Instagram doesn't approve my app with some partly irrelevant feedback - api

I have written an app which notifies users when someone make them unfollow (As like as any other apps in this area). Then, I got my app approved by Instagram. After six/seven attempts, they don't approve the app till now. I followed their instructions as feedback and fixed any probable privacy problem which my app might have. But I didn't get any bright answer from them as far.
I throw my app on the following use case:
My product helps brands and advertisers understand, manage their
audience and media rights.
And I wrote my API use cases as follows:
Thank you for considering our request to approve our application. The
required information for enabling live mode for our application is
explained in the following lines:
Q1: How your app does use the Instagram API?
First of all, our user (i.e. brands or advertisers) selects the “Unfollow Finder Service” on our application.
We redirect the user to Instagram login page, as indicated in API documentation, to authorize his account to accessing required scopes.
i. Note that we already told the user everything that we are going to
use.
We tend to call follow APIs whenever the authorized user clicks a button in our application.
Ultimately, we inform the authorized user with the information obtained from step 3.
Q2: How does it fall into one of the approved use cases?
The list of users who recently unfollowed/followed an
Instagram account are definitely crucial and beneficial for the brands
and advertisers on Instagram. In this way, they can get feedback
implicitly from their customers. Our service help them to manage their
audiences and provide better content for them. So, according to Q1,
our use case falls into “My product helps brands and advertisers
understand, manage their audience and media rights.” We never violate
the approved scopes and Instagram's privacy.
Q3: Who will be using your app?
In our region, lots of brands and businesses utilize
Instagram to publish their content. They are the users of our service
and can use it to improve their relation with their audiences. Kind
regards,
As you see, I'm trying to tell them everything in detail. But in my last submission, they declined me with the following feedback:
General issues:
Policy Violation ("Like", "Follow", "Comment" Exchange Program): Your
app shouldn't participate, enable or promote any “like”, “share”,
“comment” or “follower” exchange programs. In working to build a high
quality platform experience, we ask that you comply with our Platform
Policy (http://wwww.instagram.com/about/legal/terms/api/).
I just want permission on follower_list scope from them. The surprising part is that they noted me with almost irrelevant feedback. It seems that they do not want to approve my app at all.
Do I violate their privacy?
Does anyone face this problem? How can I fix it and had my app approved?
Sorry for asking this question here since I almost googled entire web (+Stackoverflow) and find no helpful answer. All of my previous attempts were gone away.
Thanks in advance.

Related

Correct way to ask for chatbot verification

I want to 1) be able to receive updates about the activity in the comments on my instagram page and then 2) to be able to leave a reply.
I far as I understand the products, 1) can be made using Webhooks and 2) requires Instagram Graph API.
My app is intended to be used only by me. However, when I try to go through verification process, the form requires me to show how users can log into the app and so on. This does not apply to me.
The app is really simple: the comment is posted -> Webhook sends an update -> a reply is generated (this is out of the scope of this question) -> a reply is posted using Instagram Graph API from my page. You can see that the app does not have or require any additional UI.
The owner/developer of this chatbot is business, however it does not provide any servicies to other businesses. When applying for verification, I am only requesting 'instagram_manage_comments', however even there they ask me about the user log in (see the attached screenshot).
The account went through business verification already.
I was not able to find the information that is 100% relevant to my case.
The question is: what is the correct way to ask for the verification? Does Instagram support apps without additional UI and logging in? And basically what am I doing wrong?
Thanks in advance!

LinkedIn: Find Profile by VanityName - Approved developer

My team and I are looking to add to our app several features of the Linkedin API that are currently restricted. In order of importance to us:
Find Profile by VanityName
Webhooks
Video UGC Post
We already quite understand that Webhooks and Video UGC Post are REALLY restricted. What about the first one?
In general, how can we get in contact with the right people to get such approvals? Nowhere it is mentioned that we cannot apply, just that it is restricted.
We are very happy to work with Linkedin requirements, whatever they are.
Thanks.
Thibault Drevon,
CTO of bobcaat.
To be able to find profile by VanityName with LinkedIn API you need to become a LinkedIn Partner.
First you need to create an application https://www.linkedin.com/developer/apps
Once you've created an "application" you can then apply to become a LinkedIn partner. To apply go to https://developer.linkedin.com/partner-programs/apply
LinkedIn's Business Development team will review all applications and will endeavour to respond to you within 15 days.

Instagram closed api for POST and DELETE methods.

So as of now Instagram changed the policy and now i can't create an access token with relationships+likes scope. But third party apps like Crowdfire still work. On official Instagram page they said that only third party apps that will receive the privilege of advanced scope are the apps that Instagram itself approved. Anyone had any experience filing the application for approval? Or can you guys give me tips of how to bypass that.
p.s.
I have an app that creates multiple access_tokens for different client, nothing spammy, just likes the feed of users and automatically follows people that followed them. (yeah, some people are into that) And mass unfollow (idk if thats bad or not)

iOS app consuming RESTful webservice for authentication

I am developing an app for iOS. I am planning to publish this app in app-store as free app. I would like to authorize app users via outside RESTful webservice. Is this practice against any Apple official guidelines and can be not approved by Apple app review?
The Apple Review Guidelines 11.1 states:
Apps that unlock or enable additional features or functionality with
mechanisms other than the App Store will be rejected.
It sounds clear, but I believe it is open to interpretation on behalf of their reviewers. My company has produced an app exactly as you describe and it not only passed but has been versioned up very recently. Like yours, this app consumes a web service and while the launch screen is public facing, the user must immediately authenticate on the screen after that to go any further.
Our app was not a good candidate for the enterprise store model, since the intention is to distribute to customers, not employees.
Also, and perhaps most telling, when you prepare to upload your binary the iTunes Connect portal has a place for you to enter demo account credentials for the testers to access protected content in your app. So I think you're OK. Screencap below taken from iTunes Connect.
UPDATE
Apparently, when submitting your app you can provide demo account information (#erikr98), implying that an app like yours could be tested by Apple and be approved in the store. I've seen apps like this and worked on them before, but was under the impression that you also had to provide some sort of functionality in the app outside of your "pay wall."
....
I think the answer is maybe. It sounds like you're hovering the line between a public app and an enterprise app. I'm going to assume your question could be rephrased like this:
"I make money from my customers through an existing process (probably on the web) and I want to allow them to use that functionality on iOS without giving 1/3 of that money to Apple via a paid-app or through In-App Purchase. If I build a free app and provide my current customers access to its content via their existing accounts (and through a login process) will Apple reject it?"
Apple's App Store Review Guidelines, Section 11, clearly states that if you allow users to upgrade the content, unlock features or abilities, or purchase content through your application, that purchase must be done through In-App Purchase.
However, in my experience I have found that Apple will not reject an application if it provides value to everyone, not just those with an account. If you provide some sort of benefit for someone without an account you stand a much better chance. In my case we had, 5 features available to the people without an account, and 10 features available for those that could login. Our app was approved and released to the App Store. This was last year.
Also, think about this from a reviewer's perspective at Apple: When you sit down to review an app, its probably not a good sign that you can't access any part of the app without a user name and password.
Look at the model that the newspapers use. Washington Post, for example, has a free app with a $15 In-App purchase that provides you access to their content. You get a limited number of free articles, first, though. See, they provide content for everyone even if on a limited basis. You can also sign into the application, which unlocks all content, if you already have a paying account.

Account Strategies on New Social Enabled Sites

So I'm in the midst of creating a Facebook Connect enabled site. The site in question will leverage your social graph - as defined by your facebook account - to do social things (what is really not important here). Here's the big question I have:
Are people still rolling their own authentication heuristic when using something like Facebook Connect? That is, are newer (FBConnect) sites today providing only FBConnect as an authentication strategy, or are they pairing it with other auth strategies (such as Google Auth, Open ID, etc)? What do you think is the best way to go? With Facebook having over 300,000,000 users now, is having 1 authentication strategy (FBConnect) enough? Or is it proper netiquette to provide users other means?
Some of the references I have been looking at today:
http://www.kenburbary.com/2009/08/five-reasons-companies-should-be-integrating-social-media-with-facebook-connect/
Increased Registration - Data from Facebook states that sites that use Facebook Conect as an alternate to account registration have seen a 30-300% increase in registration on their sites.
• Citysearch.com – Daily site registrations have tripled in the 4 months since Facebook Connect testing began
• Huffingtonpost.com – Since integrating with Facebook Connect, more than 33% of their new commentor registrations come through Facebook
• Cbsinsider.com – Over 85% of all new user registrations are coming from Facebook Connect
http://www.simtechnologies.net/facebook-connect-integration.php
"according to the current statistics using facebook connect increases 30-40% user traffic as compared to non-facebook connect websites."
http://wiki.developers.facebook.com/index.php/Connect/Authentication_and_Authorization
Our research has shown that sites that implement Facebook Connect see user registration rates increase by 30 - 200%.
No Need to Create Separate Accounts
In general, it's not a good practice to force a new user to create a separate account when registering on your site with Facebook Connect. You'll have the user's Facebook account information, and can create a unique identifier on your system for that user.
Just make sure you understand what Facebook user data you can store, or simply cache for 24 hours. See Storable Information for details.
If the user ever deactivates his or her Facebook account, you have a chance to contact the user to request the user create a new account on your site. When a user deactivates his or her account, we ping your account reclamation URL to notify you of the deactivation. Then Facebook sends the user an email regarding the deactivation. If the user has connected accounts with any Facebook Connect sites, and if your site has specified an account reclamation URL, the email will contain a section with your application logo, name, and reclamation link, in addition to an explanation about the link's purpose. For more information, see Reclaiming Accounts.
http://www.chrisbrogan.com/how-facebook-connect-points-the-way-towards-velvet-rope-networks/
The Drawbacks
Though there are advantages to using Facebook Connect for integration, there are some drawbacks, mostly from the marketer’s point of view. If you build out a social network project using Facebook Connect, Facebook gets all the information and you get none. You don’t get a database of users. You don’t get a way to message people participating in your event, except for “in stream,” the way everyone else is using the app. You don’t have any sense of demographics, nor any control abilities to block trolls or other unwanted types.
Crystal Beasley "All of the FB Connect sites we have built so far have incorporated "standard" accounts as well, even with the added complexity of supporting dual login methods."
There are still people who use mySpace (myself not included), and I know a several people coming out of college that have completely deleted their FB accounts to get rid of information of them they don't want potential employers to find (I know, there are a lot easier ways of doing this). If there are people who for whatever reason do not want to have a FB account, at least give them the option of creating a private google account.
Using ONLY Facebook as the register/login-method seems pretty dangerous to me. If you had a regular user management system, with Facebook Connect to speed up the process from a user-perspective is a good idea.
The Problem is somewhere else
if you really want to leverage the social graph only facebook brings "pure" data
the graphs people build at e.g. myspace arent telling much about that person and its social env. - at google neither
if you are just heading for viral spreading prefer the plattforms that share the best (just facebook again)