IPhone App Shakes Up Controversy

Looks like one iPhone application made it to the app store that is shaking it up quite a bit, and by 'it' we mean both controversy and babies. That's right, babies. Seems an app called Baby Shaker made it to the app store for a few days. From the description of the app shown to the right, you can see that the objective is to try and deal with a tiny crying baby that will appear on your iPhone once the app starts for as long as possible. The only thing that seems to shut it up, though, is shaking the iPhone until two red X's appear over the baby's eyes. A fairly dark and sadistic app to say the least.

As to be expected, the application has made some headlines, especially with people wanting to point out the fact that shaking real babies is a very serious, and deadly, event. One such person is Jennipher Dickens, whose son Christopher was injured after being shaken by his father. She now is the founder of a non-profit group called Stop Shaken Baby Syndrome, which tries to help alert the public to the perils of shaking infants. She had this to say about the game:

As a mother of a child who was violently shaken at 7 weeks old, causing a severe brain injury, and the founder of a national organization for Shaken Baby Syndrome prevention... I don't have to tell you how much this horrifies me!

On the other end of the spectrum we have one of the writers of New York Time's Bits blog that was sad to see just how quickly the program was pulled by Apple from the app store in response to the press it has received. She criticized the decision by saying:

I'm troubled by the way Apple caved into pressure here. Of course this application is deeply offensive, with no redeeming value except to people who like to play gross games or have twisted senses of humor. But as I wrote in February, the App Store is coming to resemble a bookstore. The applications available there can have political, social or literary content. And we know that one person's manifesto is another's heresy, and that your masterpiece may well be trash to me.

I can see both sides of the spectrum on this issue and probably lean a bit more towards the "one man's trash is another man's treasure", but then again, this app doesn't really seem to be sending any big message out there. I'm also sure we'd have a much different view on an app like this here at GayGamer if it hit a little closer to home, such as something promoting hate crimes towards LGBT people. What do you guys think, is this a bunch of hot air over a silly app? or a poorly crafted app that pokes fun at a serious issue?

In the end, it probably would have been better if the creators used someone like Jack Thompson instead of a kid, there's someone a lot of people could get behind on shaking to shut him up.

Baby Shaking iPhone Game Sparks Controversy [GamePolitics]