Hi Greg,

I feel your frustration my friend, Salah and I tried and fought so hard to get iUnlockYourMind approved but they are just not having any of it. They said that, because it mimics the lock screen exactly, the performer will get confused as to which is the real and the fake screen, I mean seriously come on!

It also seems that, for some reason, other Magicians/Developers, who's apps mimic features we are mimicking in our app and have had their apps approved are not responding to the help we are asking for. I don't know why this is.

Max Krause has been very helpful and passionate about helping other Magicians/Developers get their apps approved, we chatted at length about what to do.

Here is something that you can try, if you haven't done yet already.

You need to have a list of fake screens, default being the main one you want people to use, but you need to be able to customise the various features, such as text size, change the squares to triangles, circles etc. and the font size, if these are made as user customisable apple shouldn't reject the app as it no longer infringes on their copyright as it is just one of many fake screens....hope this makes sense mate

I sincerely hope you get your app approved soon Greg.

Kindest Regards
Myke

They would say that because if you escalate it and it goes through it proves they were wrong and nobody likes to be proven wrong. I have heard of many people being told this only to have it instantly approved by the review board. I guess it may not do you any good but neither will it do you any harm and at least it will be seen by fresh eyes that reverse the original decisions on a daily basis and so will have no axe to grind with your app. The app store "rules" are open to interpretation which is why ipredict + got through and all those other apps were approved while pro was rejected. The reviewers peers and manager are going to close ranks because that is human nature just as my boss will protect me publicly (while tearing me a new arse privately) when I screw up. The review board on the other hand will make their own judgement on whether your app is approvable.

Mark

Hi Myke,

Thank you for your recommendations. I feel your pain brother.
It's a very helpless feeling when you ask, "why are you rejecting me?", and they respond, "we don't have to justify our actions."

Hi Mark,

I totally agree with you. We are going to submit a new version of iPredict Pro today. If we have any further delays, then I will definitely escalate the matter in every way you can imagine.

I'll let you all know how things progress.
Greg

Good luck, Greg. Another person you might try is Lex Friedman at Macworld -- another magician.

Greg, good luck! I can only imagine how frustrating this might be. Apple's handling of this is perplexing, to say the least.

Joe Libby
San Antonio, TX

Hi friends,

We submitted a new version of iPredict Pro two nights ago.

We did everything in our power to comply with what Apple wanted.

Let's hope for the best,
Greg Rostami

Even though this is currently out of my price range I hope it gets approved and is hugely successful. It appears to be an awesome app. Iforce is currently my favourite app.

Fingers crossed Greg. I was really looking forward to taking this and showing it off at Magifest next week... I hope it goes quickly and smoothly. How many people do they think will buy a 100 dollar magic app, and not understand what is going on with the contact screen?

Good Luck Greg!

You might already be trying this, but how about having the default contacts look not so real, as in change the colors and make it look pretty ridiculous actually. But then have a setting for "use realistic contacts layout' which sets it to what you have now. That way the user will have to make the effort to choose the realistic version, and thus wont be "confused" as apple claims.

Apple definitely is strange. They make money when you make money, so you'd think they would be motivated to work towards a solution.

Hi James,

That's exactly what we've done with this version of iPredict Pro.

Let's hope for the best.
Greg

Howdy fellow Magi,

I was one of the lucky ones who received a pre-release copy,

Here is a very rough version of Mr Greg's Ipredict Pro.


http://youtu.be/I6YvcVijZS8

Hi everyone,

I'm new here, just registered in order to be able to post a review of this app.
First of all, reading through these last posts I am sorry Greg to hear of this complicated situation with the iPhone version and I hope that it will finally get approved soon. On the other hand, I can say that the Android version, which is the one I am using, works perfectly, so if all else fails there is this version available. All that is needed is for the magician to use a phone with Android (the audience can still use an iPhone), so the current non-availability of the iPhone version should not deter anyone wanting to perform this trick.

So, my review...
I was initially hesitant to make the investment in the app, as the price point was fairly high. But I had been playing around with the iPredict+ version for some days and liked the idea very much, so the fact that with the Pro version I would be able to actually record my own messages and customize the whole trick to my needs and style made it attractive enough for me to decide to make the jump. Also, another reason was that being based in Europe, the iPredict+ version was costly to do (international call to the United States) as well as slightly awkward (the messages are all in English). With the Pro version I get to call a local number, recognisable as such by my audience, and can even choose which number that is, literally, as well as play a message in my own voice. I can even use my home number that can be verified as such in the telephone directory or in the contacts list of someone who already had it prior to the trick. And the audience can call that local number with their own phones, so the trick is quite powerful. Also, if well-practised, the actual moment you determine the card or other element becomes practically invisible to the audience. And you end up completely clean, as you can hand over your mobile phone to be thoroughly examined with no fear of anyone discovering anything.

The only thing I would add is customization of the feedback address. At the moment I am performing it with no feedback at all, as the English address that appears looks too suspicious to my local audiences. But I can also say that the technology works so well that without using feedback I never fail, so if you practise a little, there is no real need of feedback to check that things are working out ok. Of course, there's a moment of cold sweat when the message plays, but you can be confident it will work out if at home 100 out of 100 tests done in a row were successful, which is how it is has been with me.

One slight drawback I do see to the app is that having both apps on the market simultaneously (iPredict+ and iPredict Pro) is detrimental to the Pro version. Even though the Pro version is quite different to the simple version, the secret is exactly the same, so many people who are just curious will have come across the basic secret of the trick. And this number of people can easily grow exponentially. That means that in your audience you get a high probability of someone knowing the secret, either through purchasing the app or knowing someone who purchased it and revealed it (either through a clumsy performance or through telling it). You can also end up having a few people who try to program a similar app after having come across the secret for this one. I believe the whole point for the high price for the Pro version was to make it less accessible people who are just curious, but this purpose becomes lost if the secret is available for 2 dollars. My suggestion would be to take iPredict+ off the market in order to make iPredit Pro truly attractive as a trick, so that part of the price that is being paid is for the actual secret, which pricewise would make more sense.

And I will end by saying thanks Greg for your excellent customer service with helping me with the initial set up the technical side of the app. Keep up the good work.

Hi magic1178,

What a great performance. I really love the idea of the paper having your phone number on one side and the states on the other. Brilliant.
Thank you so much for posting that.
I really appreciate it.


Hi GatCat,

First, welcome to The Magic Café.
Thank you so much for that amazing review. I agree with everything that you said about iPredict+ and iPredict Pro. I had never thought of it that way. I'm gonna have to give that some more thought.


As far as iPredict Pro on the iPhone . . .

The app was rejected for the FOURTH time.
This time it was rejected without ANY reason (which is REALLY weird).

I'm in Atlanta now for a trade show. Randy just sent Apple a message explaining how we had made ALL the changes they had asked for.

We can't see what else they can be complaining about.

I will now write an email to the App review board. I hope they can shine some light on this matter.

This has become the most frustrating thing I've ever been through in my life.

I really hope there's light at the end of this tunnel.

Greg Rostami

Greg,

Would it be possible to make the Pro version an "in-app purchase" with iPredict + instead? That way it may be looked at differently considering it wouldn't be a new app. It would be nuts for them to reject an in-app purchase for something (Contacts looking like the real Contacts) that the app already has and already was approved before. Just an idea...

Pulling for you!,

Randy

Hi Randy,

That's a great idea. If all else fails we may try that.

They have already said that they don't approve of iPredict+ either.

It's really unclear what's gonna happen.

Thank you so much for pulling for me.
Sorry if I haven't responded to your last email. Like I said, I've been working this week, so it's been a little hard to catch up to emails.

Greg Rostami

I'm not convinced that ipredict+ would cause problems for ipredict pro. The spectator can call you with their own phone and even see you reject the call to voice mail so they have no reason to even suspect that an app is in play. Also the average layman has better things to do with their time than search the app store for magic apps. I would be surprised if a significant number of laymen are aware of ipredict+ you would have to have a very strong interest in magic to bother searching for magic apps and anyone with that strong an interest probably already found the Café through google and is reading this thread.

I feel your pain Greg, I don't get why apple is giving you such a hard time with this app particularly rejecting it without a reason. Perhaps the reviewer that is assigned to this has a personal issue with magic and magicians. I hope the review board comes through for you.

Mark

Greg,

You may be able to side step Apple by creating a web app version of the program.
With some clever HTML5 I think it would be possible to create a web app that would look identical to the dialer/contacts app.

Pros:
- No need to get approved by Apple.
- No 30% cut to Apple

Cons:
- A substantial amount of work
- You would have to deal with the purchasing aspect, (both payment processing and license management)
- No App Store visibility (hard for people to find it) (make sure to link it from ipredict+)
- Need a way to allow users to upload contacts

Not sure it would be worth the effort.

The other con with a HTML 5 app is that you couldn't get it to pose as the contacts app.

You could get it to pose as the contacts app, but you wouldn't be able to populate it with your actual contacts. And some transitions aren't all that smooth going from contact screen to an actual contact. They can have hiccups. Plus that would just be a crap ton of effort. I've done several HTML 5 "Apps" and they took large amounts of work and that isn't anything as complicated as something as iPredict Pro. It just wouldn't be the same as a web app.