Heard the one about how many full-time staff does it take to approve 8,500 apps a week?
Apple has revealed some information about the approvals process for iPhone applications, in a filing to the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
It includes the fact that 95% of apps are approved within 14 days of their submission, and that Apple has 40 full-time trained reviewers studying the 8,500 new apps and updates that are submitted every week by developers.
The filing also states that roughly 20% of these are "not approved as originally submitted" - although this doesn't mean they're rejected outright, but sent back to developers for tweaks and changes.
What about controversial apps? Apple reveals in the filing that it has "established an App Store executive review board that determines procedures and sets policy for the review process, as well as reviews applications that are escalated to the board because they raise new or complex issues."
The board meets once a week. The filing is part of the FCC's investigation into the alleged rejection of the Google Voice telephony app.
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Talking of which, Apple stresses that Google's app has NOT been rejected, but that the company "continues to study it" - although the filing goes on to outline a series of concerns.
But from an ME perspective, developers will be pleased at the news of the executive review board, even if they wonder whether 40 staff is enough to deal with 8,500 apps and updates a week.
