The handy Apple Tracker site that allowed people to check Apple Store availability for new products has closed its doors after receiving a DMCA takedown notice from Apple.

I’ve decided to turn off the site. I’m not doing this because I want to, but rather because I received a DMCA takedown notice (you can see the full text below) from Apple. I’m not really interested in picking a fight with apple so … I guess it time to just say good bye …

The only explanation given is that the site contravened the terms of use for apple.com by scraping data:

You may not use any “deep-link”, “page-scrape”, “robot”, “spider” or other automatic device, program, algorithm or methodology, or any similar or equivalent manual process, to access, acquire, copy or monitor any portion of the Site or any Content, or in any way reproduce or circumvent the navigational structure or presentation of the Site or any Content, to obtain or attempt to obtain any materials, documents or information through any means not purposely made available through the Site.

While it’s true that the site broke this rule, it’s hard to see why Apple would object to a tool designed to help customers hand over their cash to the company. It’s not like Apple would need to be concerned about its bandwidth bill, and it seems hard to imagine usage could have been high enough to stress one of the world’s most popular websites.

Another site using the same screen-scraping approach has also disappeared, so it seems Apple may have issued similar takedown notices to all the ones it could find. It seems a pity when such tools would likely have proven extremely handy when the Retina iPad mini goes on sale if those screen supply rumors are true …

Full text of the takedown notice below.

321 11th St, San Francisco, CA 94103 Takedown Notice Date: October 17, 2013 Dear Heroku Legal Agent: I, the undersigned, state UNDER PENALTY OF PERJURY that: [1] I am, a person injured, or an agent authorized to act on behalf of a person injured by unlawful web content published via and at heroku.com [2] I May Be Contacted At: Name of Injured Party : APPLE INC. Name and Title: RYAN BRICKER, ASSOCIATE Company: KILPATRICK TOWNSEND AND STOCKTON LLP Address: TWO EMBARCADERO CENTER, 8TH FLOOR City, State, and Zip: SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA 94111 Email address APPLE_COPYRIGHT@KILPATRICKTOWNSEND.COM Telephone: 415-576-0200 Fax: 415-576-0300 [3] I have a good faith belief that the the website identified by URL below is unlawful because, among other things, the page scrapes and collects data from apple.com in violation of the apple.com Internet Service Terms of Use (see: http://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/terms/site.html) and Heroku Acceptable Use Policy, copied here: Apple.com Terms of Use Your Use of the Site. You may not use any “deep-link”, “page-scrape”, “robot”, “spider” or other automatic device, program, algorithm or methodology, or any similar or equivalent manual process, to access, acquire, copy or monitor any portion of the Site or any Content, or in any way reproduce or circumvent the navigational structure or presentation of the Site or any Content, to obtain or attempt to obtain any materials, documents or information through any means not purposely made available through the Site. Apple reserves the right to bar any such activity. Heroku Acceptable Use Policy 2.2 Your use of the Heroku Services must comply with all applicable laws, regulations and ordinances, including any laws regarding the export of data or software. [4] Reason: Content Type / Violation: Automated scraping/copying/acquiring web app, operating in violation of the apple.com Internet Service Terms of Use [5] Please act expeditiously to remove or otherwise disable the following website/web application: http://iphone-check.herokuapp.com/ [6] I have a good faith belief that the removal of copyright management information from the material listed above is not authorized by law; and [7] The information in this notice is accurate. Thank you for your kind assistance. Truthfully, /Ryan Bricker/ Ryan Bricker Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP

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