Mark Fiore

Last week we told you about Mark Fiore, who won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning despite the cartoons' sole medium being the internet. What surprised many was that, though Fiore's cartoons were good enough for a Pulitzer, they were not good enough for the App Store. Back in December, Fiore had submitted an app called NewsToons, which displayed a collection of his political cartoons, only to have it rejected by Apple for ridiculing public figures. However, shortly after he won the Pulitzer and the news broke that his app had previously been rejected, Apple invited Fiore to resubmit the app, with Steve Jobs saying that the rejection of Fiore's app "was a mistake that's being fixed." I'm pleased to report that, as of yesterday, the mistake is fixed. Mark Fiore's NewsToons app is now in the App Store. The $0.99 app gives users access to automatically-updating political animation and the ability to dig deeper into the cartoon and see what news stories, events, and facts inspired each animation. Wonder if we'll see a Steve Jobs cartoon anytime soon? Read More

It appears Apple has once again flip-flopped regarding a highly publicized app rejection. As the story goes, Apple’s app reviewers rejected an app by the Pulitzer Prize winning online political cartoonist Mark Fiore sometime in December because it ridiculed public figures. Once this information was made public, however, there was a massive amount of backlash which forced Apple to reconsider the rejection and later invited Fiore to resubmit the app for review.  Apparently those app reviewers had a change of heart, as NewsToons is now available in the App Store. NewsToons gives you a direct feed to all of Mark Fiore’s animated political cartoons that are normally only available via his website.  The app is automatically updated with the most recently published cartoons by Fiore, so every time you launch it you should be in for a treat.  Along with the cartoons themselves, the app provides the ability to dig a little deeper so you can see what news stories, events, and facts inspired each of the animations. This is just the first version of NewsToons.  The team has promised to update the app regularly based on user feedback, so let them hear it. NewsToons is available in the App Store for $.99, which isn’t bad for an ad-free and iPhone-friendly political cartoon feed by a Pulitzer Prize winner. Read More