Most of us can’t afford one iPad per child, so it doesn’t come as much of a surprise when we hear that a lot of people are concerned that there are not user accounts in iOS currently. A simple login system would go a long way towards alleviating the problems of children having access to financial apps and other sensitive information like email. What does come as a bit of a surprise is that Apple has stated publicly that its engineering team is currently investigating the problem. According to an email sent by Apple’s Worldwide Developer Relations team:
The developer reached out to AppleInsider after they received a reply from Apple after submitting a bug report. Apple’s Bug Reporter includes an option to specify that a submission isn’t a bug report, but rather a suggestion … In the suggestion submitted to Apple, the developer simply requested that the company add support for multiple users to the iPad. “After further investigation it has been determined that this is a known issue, which is currently being investigated by engineering,” the official response from Apple Developer Connection’s Worldwide Developer Relations team reads.
While Apple may be “investigating” the bug, they may not have a solution for it just yet. If anything, the email, dug up by AppleInsider, sounds a little like a canned response for suggestions and bugs that have found their way into Apple’s hands.
Two years ago (yikes) I wrote an article titled The iPad needs user accounts, and I still stand by it. It’s great that some families can afford to buy all their kids iPads, but the practice is pretty far from the norm. We currently have one iPad in my family, and it gets passed around quite a bit between us. Add in the fact that visitors may stop by and pick the iPad up to check their email while hanging out, and you’ve now got yourself a full-fledged problem that multiple user accounts can solve.
Apple, get on with it. We need multiple user accounts. The iPad is not like the iPhone. Some of us share them quite a bit with family members.
