---
title: '“Siri, install Air Dictate 2.” “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”'
date: '2012-02-21T12:23:32-08:00'
type: post
word_count: 308
char_count: 1740
tokens: 401
categories:
  - '#featured'
  - iPhone
  - News
  - Oregon
  - Portland
  - Startups
tags:
  - 'air dictate'
  - Apple
  - Avatron
  - ios
  - iPhone
  - siri
---

# “Siri, install Air Dictate 2.” “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

One of the most nebulous areas in all of mobile application development has to be the Apple App Store approval process. And yet again, that weirdness is hitting a little too close to home.

Portland-based [Avatron](http://avatron.com/ "Avatron")—makers of awesome mobile apps like [Air Sharing](http://avatron.com/apps/air-sharing "Air Sharing") and [Air Display](http://avatron.com/apps/air-display "Air Display")—have been challenged to [get their latest app, Air Dictate, into the App Store](http://blog.avatron.com/post/17732376130/air-dictate-2-0-still-dead "Air Dictate 2.0: Still dead").

What’s Air Dictate do? Well, it’s designed to take the magic of Siri and extend it to the desktop. The only problem is that it still hasn’t been approved for the store.

\[HTML4\]

> After Apple yanked Air Dictate 1.0 from the App Store, we scrambled and submitted a brand new Air Dictate 2.0 that satisfied all of Apple’s requests. We are pretty proud of the work we’ve done in this app. We no longer grab your tap on our big mic button and reposition it onto the little mic button on the hidden keyboard, which is what Apple objected to. In fact, we no longer have a button in the UI at all. Instead of tapping a button, you just raise the phone to your ear, start dictating, and then move the phone away from your ear to stop talking. We not only didn’t use private API for any of this; we didn’t use any API. iOS is doing all of the work. That’s just how dictation works on the iPhone 4S.

For more on the tribulations surrounding the app, read [Avatron’s post on Air Dictate](http://blog.avatron.com/post/17732376130/air-dictate-2-0-still-dead "Air Dictate 2.0: Still dead").