Ratings Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Apple tweaks app ranking system

by Kelly Hodgkins (Apr 18th, 2011)

Apple has reportedly modified its app ranking system to include criteria besides the number of application downloads. This change was noticed by ad network executives and other companies that monitor the ranking of applications in Apple's iOS App Store. Facebook, Skype and Pandora are three ...

Metacritic now charting iOS games

by Mike Schramm (Mar 15th, 2011)

Gaming review aggregation site Metacritic has posted that it is now charting for iOS games through its service. The site has long charted movies, music and video games as an overall average of all the scores found online (out of 100), and now it's going to do the same thing for iOS games. ...

AT&T rated worst cell phone provider by Consumer Reports

by David Quilty (Dec 6th, 2010)

Remember when Consumer Reports couldn't recommend the iPhone 4? Well, now Consumer Reports has released the results of a satisfaction survey which shows that according to over 50,000 of their readers, AT&T is the lowest-scoring cell phone carrier in the United States. In fact, AT&T scored a ...

Ratings missing from the App Store?

by Michael Grothaus (Oct 29th, 2010)

A few readers have notified us that app ratings have disappeared entirely from the App Store in iTunes. The ratings still appear on the iOS App Stores and in browser previews of apps, but for the desktop iTunes view of the App Store, they are nowhere to be found. iTunes Connect was apparently ...

TUAW's Daily App: Movie Night Out

by Mike Schramm (Sep 29th, 2010)

Movie Night Out is a fun and free little app that can help with that seemingly ever-present question: "So what do you want to do tonight?" It's a piece of cake to use. Just punch in what you want to do for your movie night (maybe hit up some shopping, see the movie, and then grab dessert, or do ...

Video demo of ABC's My Generation synchronized app

by Keith M (Sep 16th, 2010)

As Dave reported earlier, ABC and Nielsen have teamed up to develop an iPad app that supports the new series My Generation. Users run the app while watching the show -- either live or recorded -- and it will stay synced with the section of the episode you're watching by "listening" to the audio ...

Australian ratings board looks ahead to App Store crackdown

by Michael Rose (Aug 19th, 2010)

It's not a done deal by any means, but the Australian government's Classification Board is taking a hard look at games for mobile devices, which up until now have skated by the country's regulatory requirements that mandate a pass for content and age-appropriateness -- at a cost to developers of ...

Should the ESRB be on the App Store?

by Mike Schramm (Apr 10th, 2010)

Here's an interesting topic of discussion from Slide to Play: Now that Apple seems to be going all-in on gaming with its Game Center app, should the Entertainment Software Ratings Board start looking at App Store games? The ESRB is the self-regulatory industry group that's responsible for ...

Update: Promo codes again allowed for 17+ apps

by Michael Jones (Jul 26th, 2009)

Recently, we reported that developers were not able to request promo codes for their iPhone apps if the app had received a 17+ rating due to having an embedded web browser, unfiltered 3rd party content, or contained excessive violence or sexual content. This restriction severely limited the ability ...

App Store Lessons: No promo codes for apps rated 17+

by Michael Jones (Jul 16th, 2009)

Developers whose apps meet the criteria for a 17+ rating in the App Store are now running into yet another roadblock, but this time it's not about getting their apps approved, it's about distributing them. Or, more specifically, distributing promo codes for them. Typically, when a developer uploads ...

Terminal Tip: Enable half-star ratings in iTunes

by Cory Bohon (Dec 31st, 2008)

Do you like giving ratings to songs in iTunes? If so, then you've probably noticed that you are only able to rate songs on a full-star basis, not enough granularity for some music fans... there's a longstanding AppleScript hack to enable half-stars, but now there's an easier way around this issue. ...

Rumor roundup: iPhone 2.2 firmware details

by Robert Palmer (Oct 28th, 2008)

Apple has given developers a taste of the new iPhone firmware, version 2.2 beta 2, and it includes a host of spiffy new features that are making the rounds online. A tipster shared with us some screenshots of the new firmware, including what appears to be the ability to download podcasts directly to ...

AAPL down sharply after two ratings cuts

by Robert Palmer (Sep 29th, 2008)

Bad day for Big Rainbow: RBC Capital's Mike Abramsky and Morgan Stanley's Kathryn Huberty cut their ratings and price targets on Apple stock, both citing weakness in consumer spending on PCs. AAPL was down 17.38 at 110.86 (-13.58%) as of this writing: a 20-minute-delayed chart is above. Abramsky's ...

Mac 101: Stars and Smart Playlists

by Robert Palmer (Jul 28th, 2008)

If you're anything like me -- and I sincerely hope you're not, for your sake -- you have a large iTunes music library, but the music that you like right now is only a small fraction of that total. (Yeah, that embarrassing '96 Dave Matthews Band album is getting pretty dusty.) Since my musical ...

I Love Stars

by Steven Sande (May 15th, 2008)

Potion Factory brainiac Andy Kim has just unleashed a new free app on the world - I Love Stars. This little app does two things very well. First, it displays your iTunes rating (from zero to five stars) in the menu bar for the song that is currently playing, and second, I Love Stars lets you change ...