie Murai concerning all the problems he encountered trying to register for and use the development tools for the Blackberry PlayBook tablet. He ended up throwing up his hands and giving up in disgust. Today, Tyler Lessard, the head of RIM’s BlackBerry Developer Relations and Developer Programs team responded on the Inside BlackBerry Developer’s Blog. Jamie’s posting on Friday raised a number of challenges that he faced while getting started with development for the BlackBerry PlayBook and while registering to become a BlackBerry...

Over the last couple of years, plenty of people in the publishing industry have been exercised by the Kindle—in the less-commonly-used sense of the word that means “occupy the thoughts of; worry or perplex.” But now CNet reports on a Kindle application by which Kindle-owners can get “exercised” in another way—a $1.99 workout app called Anywhere Abs. While the Kindle is not and will probably never be as versatile as the iPhone or iPad, app such as this nonetheless demonstrate that it is becoming a worthwhile platform for which to develop apps. And any additional usefulness in addition to...

On Thursday, Folio posted a piece about the tight control Apple keeps (or at least tries to) over what goes into its app store. Some of it was already well known, such as Apple’s rejection of third-party development environments which caused Wired and Adobe to have to create a separate iPad version of the Wired magazine app. But particularly interesting was this bit about Sports Illustrated: More recently, a source told FOLIO: that Sports Illustrated was forced to withdraw its subscription model for an iPad app, even though the magazine felt like it was following...

Taking advantage of the zero-marginal-cost nature of electronic media distribution, a group of independent computer game developers has teamed up to offer the “Humble Indie Bundle”, a bundle of five games (including the award-winning World of Goo) for Windows, Macintosh, or Linux as a set-your-own-price download. Purchasers can choose how much of their purchase contribution they want to go to the games’ developers and how much to go to the non-profits Child’s Play and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The default is to split it fifty-fifty, but if purchasers want it all to go to the developers, or...

I wasn’t sure whether to cover this story, given that it does not seem to have a great deal to do with e-books on the face of it. But on the other hand, it relates to the viability of developing for the iPhone and iPad as a whole, and e-book applications (both reader apps and stand-alone encapsulated appbooks) have to be developed just like anything else. Apple’s OS 4.0 SDK includes a new license agreement—new terms that developers must abide by. And one of these terms is a prohibition on “applications that link to Documented APIs through an...