It's a matter of perspective. In their eyes, they are being incredibly generous with that deal.
(Just to be clear: It's not that I think they are not important, it's what I perceive as their attitude when things like this happen)
https://www.statista.com/statistics/263401/global-apple-ipho...
You can fix an app if the platform changes, but you can't put an app on a platform if the platform won't let you.
That said, it's not always that way with them, and I suspect Apple is similar. We always hear about the rough encounters, but few people write about "I just had this issue, and it got cleared up immediately. The end."
With a free Apple developer account you can build an app via Xcode onto your device. These will only be signed for 90 days, but it's something.
Google does the same thing when they kill your AdSense account for "invalid click activity" right before you're about to get a big payout. Amazon does the same thing with Amazon Payments. No explanation, no recourse. Infuriating.
For instance, I went through quite a Kafka-esque nightmare just a few months ago. Something got messed up with our order software so that when we shipped something it wasn't marked as shipped and the tracking info was not uploaded to Amazon for a few days during a busy season. Customers weren't complaining since they were getting their stuff. Amazon sent a warning that our late shipment rate was too high just an hour or so before they sent an notification saying we lost selling privileges. I immediately figured out what went wrong. I got the order software working right again, and I manually marked all the "unshipped"-but-actually-shipped orders as shipped and added the tracking. I wrote to Seller Performance about this, exactly as they instruct you to. I explained what happened, showed them how I fixed it, and explained how we'd ensure it didn't happen again. Their response was simply that our late shipment rate was too high and that my account was suspended as a result. I sent the same info I had sent, and this time included full tracking info for all of the affected orders (and by this time most of them had already been delivered). I received the same response as before. I tried doing their "Contact Us" methods, but no one would respond to my messages or talk to me on the phone, since the account was suspended. All anyone would say is that I need to contact Seller Performance to attempt to get back on. Finally, after several emails to Seller Performance about this, where I basically explained the situation and how I fixed it and how all the supposedly-unshipped orders were actually fine or already delivered, but just phrasing it slightly differently each time, I was unceremoniously let back on, more than a week later. I asked very politely why it took me so many attempts to get back on, even though I just told them the same thing each time, and they said they could not discuss it, and that I may have my account suspended (!) if I contacted them again about this.
So maybe you've had an experience having your account suspended on Amazon that went smoothly, but that's definitely not how it always is.
i'm just guessing here.
After getting frustrated with the absurdity of that situation, I contacted support and they said it was a mistake and they reset my account and to try again. I did. Same errors. Then support told me that if I didn't submit ID documents within a certain number of days, my account would be permanently closed. I responded saying I had been trying to do so repeatedly over multiple periods of time and constantly got locked out and prevented from continuing every time I tried. No reply. Then a final announcement my account was permanently banned.
In the year since, I've contacted them sporadically trying to see if they've changed their policy or will reconsider, and just get blanket statements about my account being closed and nothing they can do. The last time I did this, they got fairly aggressive and said they could not and would not be reinstating my account, would not tell me why, and would not respond to any further inquiries from me.
And we still continue to use their service lika a b*ch we are :( They have no incentive to change, because no one else cares.
Which is, in and of itself, a problem.
It's understandable that the information might not be immediately on hand, but then the correct response would be to direct the caller to someone who can help. Otherwise, yes, it does come off as a big "fuck you".
There really is no analogue to the relationship Apple has with iOS developers except perhaps, "Extremely bad contracting relationship." Apple has a lock on the perception that you need to publish on their platform to be serious about mobile dev. As such, they don't need to treat developers well unless there are very large corporate relationships to maintain (and while I assure you such things are in play, sadly I'd be in very big trouble for getting into specifics on any of them).
Apple's model is to convince developers that they're obligated to prop Apple's platform. It is not the stunning core iOS experience that drives people to the platform, nor the beautiful default app toolkit. It's the sweat and prowess of its developer community, and yet the power of the relationship is completely inverted.
While Google can be a faceless cancelmachine, my experience shipping a few apps now is that Google is actually really responsive once you get to the stage where you have a direct rep. Getting Apple to respond to my needs historically has been Game of Thrones level politics and a function of how connected our startup funding network was.
$100/year says you're wrong.
Any developer who thinks they are a "customer" in any meaningful sense of the word needs to re-read their click-thru contract with Apple. The concept of "customer" is distorted beyond belief here.
Not saying it is ok to do it. Just that business will always pick the cheapest option they can get away with - that is, that does not affect the bottom line.
And you deal with murderers by putting them in prison, which is equally irrelevant because the person in question is neither.
Saying something about some other company does not in any way justify the questionable actions.
Chocolate and Vanila, Male and Female, Apple and Google. All these things are binary, and are always inversely related to one another.
/s
I see no reason for them to, nor do I expect them to, provide me support for things like GMail, or Hangouts, or their search.
I wish I could pay for my browser, my email and my search...
Sure, we should add add a lot of names to this list: "Try contacting [Apple|Google|EBay|PayPal|AmazonAws|.*] about anything."
"I called them again and they said they can’t provide more information."
They terminate your account and then they even refuse to tell you why. A basic human thing, a chance to fix the issue, but no. Go f* yourself from Apple and that's it.