If this ever does come to be investigated, it will be interesting to see what Google's position is. Will they claim they can't compete?
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/01/apple-responsible-...
Really?
While there are alternatives, their usage is infinitesimal in comparison to the % sold through apple.
Surely nobody expects "democracy" from a privately owned app store. Clarity and good faith, yes. Agreements should be explicit and transparent between the involved parties, and that is really the relationship developers have with the app store, not democratic rule.
GoodReader has a brightness control built in. Are they not supposed to? Why not?
But those were just examples of a macro issue, so I really wouldn't focus on that too much.
Apple should just flag apps that use private API's and call them out for it when the user upgrades the OS in an alert dialogue-like fashion when they launch the app (or on the applications iTunes page). "This app is using private API's and may not function properly with your current firmware." Instead of rejection. But it's probably easier to reject than to publish a "purchase at your own risk" disclaimer. All that's going to do is get a lot of people to not purchase your application.
The AppStore acceptance and rejection policys, though, should get fully investigated. I would like to get into iOS development, but trusting my livelihood on such a seemingly fickle process makes me really nervous.