10 years later, the App Store isn’t new anymore, and Apple continues to tweak its rules so that developers can create sustainable business models, instead of selling high-quality software for a few dollars or monetizing through advertising. If Apple can’t make it worthwhile for developers to make high-quality utilities for the iPhone, then the vibrant software ecosystem that made it so valuable could decay.
Apple’s main tool to fight the downward pricing pressure on iPhone apps is subscriptions.
The application store model is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing since it made it very easy for developers to get their code to users, but that ease also caused the supply side of applications to grow exponentially. The end result is something we are all aware of – application stores are littered with garbage, prices of software have plummeted to unsustainable levels, which in turn has all but killed off the independent application developer. The top application lists are now dominated by either high-profile applications such as Facebook or Twitter, or predatory pay-to-win gambling “games”. Doing any search in a modern application store reveals piles of useless junk.
The next step is obvious: Apple (and perhaps Google) will attempt an almost Netflix-like app subscription service, where you pay Apple a monthly fee for unlimited use of applications available in the store. It’s the next step in milking the last possible drop out of third party developers, and while it will surely allow application store proponents to continue to claim the model is working, it’s just a stay of execution.
Developing quality software is a time-consuming and expensive task, and the current application store model – with or without subscriptions – is simply incompatible with it. Either software delivery on modern computing devices gets rethought completely, or even the last remaining bits of quality software will simply disappear from application stores.
It’s the end for sure. They will start adoption of the Amazon model. Subscribe, then cut off the developers little by little. In other words, create original content. Even if it’s just a copy of original content, once the user is locked. They don’t care if it’s apple or anyone else. As long as the consumer gets what they want.
This will cause most -proprietary- software to vanish. FOSS developers usually weren’t charging for binaries anyways.
Have you used Fdroid? Its pretty hit or miss. You have some great apps, some half finished apps. And some apps that don’t work at all.
Well, that’s ok its open source right? Well, yeah, you can get the source. Android is moving so fast though, that the source code for many of the older ones need to be heavily modified in order to be compiled, the maven to gradle build system switch is kind of klunky. I’ve had a few that have just bombed out on the transition. it was easier to start with a fresh project and just rebuild the build process.
And even worse, there are some apps that use lots of libraries and android studio plugins, those have their own compatibility issues with newer versions of android studio. So they’re kinda bit rotten…
I’m kind of hoping that they do switch to just a normal subscription per app, rather than all you can eat. Yes, it will make apps more expensive. And it will inspire me to get off my but and write more code. I just have no motivation to write my own app when there are ten great options for 99 cents…
Oh gawd, please no. It took literally ages for FOSS developers to have working DXVA acceleration in video players, or to have a somewhat usable video editor, and Gimp still doesn’t have the features Photoshop has and people want.
In reality, really good software isn’t sold through app stores. I am talking AutoCAD, Photoshop, MATLAB, good video editors and the like, or even AAA games. Sure, they might sell a “lite” app, but not the real thing. No reason to give the app store owner a third of the income for what is essentially file hosting. App store apps are the evolution of all those trialware apps that were appearing in search engine ads. There is a reason Fortnite on Android isn’t on the Play Store…
Which is btw the reason I can’t take platforms such as iOS seriously as laptop-replacenent platforms. AutoDesk and Adobe will never sell the real thing via Apple’s App Store.
Edited 2018-08-18 15:22 UTC
Finally / which one would that be?
I don’t care if Apple gave developers 100% of the money. The reality is not enough people are willing to pay developers what it costs to keep them making apps that aren’t games. No one wants to pay for apps. I’m happy to pay for utilities that help me, but I can tell you not a single family member or coworker I work with has paid for a single app that’s not a game. What else can Apple do? It’s worse on Android, where fewer people buy apps and pirating is much higher. Even there, people pirate games, not utilities. We just live in a world where those of us who use computers for productive tasks don’t understand that most people aren’t willing to pay for productive tools on mobile.
Edited 2018-08-15 01:23 UTC
I go further. Mobile or otherwise, I don’t pay for non-games.
Heck, aside from a handful of grandfathered-in bits (BIOS, nVidia drivers, Flash, etc.), I don’t allow closed-source non-games, even for free.
I have no problem with games, since they don’t line up well with the “iterate on it for long after it becomes dogfoodable” that works well for things like browsers, office suites, utilities, etc. …but I have a somewhat Stallman-esque attitude toward closed-source non-games and I’d sooner write an open-source competitor out of spite than pay for a non-game.
Aren’t you mixing up the concept of paying and close-source?
Maybe we should start rewarding people for opening up their source.
And I say this as * a huge cheapskate who will try to go for the cheapest option if possible.
* a part of the problem
This isn’t something to be proud of. It’s cool if you want to use open source products, but there are people spending their time coding those projects so that you can use them. Many do it out of the goodness of their hearts. Some get paid for it. You don’t “deserve” to get software for free. I won’t say you “deserve” to have to pay for software. But no one owes you any software. I hope you feel lucky you can spend no money to get your work done.
Edited 2018-08-15 02:39 UTC
Problem is, when you use paid software there’s just too big a chance some greedy fuck will slowly alter the “deal” as time go on.
Some of the other posts here expressed that we now have privacy invasive stuff because nobody wants to pay, but that’s not really true as we did pay for Windows and mobile phones and yet they still got invasive as fuck. Fact is, once there’s someone in it to earn money eventually it will poison the product until it is shit.
I’m not some kind of Stallman hippie, I too would like there was a business model that would work around writing tools. But time and time again I’ve been burnt so much that by now I’m sticking to open source software because at least then I’m sure the developer isn’t some greedy idiot (*).
*) Not saying everyone trying to make a living a greedy idiots, but those that are poisoned the well. Now it is dry.
I never said I thought I deserved the software for free. If that were the case, I’d pirate things.
Rather, I’m ideologically opposed to exchanging scarce goods (ie. money) for non-scarce goods (ie. copies of bits).
When I charge for my programming output, I charge for my time (exchanging scarce time for scarce money), not for licenses.
My choice to only pay for games is an attempt to live up to my principles, while also being reasonable in recognizing that producing entertainment in an open-source manner is a far less viable proposition than producing tools. (Though I do get most of my entertainment from either fanfiction or hobby programming these days, both of which are quite successfully free.)
I have no problem buying software for my retro-computing hobby on CD or even sometimes floppies, since the physical media are scarce goods.
Likewise, I have no problem donating to free or ad-supported efforts I approve of and/or got a disproportionate amount of entertainment/utility from.
Edited 2018-08-16 08:44 UTC
Bandwidth and storage space are kinda scarce…
(though, to be fair, they often are “too cheap to meter” (to echo another nearby discussion of ours 
) …even if not necessarily in Canada, I’ve heard, with bandwidth caps common 
)
I’ve paid for apps on every single mobile platform I’ve used so far (webOS, for a limited time even SailfishOS, BB10 and currently Android). And yes, I do pirate a sometimes on Android (and I also did on webOS), BUT only if there’s no ad-supported free version or trial available. I’m not going to pay for software if I don’t know for sure that I’m going to like it (and yes, I know you can get a refund, but the Play Store is a bit wonky sometimes, so I’m not taking that risk anymore). After I’m done trying and I like it, I’ll pay for it.
I do hope more developers will put up trials or something similar so that people can try an app before buying.
Talk for yourself. I pay for the apps I use the most, which are Word processors, PDF editors and VLC.
1 out of those 3 is open source, so that should tell you something.
I also indirectly donate yearly to open source projects of software I use a lot, which is much more than corporations, whom reap the most benefits from OSS are willing to pay them.
Owning a software development company that has developed a few mobile apps, I’ve have experienced there are some major shortcomings in the way Apple organizes non-games apps. Apple does not only impose technical requirements, which is good, but also business requirements, which is ugly.
– As an app developer you cannot freely define your =own pricing strategy: no discounts during launch, no rewards for loyal customers, no cross selling, …
– Apple defines prices in USD with fixed exchange rates. When Apple changed the exchange rate between Euro and USD last year, my existing European customers had to pay more for the same functionality. Because one of my apps only make sense in a European context, this price change upset my customers a lot.
– I don’t mind paying a 30% cut to company who sells my apps, but I do mind that Apple is exactly doing nothing to promote my apps. A survey among my customers has shown that exactly 0% of them found my apps via an organic search the App Store app. In other words Apple is charging 30% for a simple file store of my app (and I don’t have the choice), while I have to do and pay the marketing myself. This is very unbalanced.
These shortcomings have made me change gear. Because all my apps are storing their valuable data in a cloud service, I’ve made all my apps free of the charge, but the cloud storage is charged to the customer. This has a lot of benefits. I can offer a single subscription for all access methods: iOS apps, Android apps, and web clients. And I have full control of the commercial conditions
I think more non-games app developers will move in this direction, if Apple continues to put business restrictions on the app business model. It is the only way to financially survive.
A nice change of Apple would be to limit its role to validate (at a fixed fee) the technical requirements of the app and digitally sign the app if the validation passes. It must be very easy for Apple to only allow the digitally signed apps to run on its iOS devices. Developers could then choose to either continue the existing way of working or to develop their own business strategy.
cropr,
I agree with most of your thoughts about this…of course taking apple out of the loop would be in our interests, however from apple’s perspective this is a battle that they’ve already won. Why would they voluntarily retreat now? Their middleman strategy nets them a significant portion of software sales for doing virtually no work or promotion.
Consider that microsoft has been fighting a similar battle and wishes it were where apple is. Microsoft’s middleman strategy is actually comparable to apple’s, yet microsoft has been much less successful because windows users and developers still have a choice, and they’re choosing to avoid microsoft as the middle man. The overriding reason apple has been so successful with the same strategy is because they were able to restrict the free market for IOS software and don’t give users and developers a choice.
And what platform set the prices of apps to be so unsustainably low?
Before the iPhone, apps on mobile platforms (from the Newton to Palm OS and Windows Mobile) were cost-variable, but things were often around ~$20. The userbase was far lower, but it was perhaps more sustainable.
I remember when there wasn’t a repository, you went to third parties like filehippo and pda sites. They would sometimes give you the option to download from the developer. That also meant those sites provided essentially the same service, even better. Because they had a recommendation most of the time, I don’t think it was sponsored.
Either way, it’s becoming quite obvious that developers are transitioning to a thin client model. Apps are not longer going to be worthwhile on their own.
That’s just another way of saying that the iphone is a more popular platform for developers, leading to a huge supply of apps.
I don’t want to pay for email – I get it free. Of course, my data is sold to the highest bidder.
I don’t want to pay for social media – I get it free. Of course, my data is sold to anyone and everyone, and I am bombarded by crap every day.
I don’t want to pay for apps. Now almost everything is freemium, trying to addict you to micro-transactions and/or plastering your screen with advertising.
You get what you pay for.
Counter Point: I did pay for email for years, until the company went under. I’d pay again if there were a service worthy of it. Gmail is just so good… Wish I could pay to rid myself of adds.
Or can you ? I think I remember gmail for businesses is add free… Hmm….
Protonmail
Private, doesn’t rely on ads and selling data. The messages on the server are stored encrypted. There is a free tier for a single personal low traffic account, and paid accounts for increasing levels of features.
There is a caveat though… and that is if you send e’mail to (or from) someone using gmail, Microsoft mail services, or any other service that snoops on its users or employees, then it’s not all private even if YOU never agreed to their terms of service. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t!
Unfortunately this is the world we live in. Invasion of privacy is the rule rather than the exception.
Proton and Kolab’s main downfall is that they aren’t gmail. Gmail is awesome. Again, What I want is gmail, with privacy. Right now, I don’t think that’s possible so gmail it is. My privacy isn’t worth the productivity cost of giving up gmail.
Bill Shooter of Bul,
I don’t use gmail, and will not on principal. I self host for myself and clients. Can I ask what exactly is so special about gmail that you refuse to give it up for privacy? I’d really like to know.
What is so special about gmail… Where to even start? I can’t really list everything awesome about gmail. But here are things I know I would miss if I left, I’m sure if I really did leave there would be even more things I don’t even know about.
1) Basically unlimited storage. I don’t delete emails. Will not ever.
2) Intelligent Integration into Android/Calendar/Meet/Etc. It parses out airline ticket emails creates calendar items automatically. Provides suggestions on tickets/events things that Google knows I like based on the trip. This even goes as far as integrating into Youtube suggestions. I don’t even have to search it just shows the heck up. If a restaurant suggestion sounds good, with one button press I’m reserving a seat. One button I’m booking a show. Its saving me time, and making it more enjoyable.
3) Smart reminders. Hey you got this important email two days ago, you haven’t responded to the question he asked!!
4)Auto organization of email into different categories
No manual filtering necissary
5)Great security. two factor with hardware.
6)Always up. Always. Never been down for me, ever.
7)Attachment reminders. I never forget to include intended files
8)Quick reply. Don’t have to think about polite way to respond quickly the good suggestion is just there.
9) In total, If I could sum all of these up, gmail is all about removing friction. There are other things that do some of that, but not as well not as seamless.
Privacy, I kind of assume that Google knows everything,and I’m not convinced at all that protonmail and kolab don’t. To support what I want they would need to know. If they know then I can’t control who else does. Being in switzerland, just means NSA can’t go through the front door. And I don’t trust their back door security at all….
Bill Shooter of Bul,
Fair enough. I think some of those things aren’t special to gmail, but nevertheless I admit they have some neat features.
My philosophy places very high value on personal privacy and control, but I concede that I am an outlier. We have been loosing ground very quickly. With the loss of mozilla’s support, my email client of choice thunderbird isn’t getting improvements any more. It probably wouldn’t have mattered anyways, free ad supported services is the winning strategy. People don’t care about privacy enough to do anything about it.
Edited 2018-08-17 19:50 UTC
PGP won’t help with losing credentials to the account, that’s probably the main problem for ordinary folks and what two factor guards against.
Generally, IMHO you’re missing out if you’re avoiding Gmail… stuck in what email was in the past for a lot of people.
This is very true, but the tragedy is that the market doesn’t seem to be able to sustain both models. I pay for my email because I want to retain a level of control over how my data is used.
But for many social media sites and apps, the advertising model is the only option. I’m always happy to see companies who pursue a variety of monetisation options.
Didn’t Google start offering a service that allowed you to pay them money to reduce the amount of advertising on the Web? I wonder what happened to that? If Apple provide a subscription model as an alternative to paying outright for apps, that’d be a good thing, as long as it’s not the only option.
I think it would be a more interesting mobile app world if the App Store were simply a fulfillment functions ala Paypal than a one stop shopping experience.
This puts the burden of marketing back on the developers. You can’t go to the app store and find what you want, if you want to find something then it’s up to the app provider getting chummy with the search engines.
This kind of thing can outright crush the fake app market (not eliminate it, but certainly hurt it) since they’re basically free riders when they show up in a search for the original app.
It should raise app prices because when they go to iphoneapp.com, they’re going to present their app, their way, and not have “Oh hey we do the same thing, but for free*” right next to their sales pitch.
Apple can continue to vet, sign, sandbox, etc. But they get out of the marketing business and stick with fulfillment.
Mind, I don’t sell write or sell apps, I barely download them, but I just think, especially at this stage of a late, more mature market, that it would be more helpful to app developers than hurtful.
I currently pay monthly for an email account, I pay monthly for my VPN (well, actually a VPS that runs my VPN, but whatever), and I begrudgingly pay for Adobe’s applications because they’re an industry standard (no Thom, your Affinity iPad app doesn’t even come close) that enables me to put food on my plate. I’ll pay subscription fees for cloud storage if I need it one day. Ditto music streaming if there’s a service catering to my tastes. Heck, I could even see myself paying yearly for weather forecasts if they’re accurate enough (none are) for where I live.
I will not, under any circumstance, pay a monthly fee for a f–king note taking or calendar app, no matter how good they claim they are. I’d gladly pay the full-price up front, as I have for many productivity/utility apps till now. If there comes a day here all these apps adopt this revolting subscription racket, I’ll just tough it out with Apple’s sucky default apps, or maybe freemium apps that unlock ‘pro’ features via IAPs if they prove competent enough. You ‘indie’ app developers with your circle-jerking clicque of dangling furball bloggers can take your “less than a cup of coffee a month” weasel excuses and shove them up your rectums with serrated dildos.
Seriously, just a couple of weeks ago I had a UNICEF rep approach me. I was ready to hand her a fifty before she said it was a subscription thing that required my credit card. I politely told her to piss the f–k off. What is this, a protection recket on my conscience?!!
Edited 2018-08-15 19:43 UTC
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-21/sam-johnson-slams-charity-mug…
If you’re talking about charity muggers, giving fifty won’t do much good either.
But charity mugger or not, I think handing over real money on the street makes people a target for real muggers, or opens the door for accusations of people pocketing the money for themselves.
Which is why modern charities provide their street representatives with digital stuff, so you can pay with your bank card, credit card, etc. They either use a reader for that or a mobile app on their work phone.