iPhone Appstore Gives the Boot to Game Criticizing Apple

It seemed like Apple had moved beyond banning apps from the appstore, but with the holiday season coming up they’re back at it. A new game posted to the appstore on Tuesday called “Phone Story” was pulled by Apple, citing the “abuse to children” clause in the terms of service for all products being sold.

“Phone Story” takes the player through slaves mining for rare earth minerals in Africa, their assembly in Chinese factories, the fun store rushing of getting an iPhone and of course show you how they all end up in the trash in the end. The controversy mostly stems from the part of the game where factory workers attempt suicide to escape the tedium of manufacturing smartphones. It’s a bit drastic for a marketplace where most of the games are about making smoothies or flinging birds at pigs.

While the premise of the game is depressing, the company who created it (Molleindustria) say they’re just trying to raise awareness; underneath each iPhone 4G lurks a background of human rights abuses that’s no good for humanity or the environment. The one bright spot of the whole ordeal is that all money received from sales of the game will be donated to human rights and labor rights groups who are trying to fight against the conditions described in the game.

The app was live in the appstore for about three hours before it was pulled; the developers voiced their surprise and announced they were planning to release it to Android devices at a later time. This isn’t the first time that Apple has removed an app from the appstore; from apps that have taught people how to crack DRM on Blu-ray discs to apps that contained sexually suggestive or political content.