Everyone in that thread is suggesting he lawyer up, but the copycat is almost certainly in China so that’s a waste of time. The best he can hope for is to get it taken off the Play Store.
This is unfortunate, I do hope there is some recourse for him. I am curious, are there similar cases of this happening for the Android platform? Would there be another opportunity to plead his case before being banned?
Guy makes a bunch of spammy apps that clearly rip off third party trademarks, gets banned from Google Play. While I think this could have been handled better from Google's side (such as a way to let him post a new app in the future, with appropriate review, if he agreed to knock it off), I'm not sure what else you'd expect. He even acknowledges ripping off the app icons.
Oh, I'm not disagreeing with you in the least. Lawyering up may be the right thing to do, but going after a developer cloning apps for the in-app ad revenue isn't usually worth the effort. The original post had the distinct smell of chum around the edges, and thats what generated the harshess of my response, not your comment!
"We were in the middle of an especially tenacious individual who was fraudulently claiming we were using a name he did not have a TM on. As our lawyers were trying to solve the problem, we were shut down."
The title of the app uses a best-seller author and book name, and is in fact just the 52 "quotes" from the author.
Then, the real-user review shows that the app doesn't deliver even that:
"The latest update at first told me my licence was invalid, then when I wouldn't fill in my email address to get spam from mobifusion it would crash and exit."
It will be hard to proof this in court. But it should be easy to show, that they are not doing enough to prevent it, when even the popular apps have fake clones shown on top.
As a policy we don't submit our apps in any store other than Google Play Store for android as we believe in having one Android platform is beneficial for community (Including Amazon Store).
Take down notice? Where to send it? So Hire a lawyer in China to fight them? How long will that battle go on and are we too naive to assume we can fight Alibaba and win in China under their law?
I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app violates copyright laws and a bunch of other Google Play policies.
Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too.
If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats.
A direct replacement is still different than a “competing product” which implies is sold to customers. His product (the app) doesn’t compete with OpenAI. I guess a lawyer would need to chime in
It's good to raise awareness, especially on the users of the play store (I mean, the developers).
For example I learned a lot from this video: in case I decided to sell an app on any store, I'd better contact my lawyer to get advised on where and how to incorporate my company.
I don't know if it can be easily resolved by incorporating in another country, but the difficulties of an international litigation should discourage trolls.
The snes9x software that zong was distributing is largely under a custom license that only grants use for non-commercial purposes. Getting that re-licensed would be difficult due to the large number of devs. You can read more about that situation on the snes9x forums.
ZodTTD from his own statements had a trademark violation on one of Sony's marks. According to other developers he was committing license violations. Combining the two he's in violation of the android market terms that he agreed to. Any way you slice it the termination of his market account was well within Google's rights.
Here's part of the agreement for developers on the android market that applies to this situation:
7.2 Google Takedowns. While Google does not intend, and does not undertake, to monitor the Products or their content, if Google is notified by you or otherwise becomes aware and determines in its sole discretion that a Product or any portion thereof or your Brand Features; (a) violates the intellectual property rights or any other rights of any third party; (b) violates any applicable law or is subject to an injunction; (c) is pornographic, obscene or otherwise violates Google's hosting policies or other terms of service as may be updated by Google from time to time in its sole discretion; (d) is being distributed by you improperly; (e) may create liability for Google or Authorized Carriers; (f) is deemed by Google to have a virus or is deemed to be malware, spyware or have an adverse impact on Google's or an Authorized Carrier's network; (g) violates the terms of this Agreement or the Market Content Policy for Developers; or (h) the display of the Product is impacting the integrity of Google servers (i.e., users are unable to access such content or otherwise experience difficulty), Google may remove the Product from the Market or reclassify the Product at its sole discretion. Google reserves the right to suspend and/or bar any Developer from the Market at its sole discretion.
Google enters into distribution agreements with device manufacturers and Authorized Carriers to place the Market software client application for the Market on Devices. These distribution agreements may require the involuntary removal of Products in violation of the Device manufacturer's or Authorized Carrier's terms of service.
In the event that your Product is involuntarily removed because it is defective, malicious, infringes intellectual property rights of another person, defames, violates a third party's right of publicity or privacy, or does not comply with applicable law, and an end user purchased such Product within a year before the date of takedown,: (i) you must refund to Google, all amounts received, plus any associated fees (i.e. chargebacks and payment transaction fees), and (ii) Google may, at its sole discretion, withhold from your future sales the amount in subsection (i) above.
The author used other people's content, packaged them into an app, and then repeatedly submitted the same app (with one minor modification -- the use of someone else's content) to the Play store. 'Beta' apps or apps that you write for close friends/family can be distributed via other means than the main app market.
This article admits that he ignored all of the warnings he was given, and now accuses Google of unfair business practice. I don't buy it.
There's a lot of logical contortion going on to dump the blame for this back on Google. "The suspension email stated that I was trying to impersonate another company" is followed quickly by "Well since Google was silent about the exact reason for suspension..."; he even admits to intentionally ignoring the warnings he was given because "if I thought a human at Google was giving me the warning, I might have listened more carefully."
That is, at best, negligently poor reasoning. At worst, it's a contemptuous disrespect for the other party you're engaging in business with, which is pretty good grounds for them exercising their option to terminate that business relationship.
Google, Amazon, etc., are for-profit commercial service providers. If you're going to violate their policies, they will stop working with you, regardless of the impact on your business. Anyone who depends on a third party supplier for anything, in any business context, should keep that in mind -- they have no duty to you beyond whatever contract you have signed (if, of course, you have signed one).
Just reading the headline I couldn't tell if the poster was proud of having been included, or annoyed at piracy of his app. The name MacHeist actually suggests the latter, and their website only says they supply licenses -- not saying what they are doing is legal.
Now that the comments indicate everything is above board, I wonder if MacHeist plans on having an "Android Annex", or will leave that to another company...
It would be good to actually get a meaningful reply to respond to, instead of the downvotes.
The OP plainly claims they are using the name of a competitor's app in an above thread. And that simply doesn't jive with the agreed upon terms and conditions. If that is in fact what is occurring, the OP plainly has no legal recourse whatsoever.
How about proving me wrong instead of down-voting?
So using YouTube's API to use other people's content isn't using other people's content? I don't follow the logic there.
Yes, he was not banned simply because he used other people's content. He was banned because he was using other people's content to create low quality apps which (even if unintentionally) imitated official applications. Taking someone else's content and serving it up in a way that looks like it's official is just asking to be banned, especially when the thing you're imitating is YouTube and the app is on the Play store.
If someone is, for all intents and purposes, spamming your app store with imitation apps, why should you waste time giving them a "polite human touch"? If this had been a Chinese company rather than someone with a sob story would you still expect Google to offer a polite human touch?
I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app is actually quite illegal and also violates copyright laws and Google Play policies.
Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too.
If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats.
reply