Apple’s still tops in smartphone smiles, Google’s chairman lodges a foot in his mouth yet again, and a satirical game gets the boot from the App Store. The remainders for Thursday, March 21, 2013 are on a losin’ streak.
2013 U.S. Wireless Smartphone Satisfaction Study—Volume 1 and 2013 U.S. Wireless Traditional Mobile Phone Satisfaction Study—Volume 1 (J.D. Power and Associates)
Shocking as it may seem, J.D. Power (and his merry band of Associates) have concluded once again—for the ninth time in a row—that Apple customers have the highest satisfaction in the smartphone industry. In second place … well, everybody else apparently. Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, and HTC are all within 5 points of each other. Oh, yeah, and BlackBerry is losing. Shocker.
Apple says there are no Google apps awaiting review in App Store (The Verge)
If you’ve been waiting, breath bated, for another installment of “Schmidt My Dad Says”—and boy is that reference dating itself—wait no longer! When asked during a talk this morning whether the Google Now virtual assistant was coming to iOS as rumored, Google chairman Eric Schmidt cryptically replied “you’ll need to discuss that with Apple,” and made comments about the App Store approval process. So, in a shocking move, The Verge asked Apple, which said no Google apps are in the review unit. Your move, Schmitty.
Sweatshop HD is the latest victim in Apple’s war on serious games (Pocket Gamer)
Apple has removed from the App Store an iOS game about life in a sweatshop, following similar removals for a strategy game based on the conflict in Syria and one title critiquing smartphone manufacturing. Don’t worry, though, because you can still get like 18 different versions of Angry Birds.
Author: Dan Moren, Contributor
Dan has been writing about all things Apple since 2006, when he first started contributing to the MacUser blog. He's a prolific podcaster and the author of the Galactic Cold War series, including his latest, The Nova Incident.