I think there is a small misunderstanding between :
- CLOSED SYSTEM (Ron told us the system became closed in autumn) - this mean they select who can publish on their platform and seems legitimate as long as the process to get accepted is public and well documented.
And
- CLOSING ALL APPLICATIONS - This mean they won’t accept anyone.
I don’t know when but they closed application before march 31 and didn’t say it publicly, letting people try and work for nothing. And this is the problem.
I believe that this was not official and even Ron didn’t know somebody in Samsung hierarchy decided to close all application.
I got on april 17 a mail from the validation team explaining that my application request made on march 31 was refused because they closed all applications. So maybe in fact they refused systematically applications for monthes without saying it publicly and without even stopping the application process.
So I finally went with Watchmaker.
I’m quite happy with it as the SDK is a lot more modern and powerfull … and doesn’t use an old Java platform.
I have a lot of fun designing watchfaces on my Samsung Tab S6 …which was impossible with their own SDK.
I sincerely hope the Samsung Watchface team will finally solve whatever problem they have and will find a way to be more respectfull of the people who want to work with them.
Hi Ron
That’s a euphemism to say the least. I got rejected by the Samsung Review Team for the fourth time today. Of course - as always without a reason. What kind of policy is that? That’s not how you treat developers. Without us developers, the Galaxy Watch watches would be absolutely uninteresting.
On Google Play I have meanwhile uploaded 20 Watch Faces for Wear OS and the Galaxy Watch 4 and hundreds of downloads. Many customers ask me for a Tizen version because they don’t have a Galaxy Watch 4 yet. I have to regret every time.
I’ve developed all kinds of watch faces - analog, digital, with animation with gyro effects, etc.
The customers like it. Not to the review team. Totally illogical. I now doubt that Samsung is even interested in new designers. Take a look at the Galaxy Store. There is nothing innovative there. Always the same, boring designs (with a few exceptions) that I had on my watch years ago.
And honestly. I’m getting tired of developing watch faces for Samsung watches. That costs a lot of time (now thousands of hours) and money.
Samsung doesn’t care. Just like the grievances on Google Play.
There are countless bugs on Google Play that make it difficult to sell.
And the Samsung Review Team doesn’t even give you permission to sell in the Galaxy Store and I’m treated with absolute disrespect.
Really pathetic
I believe this is a cultural issue and is not meant as disrespect but for respect. Rather than cause someone to lose face most Asian’s do not reply negatively. We (developer relations team) had to work with theme reviewers to even send out a rejection letter.
I can’t help with the Play Store, I wish I could.
Ron
Samsung Developer Relations
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