The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street

Raspberries for Apple

In its first month of operation, Apple's(AAPL Quote) App Store has been a roaring hit, with $30 million in sales from the downloading of more than 6 million software programs by third-party developers.

But this impressive debut was marred by the issuing and subsequent handling of a software program from Armin Heinrich, a German software developer, that had dumb, dumb, dumb written all over it.

The first bit of dumbness: a totally useless application for the iPhone 3G that was first reported by the Los Angeles Times.

For $999.99, the iPhone's owner gets the right to download a program by Heinrich that puts a small red icon on the phone's screen with the words, "I Am Rich," in the subtext. That's it.

Second piece of dumbness -- certainly more than the first: the eight people who shelled out $999.99 for the program. It's difficult to fathom why anyone would pay that much capital for such a narcissistic message. It certainly couldn't have been for the art design.

And finally, dumb part three: Apple's botched handling of the software application. The company removed "I'm Rich" without providing an explanation to the developer, the public or the eight fools who bought it. An Apple spokeswoman told The Wall Street Journal that the decision to pull Heinrich's creation was a "judgment call." Calls by TheStreet.com to Apple for comment were not returned.

The Times surmised that the decision might have been related to a complaint on the Web from a person who bought the software by mistake and wanted his money back. We can't imagine why that would happen.

Meanwhile, you have to hand it to Heinrich. Under Apple's rules for third-party software developers, the developer makes 70% and Apple rakes in 30%. By our math, Heinrich pocketed an easy $5,600.

We have a slogan that the folks who forked over the dough can upload onto their iPhones: "I am chump."

-- by David Tong

Dumb-o-meter score: 95. Hello, is anybody minding the App Store?