What would you call them? We'llgetbacktoya letters?

@michael: yes, that's exactly what they were, and that's exactly what's happened. zomg could it be that apple's not teh evil?

I don't think Erica claims to be a journalist ... certainly not in the traditional sense. Rejection is the opposite of acceptance. Since the letter is not a statement of acceptance, it is reasonable to label it as a rejection ... a rejection of your entrance into the Beta program at this time. Of course ... you can accept that you have been rejected at this time ... blah, blah, blah ...

@g_erhart -

well they weren't letters of rejection, and acceptance is the opposite of rejection, so you could say they WERE letters of acceptance according to your statement.

all erica does is look for something to talk about, and often just to garner comments and ad views. we all need to see the horribly animated dancing loan officer aliens.

Yeah yeah yeah.

Cut Erica some slack here.

She is an active iPhone developer and has given lots back to the community.

If we were talking about your run-of-the mill click whore (absolutely no sexist pun intended) like John C. Dvorak I would be differently dispositioned.

I agree with bravedeer. There's clearly a conflict of interest here.

Erica will always bitch and moan every little thing about the iPhone SDK but will shout in triumph every little thing the hackers will do.

They *were* rejection letters - they rejected the applicant, whether permanently or "for the time being" is irrelevant. Don't try and be a grammar nazi without a clear understanding of language - just because these were not permanent rejections does not mean they weren't rejections of some kind. Clearly, they were rejections of some kind - they were rejections for the time being, if you like.

This latest crap about "not a rejection letter" is just an excuse to rehash all the ridiculous Erica-bashing that I thought had gone away. Here we go again. The same commentors saying the same crap and promoting the same misrepresentations as before.

Bob, I don't like the name calling but I agree that pehaps there's a conflict of interest in Erica covering this subject, whether there's a financial stake or not.

I'm sure she's a very smart person, but the conflict of interests has caused her to ignore the facts.

I don't like the name-calling either, but she had three chances to get it right and chose to get it wrong in the most inflammatory way all three times.

I've been a journalist for 30 years. Blogs are by no means journalism, of course, but if she's going to choose repeatedly to violate ethical norms and her coworkers and managers aren't going to call her on it, someone should.

What do you mean by "personal financial stake"? (I'm asking honestly, here.)

The word reject nor the word accept appear in either of the two e-mails I received from Apple prior to being admitted to the program. Being thanked for applying does not == acceptance into the program. You can argue (as you do) that this is not a rejection. In the absence of any real information, a vacuum of fear and uncertainty will form.

I would put this experience down as an issue of poor communication. I can think of much better ways of telling people that some will have to wait. I was much more disturbed by the lack of any clear statement that all who apply will eventually be admitted.

Cheers ... Geo

Nate, developers stand to gain income from the sale of the software they've created. It's a conflict of interest when a developer writes for a site that covers the platform the developer is targeting for income.

Back in the late '80s, for example, I was senior editor for a monthly Macintosh magazine (which no longer exists). We had strict rules about what investments, for instance, we could make in computer and software companies (like buying stock), because the potential existed to abuse our position to influence our financial outlook. Similarly, certain staffers couldn't review software from certain companies because of real or implicit conflicts of interest (someone who had a friend who worked for Microsoft wasn't allowed to review Microsoft products).

And smilespray, you describe the problem but not the solution.

@Mike: Limbograms is perfect! :-)

+1 for limbogram

"limbogram" FTW.

I don't get it. But, I did google limbogram and your name is next to the word every time.