Publishers Fight Apple Over Striptease iPhone App

The Guardian is reporting that Apple has requested for German publisher Springer to censor one of its iPhone apps which allows iPhone users to "undress" a model. The "Shake the Bild Girl" app features a girl dressed in a winter parka, jeans and a scarf -- each time you shake your phone, she sheds a layer until, voila, there's a nude girl on your phone. In keeping with Apple's "no nipples" policy, the company has requested that the girls in the app keep their bikinis on.

The Association of German Magazine Publishers (VDZ) has asked the International Federation of the Periodical Press to issue a complaint with Apple over their request to Springer -- as the VDZ CEO put it, "Today they censor nipples, tomorrow editorial content."

Apple has long banned "adult-only content" from iPhone app stores, but the company has been remarkably inconsistent about applying the rules. In February, without warning, Apple removed 5,000 sexually suggestive apps from the App Store, including apps that featured only bikinis or lingerie and no nudity. Not included in the purge: Playboy and Sports Illustrated's swimsuit apps. Meanwhile, lesser-known developers' salacious creations got pulled.

For users who cannot live without naked women on their phones, their best bet may be Google's Android phone, whose open platform enables companies to operate outside the official Android Market. One company, MiKandi has actually launched the first mobile store for porn -- details here.

Comments

[loofa]

09:24 PM on 03/13/2010

1. apple can make whatever rules they want; it's not censorship, it's THEIR product!
2. all you people saying the girl in the picture is too skinny; get over it. if she was plump you would call her too fat. this whole idea that there is one perfect weight for women is ridiculous.
3. what up with no sexuality, but guns are okay? sorry apple, that is sad. you have the right to make the rules on your product, but your ethics strike me as skewed.

[Don A]

02:29 PM on 03/12/2010

I opt out of seeing this one strip as well. No moral messages in my decision; she just doesn't warrant a peek, naked or clothed. :-)

[MARYHOBE]

05:01 PM on 03/11/2010

Censoring is somebody deciding what I can / cannot see or hear. I do not like this at all. And I do not by what I don't like. Maybe when it will be time to upgrade my cell phone I'll go with the manufacturer who treats me like an adult.

[Identity Free]

09:28 AM on 03/11/2010

Apple says Guns and Violence is ok
http://www.pcworld.com/article/168766/iphone_gun_apps_have_a_blast.html
but nude woman and nipples are bad....
This country is sooo twisted.
We are all born naked!!

[StupidPeopleSuck]

09:21 AM on 03/11/2010

The woman in the photo is so pitifully thin who would want to watch who strip? She looks like a little boy with a wig.

[jetscan]

07:51 AM on 03/11/2010

Addendum to my earlier comment.

We Europeans feel sad for the overweight/obese Americans calling others skinny and anorexic. Wow, you guys REALLY NEED Health care reform. I guess most Americans also need more dietpills and stupid gadgets from the teleshopping channels. Your view of of biology is extremely distorted.

Biology 101: do a search on ectomorph, mesomorph and endomorph.

[jetscan]

08:57 AM on 03/11/2010

Oops, typo. Meant to say "...feel sorry for..."

[jetscan]

07:28 AM on 03/11/2010

No problem over here. If I want to watch porn, I don't want to watch it on a stupid little display. Next thing people are going to complain about is not being able to watch porn on their navigation system in their car, or during air travel.

Hey, it's Apple's platform and they set the rules. They will "get it" right eventually :-))

[ResearchGirl]

05:04 AM on 03/11/2010

Apple won't lose more customers than it will gain; they make a good product, and they're appealing to the large number of people who think the social environment is pornulated enough, and who also think that the definition of "female" as equivalent at all times to "For Sex" is an outdated and outmoded way of life. Germany, overall, has no trouble with the evil of trafficked women being covered up by their legal brothel system, because they're quite happy to live with the classification of women as a subcategory iof goods-for-sale. The Bild Stripper is part and parcel of the same attitude.

Good for Apple. It's a start.

[NoMoreHeroes]

05:12 AM on 03/11/2010

Yes, because porn is only about victimizing women and clearly all porn is as bad as sex trafficking.

Keep your gross sexual deprivation kinks out of this argument, please.

[ResearchGirl]

10:36 AM on 03/11/2010

Dear me; we were all discussing a picture of a woman, and you think that my contribution to the discussion, restricting myself to the issue of women in pornography and the source of this particular app is a form of .. "gross sexual deprivation kink" ?

What?

i think you like pictures because you don't read very well.

[CaliRN]

04:50 AM on 03/11/2010

Yikes! She can has cheezburger?

[HonestJohnnis]

03:48 AM on 03/11/2010

I don't get why so many people try to say if someone is skinny they must be anorexic... Some of us are just born this way. I'm sorry if that upsets you and quit telling us we need to eat more.

[jetscan]

07:43 AM on 03/11/2010

Well said.

[NoMoreHeroes]

01:27 PM on 03/11/2010

Ditto. Skinny people, unite! :]

[Rynox]

12:25 AM on 03/11/2010

"For users who can not live without naked women on their phone..."

Don't judge me, hp. =)

[skinnytod]

12:07 AM on 03/11/2010

More HuffPorn chum

[AntiRethuglican]

11:34 PM on 03/10/2010

This woman looks seriously underweight~

[Rynox]

12:26 AM on 03/11/2010

Skinny girls need love, too. But yeah, seriously, I agree.

[billshut]

01:01 AM on 03/11/2010

Hey, it's an iPhone ... they can only be so big.

Let the big girls have the iPad.

[rosepierre]

11:32 PM on 03/10/2010

The model on the pic shown for this story looks like she has the body of a teenage boy. But I guess if they're making her keep her clothes on we'll never know for sure.

[inthedesert]

10:23 PM on 03/10/2010

OMG..I think I am going to hurl.