Apple has banned a game that depicts the working conditions and suicides related to Foxconn

[The Straight Story]

Apple Bans Foxconn iPhone App

Apple has banned a game that depicts the working conditions and suicides related to Foxconn.


It should come as no surprise that Apple's tight approval process allowed a game depicting Foxconn working conditions and the increasing number of suicides to appear on the App Store for just four days. What is surprising is that the app actually went live on Apple's platform in the first place, thus proving that -- as we've seen time and time again -- the approval process isn't exactly perfect.

According to the product description, Phone Story is a game for iOS and Android-based devices that "attempts to provoke a critical reflection on its own technological platform. Under the shiny surface of our electronic gadgets, behind its polished interface, hides the product of a troubling supply chain that stretches across the globe. Phone Story represents this process with four educational games (Coltan, Suicides, Obsolescence and eWaste) that make the player symbolically complicit in coltan extraction in Congo, outsourced labor in China, e-waste in Pakistan and gadget consumerism in the West."

Apple claims that the app was pulled because it violated four rules for iOS app creation: depictions of child abuse (code 15.2), objectionable or crude content (16.1) and promises to turn over a portion of the money to charity (21.1 and 21.2). According to the developer, 70-percent of the app revenue will pay the bills and salaries. The other 30-percent will supposedly be redirected to organizations that are fighting corporate abuses. Festivals and art institutions that are interested in exhibiting the game are asked to contribute to the cause instead of paying artist fees.

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Phone-Story-App-Store-iOS-Foxconn-Suicides,news-12616.html

[Broderick]

1. Iphone 37 or whatever is coming out next month

according to a board member.

[msongs]

2. gotta keep those slaves working to jack up Steve Job's portfolio nt

[Bladian]

6. Yep, keep talking trash on a dying man. nt

[OhioChick]

7. Jobs is no saint....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=1810665#1811156

[Broderick]

10. Al is on the board

and announced like a premature ejaculation a new iphone coming out in October. I can't do Al anymore. Making a living on slave wages and he never knows when to control his fucking mouth.

[OhioChick]

4. Iphone 37...

:rofl:

[DJ13]

3. The developers should port it over to Windows

That would get back at Apple.

[MADem]

5. Apple--overpriced crapola; phones that don't work! nt

[Tesha]

11. Ever owned an iPhone? Or do you just repeat what you've heard? (NT)

[MADem]

12. I know that a relative of mine, who owned one, used to borrow my

crap-ass butt-of-many-jokes TRACFONE constantly because his shitty phone wouldn't get a signal. The TRACFONE works in Spain, in San Juan,PR, in California, in Canada, pretty much anywhere. Since I don't spend my life yapping on a cellphone, it's more than enough for my purposes, and I just buy a card every year and be done with it. Works out to something like twelve bucks a month, if that. At the end of the year, I still have a ton of credits, and the phone will still work in London or Rome, which is perfect for my needs. My relative dumped the iPhone finally. Went with SPRINT, I think.

[BrendaBrick]

8. "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs"

Mike Daisey, Performer and Monologist on C-SPAN with Brian Lamb 4-15-2011:

In part, Steve Wozniak wept and said he was changed after he saw this live performance:

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/299080-1

Worth the watch!

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

9. I was fed up with apple long ago so I chose a Google Android phone.