Apple Really Wants You to Rate Apps in iPhone 2.2

Apple continues to try to make iPhone app ratings genuinely useful—first by making sure you own ‘em before you slam ‘em—and in the iPhone 2.2 update, apparently, by getting you to actually rate them. A new 2.2 screenshot shows it asking users to rate an app when they delete it from the phone, which would presumably be uploaded to the App Store and obviously boost the number of ratings that make up its score. Update: Looks like you can directly download podcasts to your phone, too, explaining Apple’s Podcaster rejection. One big question though.

If you’re removing it, isn’t it more likely you have a bad impression of the app? Why else would you dropkick it off your phone? We don’t know the full extent of the new app rating nanny, so it’s possible iPhone 2.2 might also ask you to rate it after two weeks of use to counter-balance what would seem to overwhelming provoke an influx of negative vibes. We’d hope there’s some countervailing voting force, anyway. Still, while it’s no Google Street View, it’s a nice little addition to 2.2—we like anything that makes the App Store better. [iPhone Hellas via Mac Rumors]