So it’s December 2nd and we have this great idea to publish an app that plays different Holiday songs. These are songs with no lyrics, just instrumental. I was looking for something quick and easy so I decided to use the unsupported Celestial media framework to playback the audio files. Now, this is likely the decision that caused all this but without feedback from Apple, I’ll never know for sure. I submitted the application to Apple for approval on December 2nd thinking that since all my other apps had been getting approved in less than 3-5 days, we would still have plenty of face time in iTunes prior to the end of the Holiday season. Much to my dismay, still no approval after 1 week. So I call up Apple and mention the fact that this is a seasonal app and if there was any way they could expedite the approval process I would be very grateful. I also decided at this point, after several discussions with other iPhone dev’s, that maybe the Celestial framework wasn’t a good move so I began to rewrite the playback using the “approved” audio framework. Later that day, I rejected the “Celestial” binary and uploaded a new binary. Now, having done that, I’m assuming that I drop back to the bottom of the queue and have to wait another 3-5 days for approval. Still no feedback from Apple and it’s now December 10th. I patiently wait another 5 days with still no approval or feedback. Now I’m getting a little impatient thinking that the licensing I paid for the music is slowly eating into my potential profits. So I decide to rename the app Holiday Tunez Now (like the hint) and publish it as a seperate application. The thought here was that maybe I tainted the Holiday Tunez app by using the Celestial framework and it now has the big red flag on it so publishing it under a different name as a different app seemed logical.
Well, it’s now February 19th and neither the Holiday Tunez or Holiday Tunez Now apps have been approved by Apple. They are both still sitting in a Review status. I have called Apple at least 6 different times asking for feedback and to this day have yet to receive a single email/call as to why these have not been approved. Now there is a lot of speculation around these apps as to why they might not be getting approved but without any feedback, I have no idea. My only hope is that someday, prior to December of 2009, one of these will get approved, then maybe I can recoup some of my expenses. I’m not alone in all this, I have talked to several other iPhone developers who have had their apps sitting in review for extended periods of time as well with no feedback. Maybe Apple will change this process in the future, until then, speculate away!