Free iOS app service, AppGratis goes missing from Apple's App Store

AppGratis, a service boasting 10 million users that offered a free or discounted app once a day on Apple's App Store, has gone missing.

The software exited from the App Store late last week, according to Pocket Gamer.biz, this was despite its approval, and on being included in Apple's platform, since last December.

AppGratis started off as "an email newsletter shared among friends," before its evolution into a business. The company brokers dealt with developers to make their software free for 24 hours, something that could help getting unknown apps discovered,and potentially boosting their profile in the paid section of Apple's rankings when the sale was over.

Similar services include FAAD and AppiDay, with apps still on Apple's store.

TechCrunch noted in January that the company, after picking up a $13.5 million round of funding, was growing by around 100,000 new app users a day. The company reported reaching 10 million users in a blog post in February.

According to an Apple spokesman who spoke to CNET, the software was removed for breaking two of the company's App Store guidelines regarding display of Apps and use of Push Notifications to send promotions, or direct marketing of any kind.

The rule regarding display Apps was introduced in October and read,  ''Apps that display Apps other than your own for purchase or promotion in a manner similar to or confusing with the App Store will be rejected.''

AppGratis CEO Simon Dawlat had at the time said Apple was probably going after low-quality copycats, not AppGratis.

However, other popular discovery apps have been affected by Apple's new guidelines, and according to  PocketGamer.biz, AppShopper was removed from the App Store and had yet to make a comeback.

AppShopper offered a way to search the App Store that was in direct competition with Apple's own App Store and additionally, it provided for alerts when an app was on sale, effectively reducing developer revenue per user.

Commentators say there may be other scenarios behind the abrupt termination like AppGratis using a private API or breaking an insignificant guideline. Apple would not put the app back in the store until an updated version was submitted.

They say as always developers were at the mercy of Apple's review team. They added teams often contacted developers to require some changes to an app in order to stay in the store.