I agree to the extent that I'd also very much prefer if all apps that fit the security model of the mac app store would be distributed through it, I hate it tha

I agree to the extent that I'd also very much prefer if all apps that fit the security model of the mac app store would be distributed through it, I hate it that almost every program on my machine seems to have its own way of updating itself (not to mention the initial download/install). I do think Apple really is to blame here though, the MAS is frankly a big pile of junk, for users, but in particular for developers. It looks like they just launched it and called it a day, the interface is slow, clunky, it doesn't work properly if you have multiple accounts (and there's no way to merge them), updates often fail to download, searching is a mess etc. This is all just user-level complaints, apparently for developers things are even worse if you read around. Over the last year or two almost any app I initially installed through the MAS appears to have moved away from it...