[muhfuhkuh]

I think DF was right in its analysis: These changes are likely coming straight from Jobs. Perhaps it was Apple Legal dictating the rules and it just didn't seem "human" enough. Perhaps Jobs wanted to unify the left and right hand to know what both were doing. Maybe they're scared of the Probe.

Apple is showing here that it is one of the biggest small companies around. The wording in the App store review guidelines reads like something out of an up-and-coming Webapp startup run by a 20-something ne'er-do-well.

It's clear that Apple wants to get back to its "Designed by Apple in California" jeans and mock-turtleneck 'tude. The draconian rules and BS were antithetical to that. Hey, maybe the gyrating silhouettes will make their comeback to replace disembodied hands in their commercials.

[orangecat]

Agreed, I'm very impressed with the changes to both the content and tone. For me the annual charge to run my own code on my own hardware and the prohibition on non-appstore distribution are still dealbreakers, but this will undoubtedly keep many developers around who otherwise would have jumped ship. It will also allow more apps to be ported to and from iOS, which is beneficial for everyone.

[danilocampos]

Hey, don't knock the annual charge. If we have garbage in the App Store right now, imagine the crap we'd see if Apple removed that particular bozo filter.

Still, it would not be out of line for a developer account to permit the creation of only developer certificates/provisioning profiles, limited to five devices a year or something, to suit personal noodling not destined for the App Store.