390

Google is full of assholes!

Just paid $25 dollars to list my app on google play store. Within 15 minutes of submitting the app, it got de-listed.

Reason:
Impersonation

Who am I impersonating?
The logo is impersonating the logo shown on MY OWN website!!!

How dafuq can you impersonate your own intellectual property?????

Contacted them back using their form. Didn't even call them "cunts". Asked to have it reviewed.
After waiting 7 business days, started sending them 1 email a day. On day 11 I sent 100 identical email asking them to review it.
Today (day 12), they cleared the app. I got this reply back.

"We found that your app was not in violation of our policies"
-Google

Comments
  • 141
    I think that in google's perfect world, there are no humans. Therefore, their machine learning models are never wrong.
  • 165
    "Didn't even call them cunts"
    Lol, it is tempting at times isn't it
  • 7
    That sucks
  • 61
    So I guess the solution is to mass send them emials.
  • 19
    Did you use an email address on your Google Play vendor account that doesn't have the same domain than your site? A dev I know had a similar issue and that was the cause.
  • 4
    @Eariel No. I heard a similar story too, so I signed up with the company "info@" email, which we use google mail for.
  • 5
    @arturgrigio, bad luck then. At least you've got it back on store.
  • 30
    Today morning I received a mail from Google on updation of google play developer policies... Lol... May be you caused it by sending all those mails.
  • 3
    @ajay-1997 LMAO 😂
  • 10
    My app was written as a testament to their terrible service (https://play.google.com/store/apps/...)

    I used my account to load some beta builds (NEVER did they see the light of prod) but they were still flagged. I explained and said "cool well then just let me delete them since I don't have the signing keys".

    Oh no, you can't delete an app from the dashboard, oh no no no...
  • 4
    I faced the same exact issue last month with my app and my website ClanJams.com !!
  • 3
    Got the same reason few weeks ago! The reason was that i was copying from another app I uploaded with the same account (?!)
  • 3
    The less duplicate apps the better
  • 3
  • 3
    @Jop- you're right, I might've lost my cool there 😂
  • 2
    @JsonC11 I agree that duplicates are not good, but shouldn't there be some oversight when your model falsely flags legit apps?
    12 days is too long. And I don't even know if they would respond if I didn't spam them...
  • 4
    Have you ever tried to publish a facebook app? It's even worst... They have absolutely no support for devs beside a badly moderated facebook group. Something I made got rejected with a message saying it was in violation with their policy... How the fuck is that supposed to help me to fix what is wrong? After 5 attempts (taking 1-2 days each) at modifying small parts of the project to fix the issue I got tired of it and just started publishing the exact same app every day. After 5 more day, it randomly got accepted...
  • 2
    @FTcuber wow! I guess I'm never developing a Facebook app
  • 4
    I had a similar issue where me and my friend developed an app for our university then a week later another university requested us to also make them a similar app and when we uploaded it in our same account it was said to be in violation of impersonation policy? So in short we were impersonating our own app in the same developer account...
  • 4
    There's a lot of crap happening in Google's Systems lately.
  • 5
    Wow you got a reply from them! A year ago I was having trouble with their system, sent email everyday and it took them months to reply. They said they will take a look and it's still not resolved. I am quite surprised they actually have customer service, I thought it is just some random sinkhole
  • 5
    They are literally
    PIGEON CLUSTERs (or PCs)
  • 4
    This could just be my personal experience, but when i violated Apple's App Store policies in the past, i was contacted by an actual human within 24 hours. I know people bitch about the $99 though 😂

    Sounds like play store is way more automated.
  • 3
    Well my first time took me two days to finally publish my first app... (between all the shaize Google asks and admob)
  • 4
    Oh and my second app is a image recognizer that returns what's in a picture... Used a meme of a gangster with a uzi on one hand and a vibrator in the other hand... My App was rejected cause of nudity...
  • 3
    Probably both reviewers.
  • 4
    That's the problem with solely relying on algorithmic decisions. All algorithm flags should be looked over by a real person. And you should have had someone address your app over the phone immediately, not wait for it to go through their ticket system.
  • 3
    That's exactly what makes Google Google 😶
  • 4
    We usually get a hold on them rather quickly. They don't always resolve the issue but we can reach them. Might be a separate division though as we do not have mobile apps.
  • 3
    @FTcuber I know that feel bruh. I did a Facebook app a year ago which was suspended eve before getting published. I mailed them and everything for 5 days but no response explaining "why". Tired of it I decided to rename the package, change the icon a bit and push it and it worked surprisingly.
  • 3
    Btw the app is FaceLyt, just in case anyone of you wanted to have a look.
  • 3
    On our launch day Google directions api had a bug blocking all our request. They told us that the fix will be in 1week minimum...
  • 3
    This is why we need to start making PWAs
  • 2
    Lol you didn't even call them cunts. That must of taken some restraint after all that!
  • 3
    @thecode I just check out your app. FaceLyt that thing is much faster than the bloated official fb app! Nice design too! Amazingly you made it at around 500kb! 2 questions; did you make that with Java & Android Studio? And does it have accelerated web pages? Don't worry I'm not making a fb app. I am looking into making a website then making a app with a web view with added mobile functionality. Any advice is appreciated. Oh and did I mention your app is bad ass? It deserves more d/l + goob reviews!
  • 3
    @Kryptic Yep I developed it using Android Studio and Java. I used proguard to reduce the size. Also including only necessary features helped me to keep the size low. Right now I'm just using the stock webview for rendering the pages excluding the lite mode which uses few tweaks to fasten up the loading.
  • 2
    @thecode wow, 252 reviews on your app. That's crazy, that means it has around 10,000 downloads?
  • 2
    @arturgrigio it crossed 23000 downloads recently. But the last milestone crossed is 10000 so it shows 10000
  • 3
    @qbalsdon HAHAHAHA OMG

    So you just changed all of it to this Useless thing? It was so tempting download...
  • 2
    @qbalsdon just gave you a five stars review
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