Apple’s iOS devices had long had at least partial support for emoji, the picture characters popular originally in Japan, but rapidly gaining popularity around the world.
With iOS 6 bringing expanded emoji support, it appears that Apple is beginning to address the significant number of emoji apps in the App Store, sending out notices to developers informing them that their apps have been removed from the store because they are no longer useful given the built-in emoji support now available.
Apparently several developers have received such notices, and a number of others have mentioned on Twitter. The text of such a notice is as follows:
Hello XXXX,
We are writing to let you know your app, XXXX, has been removed from the App Store because it is no longer needed to unlock Emoji.
Since iOS 6 now provides Emoji support to all users, your app is no longer in compliance with the App Store Review Guidelines <https://developer.apple.com/appstore/resources/approval/guidelines.html>
2.12 Apps that are not very useful, are simply web sites bundled as apps, or do not provide any lasting entertainment value may be rejected
If you have questions about the removal of your application, please contact App Review at appreview@apple.com. Please include the App ID and the name of your application in your email.
Thank you and best regards,
App Review
Even though such notices are reported to be going out to developers, emoji apps do seem to still be available.
Many developers say that it appears that Apple is targeting any app listing emoji among it’s features, not just those designed solely to enable emoji characters.
