FlickType iPhone Keyboard for the Blind Shutting Down, Developer Shares Highly Charged Twitter Thread

Mobile

FlickType, the iOS keyboard app for the visually impaired is shutting down, its developer announced on Twitter. In a thread on the microblogging platform, developer Kosta Eleftheriou announced that he is forced by circumstances to discontinue the iPhone keyboard functionality of the app. He wrote that his decision comes after several “unreasonable” rejections from Apple’s App Store against an updated version of the app. He wrote, “Apple has thrown us obstacle after obstacle for years while we try to provide an app to improve people’s lives, and we can no longer endure their abuse.”

This wasn’t the first time that the App Store forcibly tried to reject the app. Apple “incorrectly” argued against the app three years ago. “Back then we successfully appealed and overturned their decision, and this hadn’t been a problem since. Until now,” read the Twitter thread. The developer also added that their rejection history spanned “more than forty pages filled with repeated, unwarranted, and unreasonable rejections.”

The FlickType developer team have filed a lawsuit against Apple. They also exposed many paid scam apps on the App Store. Eleftheriou has been causing a dent in Apple’s image for quite some time by exposing paid scam apps in the App Store, realign secret gambling dens and review frauds.

The tweets request its users to stop auto-update of apps to retain the FlickType keyboard on iPhone. Meanwhile, the FlickType app on Apple Watch will remain functional.

Twitter users have lashed out at Apple. A user (@gauravjj_1) wrote, “This is terrible. My iPhone will pretty much become useless to me without FlickType keyboard.”

Another wrote with a heavy heart, “This is incredibly sad to hear. I’ve been using FlickType daily for English at least and found it the best experience.”

This user said how Apple continues to treat developers with hostility and “it certainly feels like in some cases it’s more and more unpleasant to work in this ecosystem.”

Last year, Fortnite makers Epic Games had also filed a lawsuit against Apple’s monopolised strategies on App Store.


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