Tag: Tapulous »

Tap Tap Tap, developer of a couple of the most popular and beautifully designed applications like Where To? (4.5 stars), Tipluator (3.5 stars) has imploded over differences in direction between it's founders. It's a theme we've seen before in iPhone developer Tapulous.

In this corporate divorce, most of the software has gone to Sophia Teutschler and will go under her Sophiestication Software name. This includes Tipulator, Groceries (unreleased), and Where Am I? (unreleased). The one odd ball, Where To? will be sold off by Tap Tap Tap and has already been removed from the App Store.

Tap Tap Tap has a few other projects in the works, though no details have been released.

For more info on this, see the latest Tap Tap Tap blog post here.

What's going on over at Tapulous? They have now lost two more employees, Sean Heber (engineer, employee #1) and Louie Matia (designer/UI) has left as well. They must be down to 3 employees now after losing Mike Lee and most recently Tristan O'Tierney.

Originally, the future looked so bright for Tapulous as they had built the top notch development team. But losing the majority of the company in just over a month can't signal good things for their future.

In another sign that Tapulous is having some internal problems, Tristan O'Tierney sent a tweet tonight that he is no longer at Tapulous. No reason has yet been given nor any indication if the parting was amicable, though a blog post has been promised by Tristan.

You may remember that Tapulous also lost a co-founder Mike Lee just a few weeks ago. Does this latest loss show continued signs of problems at Tapulous or just a direction change? It has been speculated that Tapulous is looking to VCs for money, a decision that could easily change the direction of the company and it's products. A change that could disagree with some of the original employees.

Tristan is the developer of Twinkle, Tapulous' first officially released application in the App Store.

Tapulous, the developer of some of the most popular free applications in the iTunes App Store has lost a prominent engineer and co-founder, Mike Lee. Mike Lee, self designated toughest programmer in the world, was asked to resign from the company over voicing concerns the engineers had on the direction of the company.

This is a rather shocking turn and points to obvious strife in the company. Something that can destroy a young company like Tapulous. Especially so in such a rapidly growing industry like iPhone development where talented people are at such high demand. With the current boom in iPhone app development, the engineers at Tapulous can all pretty much name their price at dozens of companies.

Consider this a turning point for one of the brightest stars in iPhone app development. From this point they either get stronger or implode.

Tapulous is a development company behind Tap Tap Revenge (iTunes) and Twinkle (iTunes).

[via Mike Lee's Blog ]