EA Pulled a Bunch of Classic Games From the App Store ⇥ stevenf.com

Steven Frank:

These were arguably historically significant titles, and there is no official mechanism to archive them for preservation.

Maybe it seems silly — they’re “just” games after all, right? But now the only source of these binaries is DRM-laced copies that someone happened to purchase and download. It’s sort of like if Nintendo recalled all unsold copies of every NES game because NES consoles are no longer being produced. And this removal happened with no warning, so anyone who may have wanted to purchase a copy for preservation purposes did not have an opportunity.

Among the apps removed is one of my all-time favourite iPhone games, Flight Control. It’s strangely still available for Android. What a bummer.