drinkypoo's Journal: Apple, Lugaru

This is the content of a comment which I should have made earlier. Here it is for posterior.

Apple's app store policies require that you hold copyright and their submission process states that they will check your software to see if it conforms to their policies. Since they already passed the valid app through from another distributor and the license was provided in the original submission they clearly had the knowledge and the opportunity to recognize that one of the submissions, either the original or the subsequent one, was invalid. This is proof that they are not performing any such test; they have not done their due diligence specifically because they have in their possession every piece of data to know that they were subsequently publishing copyrighted material in violation of copyright. Since they claim that their review process exists to catch violations of their terms, and any half-competent idiot with their resources and information would have caught this if they spent any effort on it at all, Apple is potentially in breach of contract with anyone who has accepted the terms of their app store; they have promised to subject applications to review which would have prevented them from carrying out this act. Further, since they are knowingly and willfully distributing this material in violation of copyright (they have both been informed, and allegedly have verified that the "author" of the app they approved owned the copyright on the material in question) then they are clearly aiding and abetting criminal copyright infringement.

This is precisely the type of logic that Apple lawyers would apply to anyone else who was willfully redistributing Apple's copyrighted content after it was submitted to someone else's App store. Why, pray tell, should we not apply it to them? They have made a public promise in a legal document to verify that applications will be checked to ensure that they meet Apple's requirements. They would like us to be bound by every shrink-Wrap EULA that crosses our path. They have put forward a contract to which developers must agree before they may submit software for inclusion in the app store. A contract is not valid under US law unless it grants something to all involved parties. Why is Apple not liable for violation of this contract? Why is Apple, who clearly has the resources to meet the terms of this contract and to verify copyright not to be held accountable for willfully aiding and abetting criminal copyright infringement? Corporations would like to have the rights of people; why should we expect them to meet the same responsibilities, such as meeting the terms of contracts into which they have knowingly entered?