While there are some upsides to closed application stores like the App Store, they’re not a universally good thing. The story of Bryan Lunduke is an example of what happens when you depend on a company, but a company does not depend on you.
I’m not going to delve too deep into Lunduke’s actual problems, since that’s not the point I want to make. The short version: much of Lunduke’s income to support himself and his family comes from the Mac App Store. Due to a technical glitch at Apple, his Mac Developer account was terminated, and his applications removed from the Mac App Store. The communication from Apple was abysmal, two weeks sales lost, and still no solution in sight.
For once, I’m not here to chastise Apple for this one. Technical glitches happen, and I’m sure it can’t be easy to manage the hundreds of thousands of applications and their respective developers in the iOS and Mac App Store. Communication probably could be better, but they did set him up with a temporary account to alleviate some of the problems (even though that account is expiring today with no word on a possible solution).
As harsh as this sounds, this is simply a very logical and not at all unexpected outcome of a relationship like the one between an individual developer and Apple. The problem is that this relationship lacks any form of balance: the developer is completely dependent on Apple, but Apple is anything but dependent on the developer. You’re barely a blip on Apple’s radar, so you’re not a priority.
Frankly, if you depend on the App Store, and yet have not taken precautions for the kind of situation Lunduke is in now, there’s no one to blame but yourself. It’s pretty elementary that as an individual developer (as opposed to, say, something like Facebook or Netflix), Apple doesn’t care about you. They will not rush to your aid if something goes wrong, and you can’t expect them to, either. As such, you should be prepared for this, much in the same way that I’m prepared for when my income goes bust.
Contrary to what many people think, the application store model is not all roses and sunshine for developers – at least, not anymore. There are literally hundreds of thousands of applications in the App Store alone, and the odds of you standing out and gaining any serious form of foothold between established applications, better funded alternatives, boatloads of copycats, and the sheer volume of other applications is naive, at best, and stupid, at worst.
With this many applications in the App Store, you can’t argue with a straight face that it’s easier to get noticed in an application store than it is on the web (the old way we used to discover applications). In fact, both the Play Shop (eugh) and the App Store frontends are absolutely horrible at discovering applications. I discover most of my Android and iPad (sold mine today, iPad “3” here I come!) applications on the web (recommendations, forum posts, OSNews comments, etc.) and use Google search to actually find them.
I wonder how, exactly, this is different from the old way.
Lunduke is in a serious pickle, and I hope his situation gets resolved quickly. However, let this be a clear lesson: as a small developer, it’s simply not a good idea to depend on an application store – whatever kind – for your income. Don’t be blinded by the few success stories you see on the web – most will fail.
Is there currently any app store that can seriously be referred to as an application store?
Most app stores seem to be targetted at applets, simple programs for a handful of tasks and individual developers with a small portfolio.
I was once very disappointed to learn that Intels app store did not have the capability for automated download of shared components.
Any vendor with more than one real application will have shared components, some like office suites or creativity suites implement most of their functionality that way.
Imagine you have to download probably hundrets of MB of MS office core components when buying Word in an app store and then downloading the exact same components again when buying Excel.
Any developers with app store vendor accounts here that know if or how this is solved on their respective app store?
Yeah, I know from experiencing it, more than by developing it. There are some that essentially have multiple apps on the appstore. Like remote web desktop
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.xdevelop.rm&hl=en
If you want the remote control functionality, that’s a seperate app download. And that remote control app can be used standalone, or it can be applet within the remote web desktop app. So with office, you’d probably have a single app that would have most of the core components in it, and then separate downloads for each actual app ( word, excel, etc). Google will allow apps that really aren’t apps. Some are really just libraries/licenses for other apps.
Linux repositories such as Ubuntu’s Software Center have worked this way for years, including (for example) Nokia’s app stores for their Linux-based tablets and smartphones.
In fact, Linspire’s Click’n’Run Warehouse (CNR) did this for desktops back in 2002, and eventually supported other Linux products like Ubuntu and Fedora before Microsoft’s $20M “buyout”.
My favorite CNR feature by far was “aisles”, where I could group all of the applications I use on my media center into “ricegf’s media aisle”, and all my workstation apps into “ricegf’s workstation aisle”. I could then set up (say) a new workstation with a single click, getting the OS and all applications in one optimized and fully automated download and install.
No idea why nobody has replicated this feature yet. Patent maybe?
Linspire! Yeah that same CNR app store charged money for FOSS applications and kept the profits (although they did contribute to some FOSS projects( reiserFS, Pidgn, kopete and others). Michael Robertson is kinda really sleazy. Linspire was originally called Lindows. WIth the promise that it would run all windows apps natively! Pretty much they just included WINE, made the first user root and called it a day.
There was also a subscription for CNR, or was that Lindows/Linspire itself? I can’t remember/ cant find it on google.
Basically they did a lot of things that were really bad ideas.
Yeah, no kidding. If you reread what I wrote, though, I didn’t praise Lindows / Linspire or even mention Michael Robertson – I pointed out that they had the first “app store” that I ever noticed, and praised a specific feature of it called “aisles”.
So… do you know any app stores with an equivalent “aisles” feature today? I’d love to have that in Ubuntu Software Center (or Apple’s App Store, for that matter).
Linux repositories or stores based on that technology are even a step more advanced than what I would expect of an application store.
An application store worth its name needs to at least support dependencies withing one vendor’s product line.
Dependencies shared between vendors are a lot harder so I would be OK with new stores not supporting that yet.
Stuff like that needs a curated approach where submissions are only allowed on the store after central integration/dependency testing.
Oh, wait!
And how do you suppose that the people reviewing and recommending these apps discovered them? As a Windows, iOS, and Android user, I can say without any hesitation that I prefer the app store model to the traditional ‘find it on the web’ discovery method. At least with the app store, I can browse categories and read user reviews, and I know it’s always up to date. Plus, I am fairly confident that the app I’m downloading is not going to wreck my device/PC with malware.
Granted, the app store (or repository) model has its drawbacks, but I think the advantages outweigh the drawbacks, especially if you’re able to side load apps that are a little too ‘risque’ for the app store. Would you rather have to hit some author’s website on your phone and download the app manually?
WorknMan,
“Granted, the app store (or repository) model has its drawbacks, but I think the advantages outweigh the drawbacks, especially if you’re able to side load apps that are a little too ‘risque’ for the app store. Would you rather have to hit some author’s website on your phone and download the app manually?”
Sorry for focusing just on one part of your comment, but I think there’d no (real) controversy whatsoever if app stores remained strictly optional for users and devs. As long as it’s optional, then users (and devs) would choose those stores because they *wanted* to, not because of hardware restrictions.
Let’s be honest now, a 30% cut is an uncompetitive rip off and most devs would jettison if users weren’t trapped in the walled garden. Yes, I’m aware this is precisely why manufacturers are so keen on hardware restrictions, but the lack of competition is stagnating the industry. It’s a trend I only see getting worse in the coming years.
Uncompetitive rip off as compared to what? AFAIK, both Apple and Google take a 30% cut, as I assume MS will as well; it’s kind of the standard I guess. And only one of these platforms (out of OSX, Windows, Android, and iOS) is a true ‘walled garden’.
Plus, although I don’t have any numbers to back this up, I suspect that users inside of a walled garden actually buy more apps, as opposed to pirating them whenever they are able to side load. Hell, the main reason a lot of people jailbreak iDevices is so they can pirate shit.
WorknMan,
“Uncompetitive rip off as compared to what?”
Compared to the alternative markets which would undoubtedly result if the manufacturers didn’t monopolize the software channels.
“Plus, although I don’t have any numbers to back this up, I suspect that users inside of a walled garden actually buy more apps, as opposed to pirating them whenever they are able to side load.”
I’m not willing to accept this as truth without hard numbers, but never the less it’s important to consider other causal factors as well. The people who buy an iphone may be more likely to buy more apps for reasons unrelated to DRM, maybe they can afford more.
Wouldn’t you expect people who buy an expensive home entertainment systems to also have more movies than those with less expensive models?
This is a standard truth, valid on all markets : the distributors channels the money of customers through its will, and as a consequence, gets a powerful position, which he immediately abuses for its own benefit.
In short : the stronger rip off the weaker.
Not so long ago, abusing one’s power was considered a bad practice for society at large. But apparently, this is no longer the case. Especially when the stronger is Apple….
Yeah, I guess that’s why Android is outselling them on phones, and analysts predict the same will happen on tablets by 2015. See, that’s the beautiful thing about the free market… if you act like a big enough dick, there’s always gonna be somebody to knock you off your throne
Wow, you know what you are right Android is outselling them in phones, whatever that means. That’s like saying more people buy 87 Octane gas, while Exxon Mobile makes the most money of all Oil Companies. It doesn’t matter the platform, what matters is the company selling them. So yeah, there are more copies of Window sold around the world than OS X, but Apple makes more money and is valued more than Microsoft, HP, Google, and RIM combined. And as far as your comment on what “ANALysts” say, they said the iPad would be a massive failure, the iPad 2 abysmal, the iPhone, a non-starter. So yeah, you were saying what again?
30% is a small fee. Usually, publisher “fee” in gamedev is 70-80%.
But then publishers are ideally also about promotion, marketing campaign, funding…
Casual games portals which doesn’t do anything you listed, asked for 60% a while ago (not sure how things are today)
My bet : by spending much, much more hours parsing the various categories of the application store than any normal person would. Just like it was done previously with CNet, download.com, and linux repos.
I would not say that app stores represent a loss of discoverability as compared to other software distribution methods, but I would argue that not much has been gained on this front either. The benefits and drawbacks lie elsewhere.
We agree that sideloading is the elephant in the room here, and that adding it would make current mobile OSs significantly more bearable. But I would not be against more decentralized software distribution methods where you have a centralized, community-managed database of software, but are redirected to the author’s website for the download.
In such a system, it would be impossible to justify the crazy 30% cuts and distribution rules that are put on mobile software nowadays, since the database maintainer has a much smaller role. And with proper sandboxing at the OS level, not much security would be lost.
Edited 2012-03-16 07:14 UTC
I discover my apps three ways. I read a lot of RSS feeds daily. Apps frequently come up on those feeds. I speak to real people and get recommendations. But by far the most common way is this : I open the App Store, and look at the new releases. I look at the popular apps and (for the Mac App Store) I look in the specific category (usually Music, Art and productivity.)
Examples:
Probably the last app I got from the Mac App Store was a RAR archive extractor. I opened the store and typed RAR in to the top right search panel and picked the one with the best rating.
The last app I purchased was Adobe Photoshop Touch. I got that app because it was reviewed on the RSS.
My iOS Twitter client of choice is Tapbot. A friend recommended it to me when I asked if they knew of an alternative to the car crash Twitter own client.
That is how discovery works. Notice “searching the web” didn’t ever come in to it?
There was a time when a developer could get the attention of the VP of technology if you were bringing something to the Mac platform that no one else was. It was rather touching to get those calls of interest or support.
Today we all be ants and Apple is a hundred times bigger or more.
Thom, I think you’re being too kind to Apple on this one. Although I don’t really know the details in this case, just because the developer is a small-fry doesn’t mean that Apple should be dismissive of him. If they’ve cut off his income due to a “technical glitch” and are in no hurry to correct the problem, they should have full legal liability for his losses. I’ll bet if they had to pay for the damage, they wouldn’t be so dismissive.
If my ISP suddenly terminated my Internet connection for no reason and took weeks to restore it while ignoring my complaints, I’d be more than a little angry. And if my income depended on that connection, I’d want compensation. In the case of an ISP, I could switch to another provider, but if you’re a developer for iEverything you’ve got no other place to go besides the Apple Store. Seeing how this gives Apple a monopoly, they shouldn’t be allowed to abuse this position, but I’m not surprised that they do.
You are right, Thom is being too kind to Apple, but I don’t think that it’s because he wants to let Apple off the hook. It’s because he wants the article and the discussion here to be about App Stores and not about Apple’s policies.
Apple is not responsible for Bryan Lunduke’s decision to rely so heavily on the app store for income. Further, it’s not their responsible to make sure he is being financially responsible and prepared for emergencies such as this.
You being mad and wanting to be compensated doesn’t entitle you to it.
First of all, there’s no proof of any kind that Mr. Lunduke has been abused in any way. While he may think fixing ‘his’ problem should be higher on their priority list, they may see it differently. Maybe the “glitch” he’s referring to is a symptom of a bigger problem. Maybe they’re spending their resources try to resolve the issue rather than cuddle and comfort everyone who calls in to complain. Let’s not forget, when Bryan Lunduke sells his wares in the app store, Apple makes money too. It’s not just profit loss for him.
I read Bryan Lunduke’s story with an open mind. By the time I was finished reading it, I had little sympathy for him. He wrote several paragraphs more or less blaming someone else for his problem. At no point did he really take responsibility for his choices and dependency on a single service.
He then creates a SaveMyHouseFromApple.com website as if to suggest that Apple is somehow responsible for his lack of financial planning and security. While putting a picture of his kid on a website can be touching, it doesn’t change the fact that Apple hasn’t done anything to him other than provide questionable customer service.
Everybody has a sob story… And it’s always someone elses fault.
is what it says on the tin: an application store. If a grocery store can exploit farmers, why wouldn’t an application store do the same to programmers. Especially in a market as centralized as this.
I understand that the article is about the Store way of selling software, yet I’d like to add about Apple itself. The problem is that they are completely ignorant about software vendors.
We participate in partnership programs of several large software and hardware vendors, and with Apple it took us a month of time and efforts to register where with other companies it takes a couple of hours.
Now, the company breaks APIs from version to version, forcing the developer to spend extra time on having and maintaining multiple versions of their software. So much blamed Microsoft is now seen as a sample of perfection when it comes to architecture and to relations with developers.
Conseqently it’s not surprising that Apple employees treat the software vendor as a third-grade person. I would be more surprised if they fixed an issue in an hour.
Edited 2012-03-16 06:32 UTC
The solution to app stores is not more app stores.
This is why I feel Mozilla are completely wrong to follow in Google’s footsteps.
The solution to app stores is to take away the “store” gateway aspect. Software should be published as torrents with pay capabilities built into the app so anybody can choose to pay for it (and how much) when they want.
Kroc,
“The solution to app stores is not more app stores.”
I think developers should be free to host their own app stores if they want to and users should be free to use them as they choose. Of course they could always stick to the manufacturer’s, but the choice should be the owner’s to make.
“The solution to app stores is to take away the ‘store’ gateway aspect. Software should be published as torrents with pay capabilities built into the app so anybody can choose to pay for it (and how much) when they want.”
You are right there is room for improvement. If it weren’t for hardware restrictions, I think your business model should have it’s own chance to compete against app stores as well. In other words, in a free market the user should be entitled to decide what’s best for them.
Who is going to choose to pay when Software Piracy is rampant … even when there are decent Open Source alternative (EditPlus is an example of something that has been pirated to hell).
Yo dawg,
I heard you like app stores, so I put an app store in yo’ app store so you can use the app store to buy an app store.
The Android and iOS ecosystems are a bit different since Android developers have multiple app stores and can always host their apps on their own website. An Android developer losing access to a particular app store may represent a huge drop in revenue, but it ain’t a complete write-off.
But let’s flip over to the iOS end, where the obvious question is: how can developers escape from a dependence upon Apple? After all, there are not any other markets and they cannot sell their product from their own website. So they can only prepare for disaster by saving up for rainy days, developing for multiple platforms, or having a second job. The first option is only an option if their revenues are high enough to bank money. The second option is only an option if there is enough demand on other platforms to justify the expense of multi-platform support (remember, iOS and Android use different APIs and languages thus they will probably require additional programmers). Option three basically says that you are best off securing a more stable job and forgetting about software development, which isn’t in the user’s or developer’s interest.
To make a long story short: Apple NEEDS to care. Not only do they need developers to make Apple products better, but the developers are giving Apple a pretty good chunk of their revenues whenever their product sells. 30% may be small in comparison to most retail outlets, but keep the following things in mind: Apple only pays for goods sold (the only other industry that seems to do that is book publishing) and Apple doesn’t have brick and mortar expenses. So that commission to Apple should be dedicated to providing developers with quality service.
This is nothing specific to app stores, you should never become dependant on a single supplier for anything…
I’ve seen plenty of companies go bust because they concentrated on a single big important customer to the detriment of smaller customers… Only to then lose that one big customer, and not have enough smaller customers left to keep the business afloat.
iTunes has clearly out grown its structure and interface. There is just so much stuff in so many categories. There are lots of rumours of a major redesign coming for iTunes sometime this year.
It was very interesting that Apple bought the app search and discovery platform Chomp in February. Apple buys few companies and when they do it is usually an indication of some strategic initiative that is in the pipeline.
Apple bought a couple of mapping companies last year so odds on that Apple will do some major stuff with mapping in the next year or so (part of a long term gentle but persistent detachment from dependency on Google I am sure, Apple’s vengeance on Google will terrible to behold). So the purchase of Chomp means something is coming with the App stores and iTunes. I hope so, iTunes is not unusable and is very good in many ways, not least its vast library of content, but it needs to be slicker, easier and more powerful.
Can you explain why you think it will be “terrible” to Google to bear? Last time I saw, it was the opposite, Apple was fuming because of Android giving a run for iThings money. Actually, the last statistics give a huge improvement for Android on every market.
I suppose Apple will always have a good position as “luxury brand”, as there are some in all other markets, and they will keep making money, probably will make more money. But just like in any “new” segment that starts and where are lots of money to be made, their position will be relatively weakened with time. The only case that “almost” escaped this pattern was Microsoft, but not anymore.
I should point out that I used to like Apple. They sponsor some good open-source projects I like and use. And lets remember too that if was not for FOSS projects it probably would not come back from their trouble in 9x. I suggest them stop the stupid frivolous totally unnecessary litigation war that only paint them as a greedy bastards and concentrate on products improvements. That is what rescued them from trouble times.
The way I see things, the more competition, the better.
Because Google is far more vulnerable than Apple.
Google makes no money from Android (Android’s costs are much bigger than the minute revenue it generates for Google). Google is wholly dependent on one source of income, advertising revenue associated with old style desktop browser based search, a product that is 15 years old and under threat from the long term trends in technology. All of Google’s attempts to diversify it’s revenue sources have failed.
Two thirds of the little revenue that Google makes from mobile comes from iOS. It was recently reported that Google pays Apple somewhere in the region of $1 billion a year to be the default search engine on iOS devices. Siri, the internet via apps model, the new mapping engine from Apple later this year, all put pressure on Google. As soon as Apple can replace each Google service that it uses it probably will.
As the iOS use base and ecosystem grows (64 million iOS devices sold last quarter) the potential damage resulting from Google being shut out grows. Conversely the growth of Android has not impinged on Apple’s business model, it still sucks up almost all the profits in mobile and there is nothing Google can do that threatens Apple.
Breaking it’s alliance with Apple was the single most reckless and stupid thing Google has ever done. They will almost certainly regret it one day.
I think, in all fairness, that there’s quite a bit of “blaming the victim” in Tom’s comments. Lunduke is quite aware of the degree of unearned trust he put in Apple. He has even gone so far as to say he was stupid for doing so several times on the Linux Action Show podcast.
But the issue he does raise – and which developers should be concerned about – is how poorly Apple handled the problem once he was finally able to get their attention.
From what he said, it appears Apple had communicated with him, acknowledged they saw what the problem was – and then frankly admitted they didn’t know how to fix it. After which they basically stopped communicating with Bryan and went into full “stonewall” mode.
I don’t normally condemn a business for having problems or making mistakes. But I do when they refuse to make good on them. And I have nothing but contempt for a business when it walks away from a known problem and leaves someone in the lurch without hope for a resolution.
It’s even worse when you do it to a developer. Because these people aren’t just your customers – they’re also supposed to be your business partners.
So I don’t think it really matters whether Bryan was stupid, overly trusting, or just plain naive. Apple has screwed him over royally.
And what really makes it sad is that it appears they know it, and have allowed the situation to continue.
Edited 2012-03-16 12:37 UTC
Sounds like an awful lot of professions where you may have to wait a couple to a few weeks for a major decision that could affect your revenue.
I am a Mac user and honestly I do not like the direction apple is going these days.
Locked down hardware, locked down software, one source for apps, an attempt to monopolize all media distribution, sucking 30% of the sale off their developers for every sale.
I mean when you think about it the company is really becoming everything they advertised against in their famous “1984” commercial.
The sad thing is that the majority of my fellow users just eat this crap up like the canned dog food it is without thinking much about the long term issues.
I am NOT shocked that apple would leave an indie developer hanging like this. When has Apple ever cared for a business partner? The answer is they don’t! They partner long enough to work their own solution (if they like your product) and then they lay you to waste in the name of innovation as they integrate your ideas into their software.
Frankly nothing this corporation does surprises me at this point.
In related news, I saw reports this week that the Google Play store is several days (a week?) late in paying its devs[1]. It appears it’s only limited to European devs, but there are 100+ complaints on a Google support thread.
I think what Thom said is right (paraphrasing): it sucks having to depend on a third party who clearly doesn’t depend on you.
Scary!
[1]http://thenextweb.com/google/2012/03/13/european-android-app-develo…
The problem is not depending on an app store for your income, the problem is depending on only a single app store for your income.
This really has little do with app stores and more with lack of business sense. Putting all your eggs in one basket is bad business practice and this should not be news to anyone.
Some years ago there was a nice Mac software house called Radical Breeze.
They had nice software. I bought two of their products.
One was Formation:
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/15091/formation/
Another was DiscBlaze:
http://download.cnet.com/DiscBlaze/3000-2646_4-10211667.html
They promised new versions that never came to light.
After that they left the Mac Market:
http://support.realsoftware.com/listarchives/realbasic-nug/2006-07/…
And many users like me were left out in the cold…
Now, this was done by a guy called Bryan Lund, and now there is a Bryan Lunduke?
WTF?
In Europe where I live, Apple is going for the jugular of independent resellers, that supported Apple during the “bad old days”.
But, in this case, I have my doubts.
Can anyone give more details?
Yeah, and my name is kinda reminiscent of Lazarus Long. Also, I had requests for ID, when buying alcohol and such (well, and when I got shaved…), close to a decade after I was formally allowed to buy such.
Hmm… WTF?
(alternatively – I do have relatively prominent canine teeth, a bit pointy ears, very pale carnation even for a central European, a mild dislike of the sun, being sort of a “nigh person” & I like to wear ~dark …but I don’t drink blood, promise)
Or – don’t put too much weight on names (particularly merely similar ones), they are not far from obsolete in modern world (they kinda worked when words couldn’t travel very far, and communities were rather small; considering typical levels of infidelity & just very recent appearance of genetic paternity tests, the value we attach to such “lineages” might be even seen as in the sphere of our myths…).
I have a 9-5 ( well, more like 9-7 ) in IT, and on the side I do some mobile development. I have 3 games in several shops: Nokia’s Ovi, Android Market, Blackberry’s App World, plus some small ones like the Amazon App Store and the Korean T-Store (no, no Apple mostly because all my games are in Java so they are easily portable between Android, Symbian and Blackberry but Apple is Objective-C and I am too lazy to rewrite everything). Best income actually comes from Nokia, even though the games work better in Android ( Nokia has some slight glitching problems I cannot seem to be able to fix ).
I’ve been doing this for last 2 years. Let me tell you: a small dev is off the radar everywhere. Even RIM or Nokia, the ones that should be caring the most because they are playing catch-up don’t give a damn. For example, RIM has declined one of my games because of one IMHO completely bogus legal reason and there’s simply no way I could appeal this – they don’t reply to dev support emails, and by phone I cannot seem to be able to reach anyone remotely competent.
Edited 2012-03-19 07:13 UTC