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Steve Jobs Reiterates: "Folks who want porn can buy an Android phone"

Apple CEO Steve Jobs is on a roll. While he's probably had better days than today, he's lately been shooting off emails left and right in response to customers' concerns. We just were sent what appears to be one such Jobs response, sent last week surrounding the whole Mark Fiore situation. And it's a good one.

When questioned about Apple's role as moral police in the App Store, Jobs responds that “we do believe we have a moral responsibility to keep porn off the iPhone.” Better, is what he said next: “Folks who want porn can buy and [sic] Android phone.“

Last week, another Jobs email about the Fiore situation was published in which Jobs called the situation a “mistake.” He noted the same thing in this email, but the porn/Android link is the key here. Assuming this email is legit, this isn't the first time Jobs has suggested users try Android if they want porn. Earlier this month, during a Q&A session after the iPhone 4.0 OS event, Jobs said:

You know, there's a porn store for Android. You can download nothing but porn. You can download porn, your kids can download porn. That's a place we don't want to go – so we're not going to go there.

This is noteworthy both because it's funny, and because Apple and Google are in the early stages of a war that's brewing between the iPhone and Google's Android platform. Jobs is apparently going to keep taking these jabs from what he considers to be the moral high-ground.

Read the full back-and-forth below:

Matthew Browing, an Apple customer wrote the following to Jobs:

Steve,
I was converted to Apple products with the announcement of the iPhone 3G. (My friends have been trying to convince me for years.) Since then I've purchased 4 iPhones, 2 computers, several routers, and miscellaneous other items. Unfortunately, I'm really starting to have a philosophical issue with your company. It appears that more and more Apple is determining for it's consumers what content they should be able to receive. For instance, the blocking of Mark Fiore's comic app (due to being political satire) or blocking of what Apple considers to be porn.

I'm all for keeping porn out of kids hands. Heck – I'm all for ensuring that I don't have to see it unless I want to. But… that's what parental controls are for. Put these types of apps into categories and allow them to be blocked by their parents should they want to.

Apple's role isn't moral police – Apple's role is to design and produce really cool gadgets that do what the consumer wants them to do.

Thanks for listening

-Matthew

In response, Jobs replied:

Fiore's app will be in the store shortly. That was a mistake. However, we do believe we have a moral responsibility to keep porn off the iPhone. Folks who want porn can buy and Android phone.

Yes, Jobs apparently made a typo (and -> an), but we checked the IP headers on the email and they are legit. Of course, these can be faked, but it seems hard to believe that someone would go to all the work of sending us an email in which they changed all the IPs or manipulated all the time elements only to attach their real name and real email address to send it to us.


Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/19/steve-j…

10 comments

  • steve229
    14 years ago
    Steve Jobs sucks.

    sent from my iPhone
  • samsung1
    14 years ago
    It could be a marketing move also. Trying to label the google phone as porn phone and his iphone as the family friendly alternative.

    Google and porn companies are already friends considering how much money the porn companies spend on google advertising. Hell I started using google over yahoo once I realized I could find better porn using google.
  • gk
    14 years ago
    I thinks it's a blatant marketing tactic. Every mother out there will want her kids to buy an iPhone and discourage them if not iProhibit them (not that's not a typo) from buying an Android device, not to mention wives and their husbands. That is, if the moral high-grounders have heard all this.

    It's sad but getting scary that we've come to all this. In the old Soviet Union the government enlisted businesses and even family members to spy and inform on people who didn't have the "correct" behavior.

    But that couldn't happen here, could it? Too many "police" out there would be a scary thing. Next thing you know they would be telling us we have to wear seat belts, what doctor we have to see, how much junk food we can eat, and that we have to buy health insurance. Uh oh, wait a minute ....
  • sharkhunter
    14 years ago
    I want a thin foldable Ipad that has phone and camera built into it. Plus I want to be able to roll it up like a newspaper or poster. I'll settle for phone capability and camera for now. I imagine the thin plastic technology is years away.
  • samsung1
    14 years ago
    fyi apple just released quarterly report and the growth in iphone sales was excellent thanks to asian markets.
  • SnakePlissken
    14 years ago
    gk, the world you speak of is simply terrifying, I'm glad it's not really happen...ah, shit!
  • Dougster
    14 years ago
    Steve Jobs = fuckin' faggot
  • samsung1
    14 years ago
    54% Of Women More Likely To Date Men With iPhones, Says iPhone Retailer

    Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/21/54-of-w…

    Straight from the bullshit department: a recent survey of 1500 women has found that men who own an iPhone are more attractive than those who do not. Women were particularly repulsed by men who own a Palm Pre, the study also found.

    Ok, I made that second part up, but then again the first part was completely made up, too.

    According to the survey, which was held by Phones 4u, an online retailer of iPhones (and other phones) and thus utterly neutral any way you look at it, 54% of women stated that they would be more likely to date a man if he owns an iPhone.

    Which model, remains unclear.

    Update: this survey may never be actually held, or at least not by Phones 4u, the company now claims. Read the entire background here.

    One respondent, the company says, even suggested “if he has an iPhone then he’s obviously intelligent and well-off.”

    37% of those quizzed said that owning an iPhone makes a man seem more reliable, to which nearly all went on to say that a second date would be likely.

    I have an iPhone 3GS, so clearly, I can verify roughly 98% of all positive claims about men who own an iPhone. (Also, sorry ladies, but I’m happily married).

    But let’s not let the statistics get in the way of a good story, and juicy quotes:

    “There’s just something about a man who’s good with computers that makes him more trustworthy,” said Lucy, a 23-year-old primary school teacher from London. “If he’s got the cash for an iPhone then he must be very good at his job, too.”

  • curiousgeorgefun
    14 years ago
    What's the website for the "porn store" for android?
  • samsung1
    14 years ago
    http://mikandi.com/

    The World's First
    Mobile Adult App Store
    Currently available for Android phones only, but other devices coming soon.
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