iPhone

GV Mobile developer Sean Kovacs has reacted to GV Mobile, his Google Voice client for iPhone, being pulled from Apple's App Store by releasing it through Cydia, an application distributor for jailbroken iPhones. The app has made headlines in the tech world as one of several Google Voice-related applications pulled by Apple in the last couple of days for duplicating functionality in the iPhone.

Hosted by Modmyi.com, the app is able to those who have jailbroken their iPhones. Jail breaking was once all the rage before Apple launched the App Store and released an SDK for developers to make sanctioned apps, but there is still a thriving community of tinkerers and others who wish to make of their iPhone what they will.

"Maybe you've seen GV Mobile was tossed out of the AppStore," Modmyi.com said in a post. "Apple's, 'hey, we have apps that do that too... you can't be in here!' attitude is well documented (remember Podcaster? which wound up on Cydia in the MMi repo as well?), and once again a great app has been pushed out of folks' hands so Apple can minimize the competition."

"Well don't you worry," the site added, "all you folks who still wanted the app - we've got it up in Cydia now and you can download away - completely free. Although, if you're nice, you'll toss Sean a few bucks donation for his work."

Mr. Kovacs has already updated the app to deal with an issue for jailbroken iPhones, and posted a note explaining the differences between the App Store version and the Cydia version.

He wrote, "Push: It will never happen now - thank Apple. Push uses Apple's server/techonology to push notifications - without GV Mobile on the App Store, I can't utilize their servers to push you notifications."