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Weird, I was a die hard mac developer (since 1984), and I immediately stopped when iOS came out with the app store. Like, stopped /dead/. The reason I could be

Weird, I was a die hard mac developer (since 1984), and I immediately stopped when iOS came out with the app store. Like, stopped /dead/. The reason I could be a Mac Developer was the small pond; There wasn't a LOT of work, but there was enough for good people, and it paid well. On balance I /never/ developed anything for windows, because of the 'tree vs forest' problem : Even if you are REALLY fantastically good, there are so many people on the market that you can't possibly stand out. And that's why I never even wrote a single iOS app, even tho i was a wiz at ObjC and OSX (Imagine a Classic MacOS dev thrown together with a UNIX wiz, and that's me); it was guaranteed to bring in the 'forest' to OSX as well, and make any 'edge' more or less pointless. Also, from what I've seen, if anyone comes out with a nice app/game, there's a dozen or more group of people who will throw their dev team at copying it immediately, diluting any hope of revenue. It's these guys business model after all, you just can't win, and it's not like you can defend your IP anyway. So, 2016, I wonder what took people so long to realize it was all doomed but for a tiny fraction of apps.

zepto 10y ago
Weird - so you were uniquely position to capitalize on the growth period, but because you predicted that it would ebb a decade later, you decided not to take part?
- buserror 10y ago
  Yes, because I'm an engineer, not a gambler or a marketer. In that time, I also saw OSX become more and more iOS like, with fisher-price grade APIs replacing old, working ones, etc. Quite frankly I still compile my old stuff now and then, but I have no regrets leaving it all for the hipsters to fight over.
  - xenihn 10y ago
    I can definitely see where you're coming from, but I would have still gambled if I had been in your position :)
  - zepto 10y ago
    I'm curious what OSX APIs you saw being replaced?
    - kefka_p 10y ago
      While not the person to whom the question was directed, I'd offer that the move from QuickTime to AVFoundation (taken directly from iOS) & friends (CoreMedia, CMIO) was one such example. Core Media I/O was released a few years ago to replace vdig and/or sequence grabber IIRC. Despite being released a few years back, the only documentation available for CMIO is a sample project. AVFoundation was limited in terms of codec support relative to QuickTime offering only support for built-in codes. Just as an example. Of course QuickTime had no 64-bit future so Apple had to do something but it was and still is a bit of a mess years down the road.
      - jawngee 10y ago
        Are you kidding? AVFoundation is in nearly every way superior to QuickTime, minus the fact that you couldn't make ref movies with it until El Capitan. QuickTime's API sucks in comparison. Source: I write a video editor for macOS.
        kefka_p 10y ago
        Not kidding at all. There was a lot of noise during the transition on various mailing lists, as I recall. Even as an end-user the issue presented quite a few problems. While AVFoundation is generally a better API it remains less capable than the QuickTime umbrella was. Again refer to the functionality provided by vDig and Sequencer APIs. A simple case: try to slap together a video mixing app sometime that takes input from the camera or other source, processes some effects on it, and dumps the output back as pseudo device that can be used by other apps. Unless things have changed drastically the last time I looked into the matter, such a thing isn't possible within the constraints of AVFoundation itself. You have to resort to the essentially undocumented CoreMedia IO API. Apple does provide similar functionality for other types of devices at a higher level i.e. scanners, digital cameras via some other API I can't recall off the top of my head at the moment. =]
- gutnor 10y ago
  After 20 years working on the same platform maybe he didn't want to go into that fight, knowing the eventual outcome anyway. I have seen that quite often with my ex-colleague. Some people have been working on the company for ages, solving issues in the same business realm and just at the beginning of the next big thing in the company, they decide it is time to go someplace else. I used to think they were just afraid they could not compete, or were technically rusty. With many more years in the industry, I understand that the most likely reason is that they didn't want to commit to another round of the same bullshit with new shiny tech on top of it and they simply needed some fresh air. We are lucky to be employed in an industry where you can still say fuck it and find something else to do instead.
coralreef 10y ago
I'm not sure I understand your position. The iOS platform has probably made more indie dev millionaires than any other platform in history. And countless others making a living, or make a few bucks off side projects. Or are employed by app companies. So yeah, the amount of money attracts a lot of competition, and no, its not easy figuring out marketing and distribution. Most of us fail, but that's really just the nature of entrepreneurship. If you choose not to participate on a platform that generates billions of dollars annually, I suppose thats on your choice, and you could be correct that it is a waste of time for most people. But what is the cost of being a software developer who ignores this giant wave of mobile device adoption? You can't succeed if you don't give yourself a chance to succeed.
- kbenson 10y ago
  > I'm not sure I understand your position. The iOS platform has probably made more indie dev millionaires than any other platform in history. I think the assertion is something along the lines of that being possible because more indie devs are on that platform than ever existed before. Sure, there's a lot that made it big, but so many are in the pool that it's still a relatively minuscule chance.
  - coralreef 10y ago
    I suppose that makes logical sense. But I don't know of any platforms or markets where the proportion of risk to reward is much better. And if that opportunity was much better, economics dictates that it eventually would draw in more competition until risk-reward became par with any other market. No free lunches out there.
    - cousin_it 10y ago
      Most people enter game development because of passion rather than risk-reward. So the market is distorted and will stay that way.
    - animal531 10y ago
      The whole point of the article is the the proportion of risk to reward is non-existent on the platform. The unlucky developer will LOSE money by releasing their apps. The average developer might break even or make a ridiculously small amount. Only at the very top/lucky end will you get projects (that due to social media, word of mouth or just random luck) that nets between decent to good money.
partiallypro 10y ago
I think it's possible that the "Technology adoption life cycle" can be applied to app development. With iOS you were in a unique position to be an "early adopter" getting tons of early exposure on the app store. If you were to try today you would not get much at all.
ingsoc79 10y ago
The entire reason indie devs were making so much money in 2008-2009 was due to the mismatch between a wealthy customer base demanding apps for their new iPhones and the tiny ObjC-competent developer community at the time. Now that everyone and their dog knows ObjC or Swift, plus the fact that most mobile problems are solved, the easy money is long gone.
pmontra 10y ago
Out of curiosity, what did you do instead of developing for Apple platforms?
- buserror 10y ago
  Well, I had a parallel career as low level unix/linux/embedded development, so I went full on on that, and I couldn't be happier really; that ALSO has picked up a lot, and since it's not 'sexy' and technically challenging it's still a bit self-walled gardened...
vonklaus 10y ago
i don't know what to make of this. so you correctly predicted that 5-10 years of lurcrative sales in a closed system didnt feel right to you because you were a big fish in a pond that woud become larger, so you stopped /dead/ and did what? again, I am not trying to be rude, just trying to figure out what provided a better opportunity cost and was more interesting for you to work on that you gave up 20-30 years in the mac ecosystem?

zepto 10y ago

Weird - so you were uniquely position to capitalize on the growth period, but because you predicted that it would ebb a decade later, you decided not to take part?

buserror 10y ago
Yes, because I'm an engineer, not a gambler or a marketer. In that time, I also saw OSX become more and more iOS like, with fisher-price grade APIs replacing old, working ones, etc. Quite frankly I still compile my old stuff now and then, but I have no regrets leaving it all for the hipsters to fight over.
- xenihn 10y ago
  I can definitely see where you're coming from, but I would have still gambled if I had been in your position :)
- zepto 10y ago
  I'm curious what OSX APIs you saw being replaced?
  - kefka_p 10y ago
    While not the person to whom the question was directed, I'd offer that the move from QuickTime to AVFoundation (taken directly from iOS) & friends (CoreMedia, CMIO) was one such example. Core Media I/O was released a few years ago to replace vdig and/or sequence grabber IIRC. Despite being released a few years back, the only documentation available for CMIO is a sample project. AVFoundation was limited in terms of codec support relative to QuickTime offering only support for built-in codes. Just as an example. Of course QuickTime had no 64-bit future so Apple had to do something but it was and still is a bit of a mess years down the road.
    - jawngee 10y ago
      Are you kidding? AVFoundation is in nearly every way superior to QuickTime, minus the fact that you couldn't make ref movies with it until El Capitan. QuickTime's API sucks in comparison. Source: I write a video editor for macOS.
      - kefka_p 10y ago
        Not kidding at all. There was a lot of noise during the transition on various mailing lists, as I recall. Even as an end-user the issue presented quite a few problems. While AVFoundation is generally a better API it remains less capable than the QuickTime umbrella was. Again refer to the functionality provided by vDig and Sequencer APIs. A simple case: try to slap together a video mixing app sometime that takes input from the camera or other source, processes some effects on it, and dumps the output back as pseudo device that can be used by other apps. Unless things have changed drastically the last time I looked into the matter, such a thing isn't possible within the constraints of AVFoundation itself. You have to resort to the essentially undocumented CoreMedia IO API. Apple does provide similar functionality for other types of devices at a higher level i.e. scanners, digital cameras via some other API I can't recall off the top of my head at the moment. =]
gutnor 10y ago
After 20 years working on the same platform maybe he didn't want to go into that fight, knowing the eventual outcome anyway. I have seen that quite often with my ex-colleague. Some people have been working on the company for ages, solving issues in the same business realm and just at the beginning of the next big thing in the company, they decide it is time to go someplace else. I used to think they were just afraid they could not compete, or were technically rusty. With many more years in the industry, I understand that the most likely reason is that they didn't want to commit to another round of the same bullshit with new shiny tech on top of it and they simply needed some fresh air. We are lucky to be employed in an industry where you can still say fuck it and find something else to do instead.

coralreef 10y ago

I'm not sure I understand your position. The iOS platform has probably made more indie dev millionaires than any other platform in history. And countless others making a living, or make a few bucks off side projects. Or are employed by app companies. So yeah, the amount of money attracts a lot of competition, and no, its not easy figuring out marketing and distribution. Most of us fail, but that's really just the nature of entrepreneurship. If you choose not to participate on a platform that generates billions of dollars annually, I suppose thats on your choice, and you could be correct that it is a waste of time for most people. But what is the cost of being a software developer who ignores this giant wave of mobile device adoption? You can't succeed if you don't give yourself a chance to succeed.

kbenson 10y ago
> I'm not sure I understand your position. The iOS platform has probably made more indie dev millionaires than any other platform in history. I think the assertion is something along the lines of that being possible because more indie devs are on that platform than ever existed before. Sure, there's a lot that made it big, but so many are in the pool that it's still a relatively minuscule chance.
- coralreef 10y ago
  I suppose that makes logical sense. But I don't know of any platforms or markets where the proportion of risk to reward is much better. And if that opportunity was much better, economics dictates that it eventually would draw in more competition until risk-reward became par with any other market. No free lunches out there.
  - cousin_it 10y ago
    Most people enter game development because of passion rather than risk-reward. So the market is distorted and will stay that way.
  - animal531 10y ago
    The whole point of the article is the the proportion of risk to reward is non-existent on the platform. The unlucky developer will LOSE money by releasing their apps. The average developer might break even or make a ridiculously small amount. Only at the very top/lucky end will you get projects (that due to social media, word of mouth or just random luck) that nets between decent to good money.

partiallypro 10y ago

I think it's possible that the "Technology adoption life cycle" can be applied to app development. With iOS you were in a unique position to be an "early adopter" getting tons of early exposure on the app store. If you were to try today you would not get much at all.

ingsoc79 10y ago

The entire reason indie devs were making so much money in 2008-2009 was due to the mismatch between a wealthy customer base demanding apps for their new iPhones and the tiny ObjC-competent developer community at the time. Now that everyone and their dog knows ObjC or Swift, plus the fact that most mobile problems are solved, the easy money is long gone.

pmontra 10y ago

Out of curiosity, what did you do instead of developing for Apple platforms?

buserror 10y ago
Well, I had a parallel career as low level unix/linux/embedded development, so I went full on on that, and I couldn't be happier really; that ALSO has picked up a lot, and since it's not 'sexy' and technically challenging it's still a bit self-walled gardened...

vonklaus 10y ago

i don't know what to make of this. so you correctly predicted that 5-10 years of lurcrative sales in a closed system didnt feel right to you because you were a big fish in a pond that woud become larger, so you stopped /dead/ and did what? again, I am not trying to be rude, just trying to figure out what provided a better opportunity cost and was more interesting for you to work on that you gave up 20-30 years in the mac ecosystem?