Apple bans iDrones?

Spotted by Jeffrey Johnson of Pict Earth fame in the new Apple iOS 4.2 terms of service:

“4.2 Apps that use location-based APIs for automatic or autonomous control of vehicles, aircraft, or other devices will be rejected.”

PictEarth was a project using Nokia N95 phones flown in UAS to take vertical images geo tagged with the built in GPS. As its turned out quite far ahead of its time.

I wonder if the Parrot ARdrone campaign was too much? Or would using the onboard GPS and accelerometers in an ap make the iPhone an autopilot and subject to ITAR restrictions?

Techcrunch selects several of the new TOS conditions

The very next one after UAS

4.3 Apps that use location-based APIs for dispatch, fleet management, or emergency services will be rejected

Now that seems like avoiding law suits.

What a pity, a device that might do good in the hands of emergency responders knobbled.

Seems like some of the future really will belong to Android devices.