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Apple recently green-lighted the release of  yet another controversial app for the iPhone.

This time the app in question  could potentially be used by cheating spouses.

Called TigerText, the app “allows users to set a time limit on how long a text that they send will hang around after it has been read,”according to Time magazine.

Thirty-four year-old Pro-golfer Tiger Woods is still making headlines as news of his scandalous extra-marital affairs and racy text messages continues to circulate through national media.

Time’s report notes that TigerText, named “coincidentally” after Woods, is capable of deleting a sent text message from the recipient’s phone, the sender’s phone and any severs and databases in-between.

Apple fans and iPhone users know this is not the first time the company has green lighted a less-than-decent or morally questionable software option.

In July 2009, the “Hottest Girls” app hit Apple’s online store and, much to the dismay of countless parents, featured scantily clad lingerie models and even nude pornography stars.

Although Apple executives acted quickly to remove “Hottest Girls,” it seems they are content to approve TigerText, an app which Time suggested could potentially be used between a “prominent politician” and “his mistress.”

TigerText developer X Sigma Partners LLC will even allow potential customers to try the app for free.

At its Web site www.tigertext.com, Sigma Partners also promises the app will soon be available for the Blackberry and Android smartphones.

In response to TigerText’s release, dozens of sites have posted their thoughts on and even concerns with this ethically questionable application and its future ramifications on society as a whole.

Technology news magazine web site Wired noted that TigerText is being “billed as a tool for adulterers” with the slogan “Cover your Tracks.”

In a Technology & Science piece featured on MSNBC.com, PC World’s Sarah Jacobsson admitted that TigerText is “perfect for cheating spouses, shady politicians, sexting teens, and people who send a lot of stupid texts while drunk.”

With countless TigerText purchases ringing in every day, it is becoming increasingly apparent to technology gurus and culture and society researches nationwide just how much value Americans place on privacy and how much they are willing to pay for it.

Although  Sigma Partners founder Jeffery Evans denies marketing TigerText to “people trying to cheat,” the potential ramifications of such technology and subsequent damages to relationships may prove otherwise.

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Another take on Apple and its headline making apps

After the removal of the pornographic application known as “Hottest Girls” (designed by app developer Allen Leung) for the increasingly popular Apple iPhone, it seems the multinational consumer electronics giant is seeking to clear its name of any connection to sexually explicit material.

In a bold, albeit somewhat of a shallow and pedantic move, Apple has implemented Christian iPhone app developer Island Wall Entertainment’s Purity Ring Application, “in an attempt to engage with today’s youth using new mediums,” according to Christian Today.

And why not?

After considering the ferocious uproar of countless Christian and non-Christian iPhone users alike over the sleezy photos found in Leung’s program, this would essentially serve to clear Apple’s name. Or will it?

For readers who are completely unfamiliar with the purity ring concept, allow me to fill you in. Back in the mid-nineties, the idea of sexual abstinence was being highly promoted by certain Christian-affiliated sexual abstinence groups.

The purity rings, also sometimes referred to as chastity rings, promise rings, or abstinence rings, were developed in an effort to encourage the “true love waits” mindset among teens and twenty-somethings still in the their prime dating years.

Interestingly enough, the Bush administration of the 90′s had a lot to do with the cultural explosion of the purity ring phenomenon, considering they threw millions of dollars worth of government money into funding advertisement campaigns for the rings.

The goal was to educate teenagers about the dangers of STI/STDs and promote safe sex (a rather ironic message, considering the purity rings promote no sex at all until marriage).

And now it seems that the former scantily-clad-and-nude-model-approving Apple Inc. is attempting to throw the Christian iPhone users demographic a bone.

Any iPhone or even iPod Touch owner now has the option of taking a “purity pledge” via their specific device, one which will result in a three-dimensional purity ring display “spinning on the screen….in an infinite loop.” Talk about desperation!

Am I the only one out there who thinks Apple could really care less about the moral and spiritual issues behind pornography? Or the only one who thinks this money-hungry electronics giant is just endeavoring to keep their “religious” iPhone users for fear of losing subscriptions and loads of cash? Pathetic.

Why not promote the real message and ideals behind sexual abstinence and purity all together; the message that Island Wall Entertainment is no doubt seeking to encourage?

After all, Company Director Henry E. Bennett remarked, “This is an exciting opportunity to reach a whole new generation of people, on a platform that has never been used to spread this important message.”

“I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?”

Job 31:1 (New American Standard¬-updated edition)

“I made a solemn pact with myself never to undress a girl with my eyes.”

Job 31:1 (The Message Translation)

Of the aforementioned passages, seventeenth century English clergyman Matthew Henry says, “The lusts of the flesh, and the love of the world, are the two fatal rocks on which multitudes split; against these Job protests he was always careful to stand upon his guard…From the beginning it was so, that a man should have but one wife and cleave to her only; and Job kept closely to that institution and abhorred the thought of transgressing it; for, though his greatness might tempt him to it, his goodness kept him from it.” (Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Old Testament).

And remember: the first sin in the world began in the eye (Genesis 3:6).

It seems to me Apple is just looking out for their own public image. May God bless the efforts and message of Island Wall’s software, despite the senseless antics of a money-hungry corporation.

-Josh Givens, The Underground staff writer

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Though Mac commercials are always portraying Windows computers (and users by extension) as overweight, lame, geeks, it seems like Apple is the one not “with it.”

In the past few months, Apple has shut down no less than four applications for the iPhone and iPod touch that the company deemed questionable.

These include an application about Jesus, one about the Kama Sutra, Beauty Meter and the Hottest Girls app.

According to the Associated Press, the “Me So Holy” application allowed people to choose “their religion, take a picture of themselves, and insert their face into a messianic image.”

The Eucalyptus app allowed iPhone users to search for the perfect sexual position in the Kama Sutra on the go. Eucalyptus allows usesrs to access books online from Project Gutenberg.

After pressure from the developer, Apple eventually welcomed the app back with open arms.

The BeautyMeter app allowed users to view and rate user-submitted images of men and women. The app was yanked after an image of a topless 15 year old girl showed up on the app.

Hottest Girls was an application that just had pictures of scantily clad women.

Unlike the other applications, Apple approved the Hottest Girls application.

Then, when Apple wasn’t looking, the makers of Hottest Girls added topless photos of women to the app’s mix.

The application was met with a large demand, but was later yanked off of digital shelves.

In a statement, Apple officials said, “The developer of this application added inappropriate content directly from their server after the application had been approved and distributed, and after the developer had subsequently been asked to remove some offensive content.”

“This was a direct violation of the terms of the iPhone Developer Program. The application is no longer available on the App Store.”

While the mainstream is demonizing Apple for its prudish behavior, it should be applauding the company’s moral stance on the issue.

At least one company out there is cool enough not to cave in to the pressures of a few.

Apple wants to be a family-friendly brand. What’s so wrong with that?

Besides, most iPhone users probably don’t want to access pornography on their phones anyway.

The company is also probably protecting people from themselves.

Though you have to be blind not to see how pornography and violence lead to moral decay, some researchers have consistently argued that there is a link.

Sure, some people may not want to be protected, but they don’t have to get iPhones.

There are so many phones out there from which to choose. That’s the good thing about choice. If you don’t like a company’s practices, you can take your business elsewhere.

– Tiffany Orr, The Underground managing editor

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(Newsfactor) Recently, Apple found itself in the middle of yet another controversy about its App Store vetting practices after rejecting the Me So Holy app. Apple called the iPhone application "objectionable."

–Maurice Williams, The Underground staff writer

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