I surf through the Google Play and I see tons, I mean, TONS of apps that are using famous brands. If app is free - does it need permissions from that brands to use them? And is it playing with fire when it comes to GP or/and those brands? Since You’re not charging for Your app it should be legal, but hey - it’s always better to ask than buy new dev acc.
What’s Your thoughts on this?
What about ads? If you plan to use them, you are using someone intelectual property in commercial way. If you plan to make completely free app, you probably could say it’s fan app or something. But still it’s probably risky.
GP banned a lot of my apps for copyright or trade mark infringement. Some were because I used some company’s name in my app title for example my latest app to be banned by Google was named ‘candy crush cheats’ it got banned a few months after going live. But they don’t ban apps just like that. The ban needs to be requested by the trademark owner. Which is why those apps with copyright violations are still up in GP
Unless it is a small weekend project that will bring in money quickly, I wouldn’t risk wasting time developing any app that contains copyright or trademark violation because they will catch up with you sooner or later. It hurts more later when you’ve spent a lot of time an effort on the app.
dav800: Was your account OK? They banned just the apps? I’m just curious what happens in these cases. I too was tempted to do some “cheat” apps. Thanks.
Yes my account is OK. Before I started making money from my apps I didn’t really care about the account. I have around 5 apps banned in total now. My account might be hanging from a thin thread.
Thanks for the answer. I assume they do assigns “strike points” to any account that received warnings/bans, but they should go away eventually. I too received a few warnings because of a SDK, which turned non-compliant, so I’m more careful as well. 