Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2008/12/26/ifart/

If you can fart, you can earn $10,000

As Apple relaxes, stinkers escape

By Rik Myslewski

Posted in Applications, 26th December 2008 22:01 GMT

iPhone developers have discovered that there's big money to be made in - as Mark Twain once described it - clearing one's nether throat. According to stats published on his website, developer Joel Comm's unsubtley named iFart Mobile is the current point-poot in a silent-but-deadly rise in the popularity of cyber-flatulence.

Either the apocalypse is drawing nigh, or shareholders of GlaxoSmithKline - makers of Beano - should sell, sell, sell.

Websites such as CNN.Money, TechCrunch, and VentureBeat have reported that iFart - the most popular of the new and gaseous gang of iPhone and iPod Touch "entertainment" apps - is pulling in around $10,000 per day.

The immediate reason for this surge in colonic purge is Apple's recent relaxation of its previously more-stringent App Store standards - a move that immediately inspired a concomitant relaxation of cybersphincters among developers of mobile "crapware."

Consider, if you will, the following representative digifarts now available for your edification and enjoyment (these links are to the iTunes App Store):

We could go on. But that would be wrong.

It remains to be seen - or detected by some other, more olfactory sense - what other directions Apple's relaxation of its guidelines may lead, seeing as how even the mildest form of sexual titilation remains verboten. Maybe the App Store will next feature iPuke? Or iRidiculeEthnicMinorities? Only time will tell.

One thing's for certain, though: The success of iFart and its fellows is no mere poot in the pan. Expect further refinements of audio excellence and flatulential functionality - as Comm says, "Watch for v1.1 ... we’ve got some great new features that you are going to love."

We can hardly hold in our excitement...