The horror of developing apps for the iPhone

There’s even the ultimate humiliation of your App going into “infinite review”, a process whereby it isn’t rejected, but merely remains flagged as under consideration for all eternity. This war of attrition can continue for several months until you either withdraw your App, Apple changes its mind or you give up and become a landscape gardener.

Incredibly, it took only ten days for the App Store border police to check my ID, stamp my passport and wave me through the checkpoint into the land of acceptance. That’s significantly less than the stated current queuing time of two weeks; either I got lucky, or Apple is genuinely listening to its critics.

Strong competition

And so, with only days until my App goes on sale, I turn to the very last stage of the process: marketing. In a rash moment of over-confidence, I contact a local printers and order 250 promotional fridge magnets, intending to blitz the media with glossy kitchen-based gifts. I had always imagined that the promotion would be the fun part. Unfortunately, I soon discover that there is now one rather large obstacle in my path.

Back in July 2008, when my friend first suggested this project, there were just 552 apps available. Now, incredibly, there are more than 100,000. In just over 18 months. Clearly a lot of canny developers saw the same opportunity that I did and, as a result, many people are now saying that the App Store has reached saturation point.

My heart sinks. Marketing my game in any impactful way now seems a hopeless prospect, especially when I realise I’m now up against big players such as Electronic Arts and Rockstar; even a Grand Theft Auto iPhone is in the works. Moreover, it’s too late to cancel the fridge magnets, so I’ll either be giving them away as Christmas presents forever, or I’ll have to invest in the world’s largest Smeg.

Through gritted teeth, I relate all this to my friend Matt, the very same person who suggested that I write the game in the first place. He remarks that just because there are so many Apps out there, it doesn’t mean that they’re actually worthwhile. A quick search on the App Store lends some weight to his theory; not far below the slickest top-line products are countless shoddy-looking efforts, including the inevitable Pull My Finger and dozens of other ‘fart apps’.