Over at Inside Catholic, Zoe Romanowsky shares an interesting story about Steve Jobs’ decision against allowing porn apps on Apple’s iPhone.
“So where should you go to get naked people on mobile phones? The Android. ‘Folks who want porn can buy and [sic] Android phone,’ says Jobs.
The message echoes an answer Steve Jobs gave to a similar question at the iPhone OS 4.0 debut.
He pointed out that Google’s far more lenient content restrictions means the Android marketplace has adult content, or as Jobs put it: ‘You know, there’s a porn store for Android. You can download nothing but porn.’
‘That’s a place we don’t want to go,’ Jobs said ‘so we’re not going to go there.’”
Some people seem to suspect that Jobs’ refusal to allow porn apps has more to do with his desire for power and control than any sense of morality.
To which I say ... who the heck cares why he’s doing it? Hooray for him doing it!
Other people are asking whether any internet device should be “allowed” to control users’ access to the internet.
To which I say ... you cannot seriously be suggesting that phone manufacturers have an obligation to provide customers with easy access to pornography.
Anyone who wants to access filth online using an iPhone can do it. Apple is only refusing to encourage it by allowing pornographic “apps” for its users.
To which I say ... Amen! And alleluia!
And now I feel the need to go give my droid phone a good talking to.
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I’ve never even heard of an Android phone. . . But, this makes me want to get an iPhone.
I agree with you Danielle… If we can get a win on this - even if it’s not a 100% win - we’ve got to take it. The perfect must not be the enemy of the good.
Ps. A droid?!? What could have possessed you? Do you ever use the slideout keypad or just the virtual one?
Fr. Ryan, I have a droid eris, which has only the virtual keypad. I think slide out keypads are clunky and silly. I love my eris for its Google-ness. It’s a good option for poor saps like me who live out in the boonies and can’t get AT&T service. Sigh ...
now if only they would get rid of their confession game app!
Hooray! This makes me proud to be an iPhone owner. I wonder what’s the best way to let Apple know we approve?
P.S. Google, which owns Android, has the unofficial corporate slogan “Don’t be evil” ... but it’s Apple that’s living up to that slogan today.
Steve Jobs is full of it. He knows full well that, unfortunately, anyone who wants porn on the iPhone can just open their browser. This is all marketing speak without substance.
The Apple store still approves the Playboy app along with Maxim and others. And they also have an uncensored web browser.
It’s a bad argument for Steve Jobs.
Also, Apple says no to political commentary in the same breadth. This is highly dangerous. They have censored the Dalai Lama from the China App store.
You guys need to stop using word porn. Therewas never porn on app store. There were pictures of women in bikinis. You misleadingly make it sound like jobs removed actual porn from App Store. And by the way, Apples’s standards do not apply to playboy or suicide girls because they are big brands. Porn at least requires nudity ( which has never been available in App Store). Stop misleading people to make your points
Lurch, I’m not sure you’re reading carefully enough. Porn, and Jobs’ refusal to allow it in the app marketplace, is precisely the point. Whatever changes may have taken place, no one is saying “Jobs took porn off the app store.” The story here is “Jobs won’t allow porn in the app store.”
Paolo, as bad as the lasciviousness and nudity of Playboy and Maxim are, real pornography, defined by the Catechism as “removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties,” especially in the extreme forms available online, is ever so much worse.
A porn store in the iPhone app marketplace would be a terrible thing for countless iPhone users, and we can be glad that Jobs hasn’t allowed it regardless what other avenues of sin are still open, or what compromises Apple (along with Google) have made with Chinese authorities (which isn’t even on topic ... we aren’t talking about canonizing Jobs, or even nominating him to high office).
Hi Steve,
While I agree that this is a step in the right direction, the App store has taken the road of censoring politics as well.
And if Steve Jobs was being truthful, pornography is allowed on the iPhone, you just need to open Safari. It is disingenuous to make people believe that somehow the iPhone censors pornography because it doesn’t.
Now if Jobs really wants to walk the walk, he should get Disney/ABC to clean up its act since he is the biggest shareholder.
Who really cares. I can’t believe people are writing about this.
Thanks Danielle for this story and Steve for your comments. Paolo, yes, political censorship is not our favorite pastime here in America, and I can see your point, but it is still a good thing to put limits on access to pornography. Speaking of limits and censorship- we can probably do without the tutorial from Ed on the site he mentioned above…
Jo, let me repeat what Lurch said.
There was never a time when iPhone allowed porn on its App store. What Apple has done was ban anything remotely sexual including bikinis except from high paying developers like Playboy and Maxim.
And there are no limits to porn access because of the web browser on the iPhone/iPad.
It’s just a ruse from Steve Jobs to make it seem like he has the moral high-ground, when he is just squelching smaller developers and anyone with “questionable” politics.
You can see porn for free on the I-phone and/or pay for it on the droid… Apple is being a huge hypocrite!!! Come back when you have censored your internet browser until then… big fat FAIL!!!
There’s something called ‘Parental Controls’ in MacOS X and iPhone OS, and it’s trivial to set it so that even if you don’t use web filtering like what’s available (for free!) in OpenDNS (www.opendns.com) you can still prevent porn sites from being accessed on the devices. May I suggest you learn to use the tools properly instead of blaming the manufacturer for deficiencies that have already been addressed through software settings?
Finally some good news about a large corperation!
Yet another reason I like Apple.
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