Apple on Thursday removed nearly 39,000 apps from its Chinese App Store due to the apps lacking an official license from local regulators, reports Reuters.
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The report, which cites data from research firm Qimai, says that games affected by the cull included Ubisoft title Assassin's Creed Identity and NBA 2K20. According to Qimai, only 74 of the top 1,500 paid games on the China App Store survived the purge.
In addition to the 39,000 games, the report says Apple also removed more than 46,000 apps in total from its store.
Apple in February gave app developers an initial June 30 deadline to prove they had a license for their games, and later extended the deadline to December 31. However, in July the company froze updates for thousands of iOS mobile games lacking an official license, and in August removed 30,000 apps for similar reasons.
Apple in July reportedly warned developers of app removals, should their apps not meet regulatory requirements. The removal of apps lacking official licenses is said to come from increasing government pressure on Apple to comply with local regulations that have been in place since 2016.
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Top Rated Comments
Apple’s hand was forced by the local government and the developers who have the autonomy to act on their own. So, either the developers are standing up against China, are lazy, or their game was essentially abandonware at launch.
Edit: I am confused by the downvotes that don't reply.
I’m totally curious on the comparison here, this is what totally came to mind... “wow these guys do TikTok like bans but by the tens of thousands in there”.
Is it comparable? Are these game bans as harsh or as weird as the tiktok ban on the US? Read some comments about “licenses”, what are these licenses? Are they corruption free, transparent and accessible to anyone?
Because the numbers/quantity are staggering.
When a country is banning your software just to give their own an edge, why let them not only release theirs in our market but then let it pull lots data from people which it can then use however it wants without any potential consequence.What, that’s banned in China now too?
I mean, kind of hard to ban files from existence. Trust me, Metallica tried.Their oppression state will then block these sources as well I’m afraid.