Most people have speculated that Google Voice was rejected from the App Store at AT&T’s behest. The reason? Apple’s official line is that Google Voice duplicates features already on the iPhone—namely the Phone and Messages app. Of course, none of that holds water, considering the App Store is already full of alternate SMS apps and apps like Skype that sport a telephone dialer.
Limiting apps from the App Store is a gutless, chicken shit move. I have long been a proponent of Apple products but this is a great example of Apple S-C-R-E-W-I-N-G their customers and concerning themselves less with the community and more with their relationship with AT&T. As an iPhone customer (2 times over now), I can attest to the fact that AT&T’s quality of service (QOS) is horrible in many US cities. Without the exclusive iPhone contract, I would no sooner use AT&T for my mobile communications than I would jump from a moving vehicle (both are painful- being an AT&T customer may be worse). It is simply because of the iPhone that they can count me and so many others in their customer ranks.
Apple needs to wake up and realize that customer loyalty is a competency that they cannot afford to trivialize and allow to be frittered away. Limiting the marketplace for the sake of (weak) alliances and partnerships is a mistake – and sadly one that Apple seems to have made. And why? I guess the money must have been good to sell out your soul.
Step-n-Repeat 
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