Comments on: Apple settles lawsuit over apps aimed at kids — will pay $5 iTunes credit or cash

By: C. Hays

C. Hays — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 10:59:42 +0000

Apple is still endorsing this unethical business practice. Before I read a little about this I had sent a complaint about unauthorized charges and as of today they have not responded to the company’s “bad business” practice.

By: ChristiaanHoogerwerf

ChristiaanHoogerwerf — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 14:33:34 +0000

Maybe my story can help a little to make the nuances. I am a parent of two children and, having finished Technical University, you can’t call me ‘stupid’. Two years ago I bought an iPod for my son and made an account on iTunes. To make it work it was obliged to attach it to my creditcard. And yes I put a password on it and NO, my children didn’t know my password. But on these iPods, at that time, you needed to login on iTunes to do updates. And after the update, your are logged in for about an hour. But it’s not mentioned. And at that time I didn’t know about the existence of in-Apps. My son played a smurf-game and you can collect berries with that game. But you can buy them as well with an in-App. And of course he ordered a ‘Wagon full of berries’ for €80,- ($100,-) and ordered some more bags of berries for a total of €16,-. In the evening I got a mail from iTunes and i was shocked, because I didn’t know what happened and I didn’t know if it was a single purchase or was it a monthly fee? I tried to find out from which game and noticed that at this Smurf-game the berries you can gain (for free) look very much like the ones you have to pay for by this in-App. The price of the in-apps is in bright -happy colors and the icon for ‘€’ is not very obvious. I can understand that games cannot be ‘for free’ always, but offering the game for free and steel the money with these kinds of numbers, I think it is criminal: 80€ for imaginary berries. I was lucky that he didn’t order 5 times in a row for €80. And trying to complain doesn’t work. I couldn’t use the application form on iTunes nor Apples website! It was simply not working. That is my story.
Christiaan (The Netherlands)

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 15:05:43 +0000

I’d rather see parents take responsibility for their own actions rather than find someone else to blame. I and other parents I know don’t have this problem despite letting their kids use their iOS devices all of the time for years.

Apple fell on their sword here to stem bad PR.

One parent I know just ties their kids iOS device to a pre-paid gift card. The worst that could happen is the kid maxes out the $10 pre-paid card.

By: snappy-anon-user-cant-read

snappy-anon-user-cant-read — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 06:01:35 +0000

Sarcasm. Google it.

By: Colin Campbell

Colin Campbell — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 10:31:12 +0000

Yep you’re right. I have two kids (5 & 11) who both have iPods, I have an iPad2 and my wife has an iPhone 4gs. There is an option to password protect app purchases and to switch off in App purchases under the restrictions settings.

The thing is, not all parents are technically minded to know to switch on these restriction settings and they aren’t savy to the bait apps.

I don’t think it’s stupidity as such, but is certainly ignorance to current app practices and options open to them.

If parents applied a little common sense this might never have happened, however “the thing about common sense is, it’s not that common” that’s why we have lawsuits such as these.

By: guest

guest — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 20:10:10 +0000

$900?? Don’t worry Apple may or may not send you a gift card to compensate you by giving you a chance to spend even more money.

By: Phil

Phil — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 19:53:01 +0000

Unfortunately, this is the model that Apple wants for apps. It’s by no means limited to bait and switch apps. It’s the model that Apple encourages for apps now, and is why they are more frequently featured.

I’ve developed over a iOS hundred apps and three games. If you’re launching a game for kids using an in-app purchase model and virtual currency is almost a must-have if you want Apple to display your app in a feature or app collection. It is clearly the preferred pricing model as it has such tremendous revenue potential. Personally, I don’t like it, as all three of my kids have made in-app purchases.

If you’re not in one of those app placements, your app is lost to the abyss, buried behind one of the worst content search engines in use today.

By: Olly Be

Olly Be — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 18:11:35 +0000

am pretty sure apple have the option to turn off in app purchases plus its the parent responsibility to keep the password away from the child its just common sense, i know with android if u dont set a pin anyone can buy anything from the play store without a password however with apple u need a password to buy stuff so how can the parent blame apple for their stupidity giving their kids the password

By: EricisDumb

EricisDumb — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 17:33:04 +0000

Oh my gosh. Be a parent, will you? You bought your son an iPad [dumb], then you attach your credit card to HIS account [dumb], and then you dont turn off in app purchases, [DUMB] and then you dont watch what he is doing for several hours, while on the internet on a tablet [dumb]

By: Eric

Eric — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 16:14:49 +0000

I bought my son a iPad, created a iTunes account for them and added my credit card to the account. After a few hours he had made 1000 in In App purchases without my permission.

How could Apple allow this to happen :-p

It’s called personal responsibility people. Only in America would people expect to be compensated for their own stupidity.