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When Microsoft helped me get Krita in the Windows Store I hadn't much expectations. Now the Windows Store and Steam (fifty/fifty) bring in enough to pay me and
by boudewijnrempt 6y ago
When Microsoft helped me get Krita in the Windows Store I hadn't much expectations. Now the Windows Store and Steam (fifty/fifty) bring in enough to pay me and six other people to work on Krita almost full-time. It has saved me from having to find a day job that would have driven me round the bend for sure.
That said, it sucks that I cannot tell people they can also download Krita from krita.org. There's always the fear that some day, the Windows Store will be closed, or Krita will be kicked out or whatever.
Publishing in an app store means you're a sharecropper, with all that entails.
- AdmiralAsshat 6y ago> That said, it sucks that I cannot tell people they can also download Krita from krita.org. As in, you've signed an NDA literally forbidding you from mentioning as such? Or you're simply not allowed to put the URL anywhere in the Windows Store description?
- gganley 6y agoThe second option, keep in mind speaking from reading and not from experience
- rnotaro 6y agoFalse. The URL is currently in the Microsoft Store description. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/krita/9n6x57zgrw96 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/krita/9n6x57zgrw96
- dapole 6y agoI mean in practice you can also list links to your site on the Apple App Store but you aren’t allowed to mention a cheaper price or another purchasing option.
- thephyber 6y agoIt seems to me there is some price arbitrage opportunity for a 3rd party who can figure out how to get affiliate payments. If the app developer can't advertise that one of their store options is cheaper, a 3rd party isn't limited by the same contractual obligation.
- jaywalk 6y agoI'd imagine it's more that Microsoft takes a smaller cut if they come to the store via krita.org versus finding it through the store itself, so they don't want to give that up.
- httpsterio 6y agoKrita on Windows' store costs (I think) around 10 dollars. Directly from Krita's site, 0 dollars. Windows has a similar policy as Apple that the app creators cannot tell the users on the store page to go somewhere else to get it cheaper/free.
- ehsankia 6y agoThe commenter above was making a slightly different point. Some digital stores take a large cut if the user finds the app organically while browsing their Store, vs if they came to the store page from a link on the owner's site. The former means Windows helped the user find the app, whereas the latter means the author did and Microsoft is just providing a way for the user to download the app.
- Talanes 6y agoWhich stores? Does the Microsoft store work this way? When you respond to a specific and pointed question with theoretical knowledge of how things "could work," it just starts to muddy the waters.
- 6y ago
- bebna 6y agoI don't think that don't matters that much atm. Most will google for paint programm or directly for krita after they heard about from somewhere (youtube tuts for example) and land on the project homepage. After which they mostly will remember to look for the homepage next time they install it again.
- blackoil 6y agoDownload link is prominent(in top header) on krita.org ?? Do you mean you are not allowed to add link from Windows Store description. Which seems reasonable, i.e. equivalent of using Amazon to promote company site (alternate/competing store).
- jobigoud 6y agoIt feels a bit like a dark pattern though if you consider a user that find it first through the store. I would like to know the percentage of users that consciously paid for it knowing they could also download it for free vs those users that paid for it because they didn't know better.
- kohtatsu 6y agoAgreed. I imagine a lot of the blindsided users would be wary of using the Microsoft Store thereafter.
- vageli 6y agoWould you feel similarly about AirBnB hosts leaving their contact information in the physical location so you could arrange bookings outside the platform? Just curious because I can see the value platforms provide in discovery and "bringing the customers to you" but once you have proved your worth to the customer, it's not clear to me why a platform-middleman is still needed.
- Tade0 6y agoRecently friend of mine told me he bought Krita through the Windows app store - I was confused because I thought it was free. Thanks for the clarification. BTW big fan of this app and I have to admit that I'm relieved that it has some sort of a steady revenue stream. That sum next to the Donate button doesn't look like it could sustain any large scale development.
- boudewijnrempt 6y agoCurrently, we're making about 16k a month, and that's funding six people. The donations fund the seventh person.
- nico_h 6y agoYeah, that's the thing that's so annoying about at least the windows (TIL) and Apple App Store: you cannot mention any other option. If they were so confident in the convenience they offered they would allow you to mention other options. This reeks of anti-competitiveness.
- jfoster 6y agoTheir fears seem mostly unfounded, too. For most consumers, the convenience of an app store is massive.
- sneak 6y agoThe issue, I think, is not that Apple sets draconian rules in their store. Their store, their rules. It's that I, a user, cannot choose to sideload an app I want to use on my device or choose to use a different store.
- dathinab 6y agoWhat should be possible is not to sidenote an app but an entry app store.
- Sir_Substance 6y ago>It's that I, a user, cannot choose to sideload an app That's only half the equation. I run android, but have no google account. I have always used a combination of aptoide, f-droid and manually downloaded apk's for my apps. When all the covid apps were released and governments were encouraging people to download them, do you think they put the APK on a government website for people to download? Nope, just links to the app store. Of course, most of those apps relied on google play services API's for a bunch of stuff, so it's not like they would have worked anyway. It's not enough to merely allow sideloading. If the expectation isn't that mobile devices are a diverse ecosystem and that it's not good enough for developers to pick one store and bugger the rest, you've achieved very little. Most people could not be bothered going through what I do to keep my phone clean.
- 6y ago
- femiagbabiaka 6y agoIt’s definitely not all that it entails, but point taken. Anyways, I prefer the open web instinctively, but it would be interesting to see data on the average age of software on the internet alongside where that software is hosted.
- i2shar 6y agoI wasn't aware of Krita before, checked it out after I read comments here. I now have a much deeper appreciation of animation artists. One scene is so much work! [1] And kudos to you for making your tool available for free. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9diKUhxImqo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9diKUhxImqo
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- mycall 6y agoDo you have any plans to make a VR version of Krita? I would love to hang and paint with it's capabilities in 3D space.