“Audio erotica apps cannot have the word ‘desire’ in their names [if they want] to be visible on the store,” while developers of apps like those for controlling sex toys “have a hard time having the apps approved on the store, which puts their entire product in jeopardy,” said Ana Ornelas, erotic author, sex educator and advocacy officer for the Digital Intimacy Coalition.
According to Alessandro Polidoro, a lawyer and coordinator of the Digital Intimacy Coalition, “other apps that host adult content — like X and Reddit — are still allowed on the official App Store, so Apple’s moral argument seems quite contradictory.”
The techies behind the alternative app store said there were still appropriate controls for users, notably through Apple’s device-level parental controls, which allow parents to remotely turn on content restrictions for their kids’ phones.
The Hot Tub app “is rated 17+ and is subject to the exact same parental controls as any other App Store app. So if you put parental controls on your iPhone to restrict 17+ you cannot install Hot Tub,” said Riley Testut, one of the alternative store’s two co-founders.
Apple’s parental controls can extend within apps, however, such as setting limits on screen time, but not for those downloaded through alternative stores.