Why Sticky is off the iOS App Store
This is the story of the Apple App Review of our app Sticky, which is a mobile-native NFT marketplace with several hundred thousand users. Our website is https://getstic.ky
My intention in publishing this is (a) to provide Sticky creators & collectors with an overdue explanation of what is happening, and (b) to draw attention within Apple to this in the hope that the matter can be resolved with the appropriate urgency and we can get back to work building for the Sticky community.
In summary:
- Apple approved 10 Sticky updates in the 3 months from Nov-21 to Jan-22.
- Then Apple took a total of 38 days to review the update we submitted on 1-Feb-22.
- On 10-Mar, it not only rejected the update, but also removed the previously-approved live version of the app from the App Store, without prior warning.
- We immediately appealed the removal and two days later, on 12-Mar, submitted an update intended to address their concerns.
- 24 days have passed. As of 5-Apr, the previously-approved app continues to be off the App Store, and the subsequent update continues to be ‘In Review’, despite numerous attempts from us to follow-up with App Review.
- As a result, thousands of creators & collectors who continue to use the app daily have had important updates kept from them for two and a half months, thousands more can’t download the app, and our ability to continue as an ongoing business is at risk.
Insofar as possible I will try to be objective and as detailed as possible: I do not wish to cast the Sticky team as victims — we are a for-profit company and we are not perfect. You may well disagree with some of our decisions. But even if you do, we hope this story will show how the Apple App Review process has hindered, rather than promoted, our ability to offer the best possible app to users.
Some background: we first launched Sticky in early 2020, initially as an app to create stickers, which was our focus then. We were trying to find a viable alternative to the subscription model that our main app used — one that would be cheaper and more accessible to more users and still financially sustainable for us. We tried things like a one-time payment, a virtual tip jar and ads, but couldn’t make the numbers work. We eventually redesigned Sticky to focus on NFTs, and in late December 2021, engagement took off and feedback became very positive.
We proceeded to work on improving the product. Our plan was to (1) first fix bugs and usability issues, then (2) add a secondary market functionality (at that point creators could publish and collectors could collect from them, but collectors couldn’t trade with other collectors) and then (3) add integrations with outside blockchains (more on this later), all while beginning to talk to venture-capital investors. Plenty of work ahead.
App store review seemed to go well initially: we published 2 updates in November 2021, 4 in December, and 4 in January 2022. All were approved in 1–2 days.
When we submitted an update on February 1st, though, it seemed to be rejected.
We were initially relieved when it turned out this was actually a request for more information, not an actual rejection. The message from App Review began “We look forward to completing the review of your app, but need more information to continue.” They requested credentials for a demo account and asked:
- Please confirm if your app offers/facilitate cryptocurrency transactions
- Which mainnet do you use to mint NFTs?
- Please confirm if your app offers/facilitate NFT trade internally
- Please confirm if your app users can trade NFT made/purchased from this app externally
- How do users cash out?
- Can you trade Sticky Coin in cryptocurrency exchanges
- Is Sticky Coin a cryptocurrency?
We answered:
Thank you for your questions, which we have answered below.
In short, the purpose of Sticky is precisely to offer NFT digital collectibles in a safe and user-friendly environment (i.e. a platform that curates and vets featured publications, has fraud prevention mechanisms, is offered within a native iOS app, uses in-app-purchases) in full compliance with all App Store Guidelines.
This is in contrast to other leading NFT marketplaces such as OpenSea which, though huge, are primarily browser-based, require cryptocurrency payments, do not support IAP in their iOS apps, and are unfortunately notorious for lacking appropriate review of user-submitted and fraud & money-laundering prevention mechanisms.
- Please confirm if your app offers/facilitate cryptocurrency transactions
No, it does not.
- Which mainnet do you use to mint NFTs?
NFTs are minted on a proprietary Sticky ledger only.
- Please confirm if your app offers/facilitate NFT trade internally
Yes, Sticky allows primary trading (from artists/creators to collectors). Secondary trading features (between collectors) are under development.
- Please confirm if your app users can trade NFT made/purchased from this app externally (i.e. on OpenSea)
No, they can only sell items made in Sticky within Sticky. One of the reasons for this is precisely the lack of review and fraud-prevention mechanisms in external marketplaces such as OpenSea. For example: images in Sticky appear with a watermark unless you own them, whereas they have no watermark and anyone can copy them from OpenSea.
- How do users cash out?
Creators can request a revenue share on their sales of original NFTs to collectors via the “Payment Details” in the app menu. To qualify, creators must meet anti-fraud requirements such as: providing a real name, photo and address, selling to at least 50 different collectors, complying with Sticky & the App Store’s guidelines & age rating. The Sticky team checks the artwork for plagiarism prior to payment and if necessary requests additional evidence of authenticity via email. Payments are in USD via PayPal and occur after the end of the calendar month subsequent to the payment request (so we are currently processing payment requests from December). To be clear — Sticky coins are not convertible to USD. They are simply used to measure creators’ contributions to the app, in compliance with the second item of App Store Guideline 3.1.1: “Apps may use IAP currencies to enable customers to ‘tip’ the developer or digital content providers in the app”
- Can you trade Sticky Coin in cryptocurrency exchanges
No.
- Is Sticky Coin a cryptocurrency?
No.
Please note that because the the NFT & digital collectibles space is so varied and changing so rapidly (e.g. OpenSea, Veve, Sticky and Axie are all platforms with very different characteristics), we also emphasize these points to Sticky users in a variety of places, such as: on our app store description (below the “Important” heading), on the homepage of the app’s website, in the terms of use and FAQ (where the explanation is quite detailed), in the Sticky NFT Guidelines (for creators), and in our communication with users via email, social media and in response to reviews.
We hope this answers your questions. We are happy to answer any additional questions, and in line with our objective of developing Sticky into the leading iOS-native NFT collecting app on the App Store, welcome any feedback as to whether any of the features you ask about specifically ‘should’ or ‘should not’ be included to ensure continued compliance with App Store Guidelines.
Regarding the user ID for testing, we have created [redacted], password [redacted], and will add that to the submission metadata. It is pre-populated with a Test NFT Pack with 3 Test NFTs.
Let me give you a little context on Sticky’s design and those questions and answers.
Apple has several restrictions on cryptocurrency apps. Although none of the rules appear to explicitly forbid offering an in-app-currency that is also a cryptocurrency, we thought it would be best to avoid that issue, so StickyCoins are just a regular in-app-currency.
Apple also has several restrictions on how you can sell things in apps. Digital items within an app must use their in-app-purchase (IAP) system, whereas items consumed outside an app must not use it. NFTs on public blockchains such as Ethereum are on one hand digital, but on the other hand they are not really ‘in your app’, so in principle it’s not clear how they should be sold. Apple doesn’t have written guidelines on this.
To avoid this dilemma, we initially offered only exclusive NFTs that artists had produced specifically for us and which were available just on Sticky. These could be collected with StickyCoins, which in turn were bought with IAP. Because of that design, we also checked to make sure that ‘NFT’ was an appropriate term for items that were available just on Sticky.
Wikipedia currently defines an NFT as ‘A non-interchangeable unit of data stored on a blockchain, a form of digital ledger, that can be sold and traded’, and a blockchain as ‘A list of records, called blocks, that are linked together using cryptography’, which, it goes on to say, ‘are typically managed as a peer-to-peer network for use as a publicly distributed ledger’.
The word ‘typically’ is key. Although the decentralized blockchain networks that support cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ether have got the most attention recently, they are not the only form of blockchain. A chaining blocks together cryptographically to ensure that data hasn’t been altered can be implemented in a centralized ledger — Amazon offers this as an off-the-shelf product called QLDB, for example.
It’s simply a technical tradeoff: compared to a distributed blockchain, you gain speed and reduce vulnerability to some types of hacks, but have a single point of failure. Therefore it is perfectly accurate to call the items in Sticky ‘NFTs’, even though they are on a centralized rather than a distributed ledger.
To be clear — reasonable people may disagree with our understanding of the term ‘NFT’: some people only use ‘NFTs’ to refer to items on distributed ledgers, while for many who aren’t interested in the technical underpinnings, NFTs are just synonymous with ‘digital collectibles’ in general. Accordingly, we explained this characteristic of our NFTs in the app description on the App Store, right on the main page of our website, and in our FAQ and Terms of Use. We felt confident in our assessment not least because Apple had already approved half a dozen versions of the app with this use of the term.
We re-submitted the app, and it remained ‘In Review’ until February 9th, when we discovered one of our IAPs had been rejected. Because demand for our largest bundle of StickyCoins, which cost $99.99, had been higher than expected, we had decided to offer an even larger bundle worth $199.99. The rejection read:
Your app includes in-app purchase products for consumable credits, e.g., coins, priced over $99.99, Tier 60. “Single” in-app purchases for consumable credits are required to have a maximum price no more than $99.99, Tier 60.
We were surprised, having seen many apps offering bundles of credits for more than that. But we decided to look into that later. We removed the IAP and resubmitted the app the same day. We assumed App Review had been satisfied with our answers to their questions about crypto and NFTs and had moved on to other details.
It turns out we were wrong. The app was rejected a little under a week later, on February 15th. Once again, these were questions about crypto and NFTs, not an actual rejection. We tried to infer where these questions were leading and if there were any features that we should start working on straight away, but we simply weren’t sure. For example — was offering a crypto wallet to collect NFTs something Apple expected, or were they asking because that would be a problem? So we simply replied and resubmitted on February 19th. Our answer read:
Hi App Review Team, thank you for your questions, answered below. Best — Alan Lammiman, Daily Apps
- When users get NFTs, do users also get an address for viewing?
We assume you mean an address as in a URL link? Yes, they have a link that they can share (see the three dots button to the left of the export button. Currently that URL is a deep link that opens only in the app — not in a web browser — to prevent scraping/copying of the NFTs.
- When users set up an account, do they also set up a wallet or crypto account?
No. Items in the app are bought via in-app-purchases and are linked to the user’s account in the app. No cryptocurrency or crypto wallets are involved.
- Is the Sticky ledger on a particular blockchain? If so, which blockchain technology?
The Sticky ledger is a proprietary centralized ledger system operated by Sticky, not an open-source blockchain.
By February 28th, we hadn’t received any decision, so I contacted App Review for an update. On March 2nd we received the following reply:
Hello Alan,
Thank you for contacting App Store Review. I understand that you would like to check the current status of your app, “NFT Marketplace, Maker: Sticky.”
In checking your app’s records, I noticed that your app is in review as of February 19, 2022.
You can find more information about the app review process on the App Review Support page.
On average, 90 percent of apps are reviewed within 48 hours. However, there may be cases that require additional review time. You do not need to do anything at this time. If we require any additional information, we will notify you directly.
When your app’s review is complete, you will be notified by email.
I hope this information is helpful. Your case number is 101626001080.
On March 10th, 8 days later, our update was rejected. The review message read:
Your app’s metadata contains misleading content or content that is intended to deceive users.
Specifically, your app uses the term “NFT” in a way that is considered misleading and is not compliant with the App Store Review Guidelines.
Please note that adding a disclaimer to the app description is not sufficient if the rest of the metadata and the app are misleading.
The next submission of this app may require a longer review time, and this app will not be eligible for an expedited review until this issue is resolved.
We were frustrated. Apple had approved half a dozen versions of the app that used the term NFTs between Nov-21 and 22-Jan-22. We had already explained how the app worked over a month before, when they had first asked questions on 1-Feb, and we had emphasized our eagerness to understand their expectations around NFTs. Yet it had taken Apple well over a month to decide it no longer agreed with our use of the term ‘NFT’. Well, at least we had something to work on. We paused our work on the secondary market, which was the feature our users were asking for the most, and got cracking on adding a feature that lets users export their NFTs to a public blockchain, which is what Apple seemed to want.
Then it hit me.
Apple hadn’t only rejected the update. They had removed the live version of the app, which they had approved on 22nd January, from the App Store. That meant that after a very successful first couple of months, new users couldn’t join Sticky, which in turn meant that the community of creators and collectors would gradually wane, and that our conversations with investors and the survival of our company were at risk.
This had to be a mistake! Removals of live apps from the App Store are supposed to be a last resort, and are typically preceded by a demand to correct whatever the perceived issue is within a given deadline. Surely an app should not be immediately removed based on a change in App Review opinions of characteristics that were evident in multiple versions that they have recently approved? Surely an app should not be removed a week after the developer proactively reaches out to see how things are going and is told to just sit tight?
I raced to appeal the decision, explaining all of the above, and we also submitted our update that allowed users to export NFTs collected in Sticky to a public blockchain just 2 days later, on 12-Mar. It went ‘In Review’ and we waited.
As the days passed and our business waned, I tried to contact App Review again and again.
Finally, on 17-Mar, I received a call from an Apple representative. We spent over half an hour on the phone. I explained all of the above. I was told that the concern was indeed that the NFTs were not on a public blockchain and that the sudden removal of the app was indeed unusual. She didn’t have an explanation as to why Apple had chosen to remove the app immediately rather than inform us of their concerns and give us time to address them. However, she assured me that our update did seem to address their concerns. She promised to escalate matters immediately and said we would likely have an answer early the following week. I was frazzled but optimistic.
But the week came and went, and then another, and now another.
As of 5-Apr, our update submitted on 12-Mar remains ‘In Review’, our version of the app previously approved on 22-Jan remains off the App Store, and creators & collectors who downloaded Sticky before that have not received important updates for two and a half months.
Since that call with Apple on 17-Mar I have tried following-up with Apple several times via email and phone, to no avail. The Apple representative provides a first name and phone number only — no surname or email address. After a week had passed I tried calling to follow up, and hit voicemail every time. I left messages but got no callbacks. At one point, the phone system started rejecting calls from my number. I also contacted App Review via email and via the web forms they provide, but the following reply, received on April 1st, illustrates how dismissive the responses are. They are also all signed first-name only (often a different name for each reply) and come from the same email address, so it’s challenging to carry on any sort of meaningful conversation.
Hello,
This is the App Store Review team following up with you regarding your app, “NFT Marketplace, Maker: Sticky.”
I understand that you are concerned with waiting longer than you have anticipated for your app to be reviewed.
The review for your app is still in progress and requires additional time. We will provide further status updates as soon as we are able, or we will contact you if we require additional information.
We apologize for the delay and thank you for your continued patience. For your convenience, your case number is 101665122819.
Receiving that message after two months was just too much. I had stated clearly that at this rate our business would not survive, and I was being thanked for my ‘continued patience’. I informed Apple that we no longer saw any alternative but to make the issue public so that our users know what is really happening. Still, because our intention was not to blindside Apple, on 4-Apr I sent them an initial draft of this post.
Today, on 5-Apr, I received a message saying our appeal had been escalated to the App Review board, and received a call from a different Apple representative.
I asked why the appeal was only being directed to the App Review board nearly four weeks after we initially filed it and over two weeks after an Apple representative just like him had promised to address the matter. I asked why I should believe him if the previous Apple Representative had gone silent after promising a response in a couple of days. I asked if they had an actual date by which I could expect a decision. No real answers. Just more thanking us for our patience.
I have focused above on the interactions between us and Apple, but of course, the most important party here should be neither Apple nor us, but rather the creators & collectors who have trusted Sticky and the App Store.
Over 28 thousand people have given Sticky a 4.6 star average rating and thousands continue using Sticky daily despite all of this. They have now been waiting for updates with important features and bug fixes which have been ready for over two months, while they and their friends have not been able to get our app on the App Store for nearly four weeks. Even the publication of Sticky NFTs on a public blockchain, which Apple seems to have deemed urgent enough to justify removal of our app, has now been sitting in App Review for over three weeks.
Dear Sticky community, I am really sorry that we did not foresee this and prevent it from happening. We’re working hard to get things back on track. Please help us by sharing this story.
Alan Lammiman
Founder
Sticky, Daily Apps
