Annihilation Celebration App

Well I made an App. What I could have never imagined is that Apple would reject it for a reason that still doesn’t make sense to me. Here’s the story…

 I was in the middle of editing an independent film I had made called Annihilation Celebration. When deciding how to distribute it, the two obvious options were Amazon and iTunes. From my reading I learned that offering my movie on Amazon would be no problem, but that getting approved on iTunes would be close to impossible. Requiring an expensive process in which you paid “approved aggregators” who still can’t ensure that you’ll be approved once submitted, everything I read basically confirmed it was close to impossible to get your movie available on iTunes as an independent film maker.  However I ran across an article written by an indie filmmaker who had found a creative way to offer his movie as an App. As I researched further, I found lots of other filmmakers just like him that all had movie Apps approved and for sale in the app store allowing them to share their film through this unique platform. Excited about the idea and wanting to release my film in the most versatile way possible, I decided to offer the movie as both an Amazon download as well as a movie App. In the end, it was about making my movie accessible to the most people possible and since everyone is walking around with a smart phone in their pocket, creating a movie app meant I could make my movie available to basically everybody.

 Since I had already seen it work on the Apple platform, I decided to start building a version in iOS. I really knew nothing about the process and it ended up being a massive undertaking. Wanting the app to have its own feel, I opted to create a custom layout instead of using a template. For the programming, we reached out to a few different developers and ended up working with a team in India.  I determined the layout and functionality, created the images, graphics and buttons in Photoshop and would then pass it along to the programmers to put it together. The undertaking required what would be considered a substantial amount of time and money for most anyone. Despite the language barrier, which often made communication difficult, we finally reached completion and I was really happy with the App. The finished Annihilation Celebration Movie App included:

•  The Annihilation Celebration short film (which streamed instantly over the internet, keeping the app file size small)
• A narrated “about the film” section in which the user can choose to either swipe read the text or push a button to have the text read to them with a narrated audio experience.
• A section to view additional special feature videos.
• A user controlled photo gallery with background music.
• Links to the Thinkpierce Website and social media sites.

 Pretty interactive right? Not according to Apple. Since I had based my App model after Apps that had already been approved and were currently for sale in the App store (even still today), getting rejected was the last thing I had expected. However, that’s what happened. After submitting my App to the App store, Apple sent me the following response:

“We found that your app is primarily a movie and is therefore not appropriate for the App Store as noted in the App Store Review Guidelines. Songs and movies should be submitted to the iTunes store. It would be appropriate to revise your app to integrate more iOS functionality and interactivity.”

Annihilation Celebration App

To be honest I was shocked. Basically what this meant was that during the period in which I had developed and submitted my App, Apple had changed their App Store Review Guidelines, which now rejected apps that they had previously accepted. Simply put, within the months I had been working on my app, Apple decided to change its rules and it was just “too bad for me.” I immediately thought of South Park’s “HumancentiPad” episode, which among other things pokes fun at how often apple changes their iTunes agreement.

 The rejection included an option to appeal the decision. Having just invested a considerable amount of time and money into creating the App, I was not only starting to realize that I actually had no control over it, but that it was possible all the work put in to the App could end up meaning nothing. Here were some of the main points I made in my appeal to Apple hoping they would reverse their decision to reject my App:

• I specifically based my App model off of Apps that had already been approved and were currently for sale in the Apple App store. The Apps I referenced continue to be for sale in the App store today. I then listed the links to the movie apps I had referenced and also offered to provide additional examples of as many currently sold movie apps as would be necessary to verify. (To this they responded by saying that Apple’s submission requirements had been less conservative in the past and they thanked me for making them aware of Apps that might be out of compliance so they could take necessary action, as appropriate.)

•  As long as I have complied with Apple’s programming requirements, why is Apple determining if the App is a good idea, instead of letting it go to market and allowing the consumers to decide? (I didn’t receive a response to this)

•  What difference does it make whether my movie is in the form of an App or the form of an iTunes movie download since Apple owns both stores and would make money on it regardless of what platform it is in? (I didn’t receive a response to this)

•  Since Apple has made it so difficult for an independent filmmaker to offer his or her movie in iTunes, creating a movie app is an amazing way a filmmaker can make his film available to anyone in the world with the added benefit of providing extra content, features and interaction that simply couldn’t be offered in an iTunes movie download. Rejecting my App simply because the primary focus of my App is a movie only leaves me wondering why Apple would even care what the focus of the App is as long as it wasn’t blatantly offensive? If my idea gives me a chance to reach out to my audience through an App and make it a success, what reason is there to stop me before I can even try? Especially since Apple would have nothing to lose and everything to gain from it? (I didn’t receive a response to this.)

•  Thinking I might actually be experiencing a light at the end of the tunnel, the appeal process led to me receiving a phone call from a rep that explained she hoped I would consider adding more interactive features to my app so that it could comply with Apple’s current guidelines. I responded by telling the rep that I thought Apple had lost touch with what an individual has to go through to even assemble an app and that adding additional “interactive” features to my app, would not only mean I would have to go back and double the amount of time and money I had already invested in the app – especially since it was just as interactive if not more interactive than many of the Apps off its kind currently for sale in the App store today, but that by doing so, I would end up with an app that was no longer something I had wanted to create, but rather an app that Apple wanted me to create. As a creative free thinker, if creating an Apple app only means I’m only allowed to create the App that Apple wants me to make, where does Apple’s requirements begin and my creativity end? I also mentioned that even if I did create a new app concept that was within Apple’s “interactivity” guidelines today, how could I have any assurance that Apple wouldn’t modify their guidelines between now and the future causing me to find myself in the same situation again? (To this the rep just referred me to some of Apple’s developer videos which explained the type of interactivity Apple is currently promoting)

Annihilation Celebration App

 …I could go on, because trust me, the more I thought about it, the more insane it was that Apple would reject an App like this. In the end, the main response I got was that Apple apps (which were once the source of a totally open platform where anything was possible) are now required to specifically be “interactive”.  However, the definition of “interactive” is up to Apple, and that definition can change at ay time. Interestingly, that same week, I saw an “alarm clock” app featured as an editor’s choice in the app store. Why my movie app wasn’t considered to be at least as interactive as an alarm clock app, I’ll never know. Looking in to it further I learned that I wasn’t alone as I ran across similar stories of app makers also rejected for foggy reasoning. The one common thread was that Apple could pretty much come up with any reason to reject an App even if that reason didn’t make any sense.

 In the end, after considering all the factors involved, I decided this was a situation where I just needed to cut my losses. Yeah I guess I could have gone back and spent more time and money developing the App in to something I didn’t even want it to be, but Apple hadn’t given me any reason to believe that things would be any different the second time around. In fact it only revealed how unpredictable I could expect the experience to be in the future. Would this have all been different if I had come up with an App concept that had been approved? Sure. But what I ended up learning about Apple’s app industry the hard way is that the fate of your App’s acceptance hangs on whatever the App Store Review Guidelines happen to be that particular month, plain and simple. And yes there’s also the option to give it a whirl on Android, but at this point I think I’m just done with it for the time being.

 What I learned from my experience is that as an app maker, I am not in control. I learned that the app world operates on a set of rules that can change at any time. I’ve always been careful not to put myself in situations where the fate of my hard work is in someone else’s hands but in this case I didn’t see it coming. On the other hand this is how phrases like, “sometimes life just isn’t fair” are born, right? At least that’s the phrase I’m going with to chalk this one up to, but life goes on. Speaking of which, on a positive note, my experience with Amazon was a success. Click here to view Annihilation Celebration as an instant movie download on Amazon.com or learn more by visiting the film website. Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

Jim Jamkins

Shortly after graduating high school I wrote and self-published a book about an oddball character that lived in a school bus titled, “Jim Jamkins: The Fringe Benefits of Converting a School Bus into a Home.” The comical story allowed readers to see life through Jim’s eyes as he used unlikely logic to handle the different experiences that were presented to him throughout each chapter. In the opening pages Jim decides to purchase and live in a school bus. Although he researched a number of housing options, Jim realized that to afford any of them he would have to put in more than 30 hours a week at the local pizza place where he worked. Spending that amount of time working would severely cut in to Jim’s current video game schedule. And if you knew anything about Jim, you understood that gaming was one aspect of his life that was non-negotiable. Sure, he ended up having to buy cheaper land that was located next to a semi-dangerous electrical power site in order to stay within his budget and pull the whole thing off, but on the flipside he was able to live in a freaking awesome custom rigged school bus and enjoy uninterrupted game play.

Jim Jamkins

But when a leak in the bus roof suddenly ruins his gaming console, Jim’s world is turned upside down as he figures out how else to spend his time while waiting to hear back from customer support. Throughout the book Jim proceeds to undertake such projects as creating an imaginary community out of trash in his backyard, have the most awkward rollerblading accident / dentist appointment of his life which ultimately inspired him to purchase a daddy long legs insect farm, end up using a box of Smack Puffs cereal to reenact a movie, have a nightmarish experience delivering a pizza to a customer, and much more. While true, it’s likely that Jim is probably the only person that could handle dealing with such an insane combination of psychotic experiences, it’s also fair to say that Jim is probably the only person who could manage to get himself in those situations in the first place. The more I wrote about Jim, the more interesting his life became and I decided to delay a solution to his video game dilemma, extending the storyline to a second book that would pick up where book one had left off.

Jim Jamkins

After self-publishing book one as a paperback, I went on to write “book two” of the paperback series, which I was planning to title, “Buckle Up, It’s Gonna be a Rough Ride.” The storyline in book two was based around Jim’s frustration with his unreliable SUV that had “untraceable / unfixable” electrical problems. Completely fed up and unable to sell the vehicle due to its faultiness, Jim decided to host a “farewell and good riddance” bon fire in which he would blow it up. In the climax of the story Jim devises a dramatic mob style vehicle assassination, which required guests to yell and scream with pitchforks in a medieval battle like setting. Wanting the event to be played out like a Hollywood production, Jim planned to jump a scooter (his new ride which was actually quite reliable) off a ramp he had attached to his bus that would hurl him over the SUV as he fired bullets in to it at the exact time guests were signaled to ignite trails of gun powder triggering explosives inside the vehicle, sending Jim through the flames like Evel Knievel. I was never fully happy with the completed book cover illustration for Book two because I felt you couldn’t quite tell what was happening just from looking at it. But to be fair, after what I just described, how could you, ha ha. I really enjoyed working on the storyline of book two, however, up to my neck in real estate and remodeling work at the time, the endeavor slipped through the cracks and I never ended up following through with publishing the second book.

Jim Jamkins

Years later I pulled the original paperback book after deciding to redevelop Jim Jamkins character and storyline. As time had passed, I felt the original book wasn’t as good as it could be and I welcomed the opportunity to make it better. Learn more about how that came about here. Among other changes, the revamped story of Jim Jamkins would also include a new character design, (which had previously simply been a likeness of me, ha ha). Unlike the original book, the new Jim Jamkins story will feature illustrations of each scene. I went on to draw a number of characters and scenes for the new story, which were then passed along for coloring. You can see those completed illustrations in the gallery below. The work continued for a while and then seemed to taper off and reach another stopping point. Shuffled in with a variety of other projects I’m currently working on, the “new” Jim Jamkins book is still a ways away from being finished. Maybe one day the stars will align and the timing will be right for me to get back to it. Although I’ve made other creative projects a priority right now, the story of Jim Jamkins is definitely something I’m planning to complete at some point in the future. Either way, this process has also shed a light in helping me understand why some movies or stories have taken “years” to reach completion, ha ha.

Zap Nugget

Recently I updated the Zap Nugget book page with a new promo photo and preview pages from the book. Special thanks to my wife Rhona for helping create the giant zap nugget iconic trophy… Click here to give it a gander. Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

For roughly 6 years I lived in a downtown Tulsa Apartment that also ended up being the location where I created the first version of Thinkpierce.com. The low rent and high tolerance of the area allowed me the freedom to fund creative endeavors and play drums at full volume (even though I had neighbors directly below me– thanks Daniel & Mercedes! ☺ It also ended up being the set location of an independent film I made called, “The Turtleneck Club”  Let’s just say to call it a bachelor pad, would be an understatement; for starters I literally installed a shower in it. ha ha. Before getting married and moving to a place with a roof that didn’t leak, ha ha, I decided to get it on camera in all it’s glory thanks to the help of video buff James Plumlee. In addition to shooting the apartment at different times of the year, I was able to get access to a couple of high-rise buildings nearby to really capture the area. It’s been fun to finally put all the pieces together and end up with a video snap shot of what would best be described as the original “Thinkpierce Headquarters.” Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

Utica Remodeling Compnay

When I started setting up a camera on my remodeling jobs with the idea of creating a website that showcased videos of my work, I wondered why more business owners didn’t try to do the same thing.  Now that I’ve done it I know why; it is practically a second job! Ha ha.  Click here to check out this week’s video, which combines clips from various job sites to create a power packed promo for the Utica Remodeling Company Episodes. Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

Captain Robert Play

Anyone that has rummaged through a few pages of Thinkpierce.com, probably wouldn’t be surprised to learn that drama class was one of my electives as a senior in high school.  What might not be expected however was that I hated it.  The class focused heavily on Shakespeare type plays and other stereotypical content that anyone would assume to be a part of a drama class. It seemed to be something my peers could get in to, but it just wasn’t for me. When I dropped the class and didn’t return the next quarter something unique happened; for whatever reason, the drama teacher Mrs. Harbolt wanted me to come back to the class when the next semester started.  Around that same time I had already started working on a rough draft for a space based story during my homeroom period that featured a character named Captain Robert. I wasn’t really interested in coming back to the class if I had to keep doing the same type of stuff I had done the first quarter, however Mrs. Harbolt’s question put another idea in my head. I asked her if she would let me put on my own play if I enrolled in drama again next semester.  I don’t know why, but she said yes and that moment marked the beginning of what would eventually turn in to a play called, “Captain Robert and the Search for Magni-Tron Transmitters.”

Captain Robert Play

Over the remaining weeks I finished writing the script during my homeroom class and once the next semester arrived I was ready to get started. True to her word, Mrs. Harbolt gave me control of the class for a set amount of weeks as well as a small budget to spend on costumes and building the set. I was truly blown away by the opportunity I had been given. I was allotted a specific amount of time to rehearse with the class and after a lot of work on everyone’s part the day finally came to perform the play. We performed it two weekend nights and had a really positive turn out. Many of the audience members who had seen it the first night, came back to see it the second night as well.  The zany storyline included anything from an insane choreographed rant about the lunch I brought to a woman swooning lip sync performance of Backstreet Boys’ I Want It That Way. Due to the positive buzz the play had created, the school administration asked us to perform it again the following week to provide entertainment for all of the seniors while the junior class was doing some testing. This brought a lot more exposure to the play that it wouldn’t have gotten otherwise and seemed to once again bring a positive response from the audience.

Captain Robert Play

The experience of getting to create this play ended up being a landmark moment for me creatively. I owe a huge thanks to Mrs. Harbolt as well as my fellow drama class students for allowing me a unique creative opportunity that I’ll never forget. The only regret I have is that I didn’t take better steps at the time to get higher quality video footage of the performance.  Although I currently have a lot of creative goals that I have made a priority right now, one day I plan to make a unique movie version of this play. When that day comes, I will probably have such a natural high that people will think I’m insane….er, wait a minute…

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The Rental Rehab

While I was in the process of remodeling an owner finance fix up the tenants in the house next door moved out. Weeks later, it had turned in to another rental rehab project by Utica Remodeling Company. Click here to watch the video. Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

Numlock & Gordon

“Numlock & Gordon” is the half-finished illustrated story of two characters that I sketched while working a call center job. It began by drawing a character named Gordon in a veterinarian clinic who was becoming obsessed with a rugged door wreath while waiting for his dog – you know, the predictable action-romance “Hollywood blockbuster” storyline that gets recycled and released every year? Yeah, that one. From there a rough plot began in my head adding a sidekick character named “Numlock” (named after the numlock key) and the Numlock and Gordon adventure began.

During that period, I was working as much over overtime as I could at the call center to raise money for The Turtleneck Club, an independent film I shot later that year. Drawing “Numlock and Gordon” in addition to a small army of other oddball characters and drawings was a way for me to pass the time during those long hours. Many of those additional characters and drawings were later used in a book of illustrated stories I wrote called, Zap Nugget.

Numlock & Gordon

After raising the money to shoot The Turtleneck Club movie, I had gotten what I wanted out of the call center job and since I already had some home repair experience under my belt, I decided to dive back in to remodeling work which later turned into Utica Remodeling Company. Although I had reached the halfway point of the Numlock and Gordon storyline, I didn’t consider the project to be a main focus at the time and the drawings sat in a folder as I continued to remodel and work on other creative projects.  Years later, my interest in the characters picked back up when I was working with colorists to enliven some of my other whacko-spazzed illustrations, which later became Thinkpierce Art. That experience opened my eyes to the possibilities, and I was starting to envision Numlock and Gordon’s spastic tale in the form of a book app.

At that same time I was also in the process of redeveloping another story I had written featuring a character named Jim Jamkins. Working on both stories at the same time allowed me to see a lot of similarities that I felt both Jim Jamkins and the Numlock and Gordon characters shared. Since both storylines had such a similar feel and because I could start to see that I might be spreading myself out too thin by taking on more than I could complete, I came up with the idea of combining them, merging the qualities of Jim Jamkins and Gordon together creating only one lead character. Because I had already done more development with Jim Jamkins, I stuck with that name with the intention that Numlock’s character would be transformed in to a neighbor or friend for Jim later on.

Numlock & Gordon

With a new vision in place, I went back to the drawing board and created a redeveloped character sketch of Jim Jamkins. I then began drawing accompanying characters and scenes for the revamped storyline, passing them along for coloring. You can see some of the completed illustrations here. As the redevelopment process tapered off, the original story I had written about Gordon’s obsession with a rugged wreath was turned in to the storyline for “Jim Jamkins”…and up to this point, that’s where it has halted.

Looking back, the story of Numlock and Gordon is a perfect example of what can occur during the creative process and ultimately represents what will perhaps one day become a story or series of stories about a character named Jim Jamkins. Overall, this has been one of those projects that tends to fade in and out for me. Currently, other creative projects have priority right now – so for the time being, Jim Jamkins has been put back on the shelf. Maybe one day the stars will align and the timing will be right to pick it up again. Either way, this process has also shed a light in helping me understand why some movies or stories have taken “years” to reach completion, ha ha.

Zap Nugget

Birthed from a lineage of homemade style booklets, Jonathan Pierce’s whacko-happy book, Zap Nugget offers a unique literary adventure that could best be described as experiencing “Sludge-Wad Psychosis”. Starting with page one, Zap Nugget readers are immediately dumped into an inkhorn of insanity as they explore a hodgepodge of zany illustrated stories and oddball comics. Casting a wide net, the mini stories in Zap Nugget bust open the doors on a variety of topics like, doctoral robes, going in to the scab selling business, creating a month long lesson plan to learn about frogs, identifying the problem with nomads and much more.  Offering 30 pages of total bliss, Zap Nugget has the power to offer something exciting to everybody and nobody all at the same time. So for those who want to live vicariously through characters like “Barg” who encounters the unpleasant of experience of getting his toenail ripped off in a motorcycle gear-shift gone wrong, strap in for a good read that is guaranteed to leave your hair greased and your lips so dry that they’re cracked and crusty. Click here to order your copy today!

Check out this week’s video trailer, which promotes a fictitious movie about a rugged special ops military legend named Drill Sarge Dan. Thinkpierce, Something New Every Friday!

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