6 ms·

I see it moving to a situation where a consumer pays a monthly price and has access to all the apps they want to download. This is already happening to games (s

I see it moving to a situation where a consumer pays a monthly price and has access to all the apps they want to download. This is already happening to games (see humble bundle & EA Origin subscription). Amazon are moving this way to an extent, at GDC 2016 the announced that you could publish your app for free on their app store for their line of tablets, and they would pay you per customer per minute of usage on your app. Also, didn't exactly the same thing happen to music industry? Now we can pay $0 for music, we just have adds interspersed between tracks. The same thing will eventually happen to everything digitally distributable.

meheleventyone 9y ago
Amazon actually announced their service was closing down last week: https://developer.amazon.com/blogs/appstore/post/cbadeae1-990d-4d52-bef5-ea61f6114b94/announcement-amazon-actually-free-program https://developer.amazon.com/blogs/appstore/post/cbadeae1-99...
- greybox 9y ago
  At the time I thought they would just turn down the money/minute dial to almost zero once they had brought enough people to their platform that it wasn't worth it anymore. I didn't realise they would shut it down completely. I would be interested in seeing data about how successful that program was at attracting actual consumers to the platform rather than just developers . . . .
  - meheleventyone 9y ago
    Yup, I'm not sure it was amazingly popular with either. The Amazon appstore has a bit of an uphill battle in the regard in general AFAIK. In regard to your other points I also happened across this today: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-apple-music-tidal-music-streaming-services-royalty-rates-compared/ http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify... Interesting how quickly these subscription services are losing money and how low the rate of return to the artist is.
    - mysterydip 9y ago
      I only have one game on there, and can't give specifics, but it earned more on underground than either google or apple's stores (but not both combined). I was looking forward to the long tail of updating it and gaining users, but I guess that's the risk with walled gardens.
      - meheleventyone 9y ago
        I think in comparison to F2P type mechanics a subscription service that pays developers per minute of play is great. It's the same focus on retention without the requirement to try to have the player spend on a regular basis.

meheleventyone 9y ago

Amazon actually announced their service was closing down last week: https://developer.amazon.com/blogs/appstore/post/cbadeae1-990d-4d52-bef5-ea61f6114b94/announcement-amazon-actually-free-program https://developer.amazon.com/blogs/appstore/post/cbadeae1-99...

greybox 9y ago
At the time I thought they would just turn down the money/minute dial to almost zero once they had brought enough people to their platform that it wasn't worth it anymore. I didn't realise they would shut it down completely. I would be interested in seeing data about how successful that program was at attracting actual consumers to the platform rather than just developers . . . .
- meheleventyone 9y ago
  Yup, I'm not sure it was amazingly popular with either. The Amazon appstore has a bit of an uphill battle in the regard in general AFAIK. In regard to your other points I also happened across this today: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-apple-music-tidal-music-streaming-services-royalty-rates-compared/ http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify... Interesting how quickly these subscription services are losing money and how low the rate of return to the artist is.
  - mysterydip 9y ago
    I only have one game on there, and can't give specifics, but it earned more on underground than either google or apple's stores (but not both combined). I was looking forward to the long tail of updating it and gaining users, but I guess that's the risk with walled gardens.
    - meheleventyone 9y ago
      I think in comparison to F2P type mechanics a subscription service that pays developers per minute of play is great. It's the same focus on retention without the requirement to try to have the player spend on a regular basis.