I read an interesting article yesterday on Wired. The concern was over Apple's censorship of it's apps store. "From a legal perspective, Apple can do whatever it wants with the content in its App Store. Apple is not government, and thus it is not governed by the First Amendment. In light of the recent ban, many have correctly compared Apple’s App Store to Wal-Mart, which also doesn’t allow porn." While the author doesn't seem to have an issue with Apple removing sexual content, he is concerned whether or not this could extend to news apps in the future.
Now admittedly, I am an Apple girl, but this doesn't mean I wear blinders. Apple does have a scary amount of power, but it is their store and if they choose not to have an 18+ section who am I to say that's wrong. But what if somewhere down the road they do start getting complaints about say a New York Times article, will they be able to pull that too? The news shouldn't be censored, it's there to inform the world about actual events.
I don't believe that they would stoop to censoring the news even if it was obtained through one of their apps. People who get news apps know that not all of it is going to be to their liking. People don't complain to the newspaper vendors when something offends them in the paper, so why should they expect electronic newspapers to behave differently.
Yes, Apple probably can censor the news, but I don't think they will.
Read the article here
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