iPhone app rejected for "transferring excessive volumes of data"

Question

Our lovely app that downloads mp3s from our server into a local file on the phone then plays from that file was rejected for using too much bandwidth.

I understand the rejection (we are downloading rather than streaming) and don't quibble with their decision... our first priority was quality of user experience.

I am just wondering... what do I do now?

There are no hard and fast rules... Apple just says, "Must not in Apple's reasonable judgment excessively use or unduly burden network capacity or bandwidth".

Anyone have data on what Apple considers reasonable data transfer rates?

Should I fill up the buffer file in short spurts? Should stream the file at a constant rate (and how would I limit the transfer rate from within the app?)

Any and all suggestions are welcome.

Thanks

Answer 1

I have talked with Apple Developer support, and just FYI. You are only allowed to stream 1 MB per minute over the Cellular network. Support suggest that you test your app in the following way:

"The basic measurement methodology is to turn off all background updating (particularly Mail's automatic mail downloads and Calendar updates), reset the transfer statistics in "Settings:General:Usage:", and then launch your application. Let it run for a fixed amount of time (five minutes is reasonable), and then exit your application. Once you've finished the test, the numbers listed under "Cellular Network Data" in "Settings:General:Usage:" are what you should focus on reducing.

Using what I just described, I'd suggest 4.8 MB every 5 minutes as the guideline you use to ensure your application stays within our bandwidth requirements."

Hope that helps at least a little.

Answer 2