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If it was closer to 5%, or even a fixed fee (eg: $1 per app sold), I would accept the narrative that it's a fee. 30% of your business is not a fee, it's more l

by pier25 6y ago

If it was closer to 5%, or even a fixed fee (eg: $1 per app sold), I would accept the narrative that it's a fee. 30% of your business is not a fee, it's more like a partnership. Apple is, in practice, a business partner to each and every iOS developer. Except that they have total and absolute control of the business. If they shut you down on the App Store, you're done. Your iOS app is worthless on any other platform. I shit you not, I've personally had apps rejected by the review board because they didn't like the screenshots. Those were screenshots of the app itself.

CharlesW 6y ago
> I shit you not, I've personally had apps rejected by the review board because they didn't like the screenshots. Those were screenshots of the app itself. That kind of editorial feedback seems like a good thing, no? Do you feel like that process improved how your app was presented to users?
- mhh__ 6y ago
  I don't know how much time the average app get looked at for but is it long enough to be feedback? I don't know what this app looks like, but if a screenshot of the app is a screenshot of the app what more can you do? Ideally, I would assume the creators of the app would know their customers well enough to choose.
  - judge2020 6y ago
    Eh I mean we don't know what it was, but if it was something like the settings page or a screenshot with a lot of white-space I can see why it would be rejected, although it probably should be allowed at the developer's expense.
  - CharlesW 6y ago
    > Ideally, I would assume the creators of the app would know their customers well enough to choose. Having worked with many creators in many mediums, that's often not the case. In the case of apps, independent developers who don't have a marketing person can often benefit from even the surface-level presentational help Apple was providing.
prepend 6y ago
I mean most retail software gives what 40-70% to retailers and wholesalers, right? If I sell something at Target for $50, I’m probably getting $25 tops. Don’t think I’m in partnership but definitely an important relationship.
- slindz 6y ago
  True... But the difference here is that you've prepared an asset that can only be sold in one place.
- mhh__ 6y ago
  As for Target, it's a brick and mortar store. Apple do have some hefty expenditures, sure, but they're luxuries (e.g. Making your own CPUs is cool but ultimately not all that for a product that most users won't have even the slightest clue of the trade-offs that went into that decision) - 30% is quite a lot for software, especially in a market like apple's.
  - jachee 6y ago
    A lot compared to what? What other market is like Apple's?
    - mhh__ 6y ago
      As in Steam also charge 30%, but Steam don't exclusively control access to their customers. If you sell your game on the epic store it's 12%. Apple exclusively control the gates to their customers in a way not found in any other device of comparable stature (Microsoft and Sony are gatekeepers for their consoles, but they aren't a "utility" in the same way some would argue a phone is)
  - surfpel 6y ago
    I would like to see some good arguments as to why a brick and mortar store deserves a significantly larger cut. > Making your own CPUs is cool but ultimately not all that for a product that most users won't have even the slightest clue of the trade-offs that went into that decision Is developing better hardware not a valid reason? It’s too much of a luxury to legitimize fees?
kemayo 6y ago
Interestingly (sort of), 5%-or-$1 wouldn't work out well for Apple. This is because credit card processing fees are generally structured as a flat fee plus a percentage of the transaction. Something like 5 cents + 1.3% would be a great deal on payment processing, generally. Apple is a behemoth, so let's assume they're getting a good deal. For a $1 purchase that'd be ~$0.07 to the transaction processor... which is more than the flat percentage already. Then Apple has some amount of costs involved (bandwidth, maintenance of systems, general overhead, etc) even if they started running the App Store at cost as they originally claimed they'd do. There's definitely room to lower the cut Apple takes... it's just that somewhere in the 10-20% range is still a reasonable fee to cover their costs. It's also worth considering how gift cards affect what Apple can charge. Apple sells gift cards through retailers, who are getting a cut of those sales. That cut comes directly out of Apple's portion of the sale, so they have to account for some percentage of transactions having that effective cost, which is probably higher than the aforementioned payment-processing cost. (There are some markets where gift cards are incredibly common. Kids get given them a lot. They're super common in Japan and other countries for everyone.) (The flat $1 fee wouldn't fall apart on processing costs until you reached really expensive in-app purchases... but it'd massively change the economics of the App Store, where $1 apps / in-app purchases are pretty common. I have no idea if that's a good idea or not.)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- cnst 6y ago
  Wait a moment, how do you get from 5 cents + 1.3% to the 10-20% range all of a sudden?! Electricity and processing power aren't that expensive. They'd probably do just fine if they'd lower the fee to 10%, and stop enforcing that you don't have third-party payments.
  - sebastien_bois 6y ago
    > They'd probably do just fine if they'd lower the fee to 10%, and stop enforcing that you don't have third-party payments. Especially considering they're a) charging a yearly fee and b) selling ads on the AppStore (which as someone else here pointed out is their aim to grow ad sales by clamping down on the ad identifier to make ads outside of the AppStore less useful).
usefulcat 6y ago
As long as there are still plenty of people making apps for iOS, I don't see how Apple has much incentive at all to change their behavior. If this stuff is that big of a problem for the average iOS developer, then shouldn't this at least be an opportunity for Google (to attract more developers to its platform, possibly exclusively)? Or no because G has pretty much the same incentives that Apple does? Or is this already happening and I'm just not aware of it?
- crooked-v 6y ago
  From what I understand, Google, Microsoft, and Sony all also charge 30% for the app marketplaces on their devices. There may be some game-theory pressure here not to lower the cut for risk that the others will do the same and a race to the bottom will ensue.
  - d3nj4l 6y ago
    Epic basically started that race to the bottom in the PC gaming space. Time will tell if it will actually drive Steam's cut down.
    - Bekwnn 6y ago
      Steam already lowered their cut directed mostly at AAA games with sales over $10 million dropping to 25% and sales over $50 million dropping to 20%. AAA devs were already trying to leave steam as much as possible, so they tried to bring them back while doing nothing for smaller studios and indies who can't afford to exist off steam.
      - foepys 6y ago
        Doesn't Steam allow indie developers to generate as many keys as they want for free? The Humble Bundle gave me a lot of Steam keys the last time I bought something from them and Steam didn't get a 30% cut from it.
      - hutattedonmyarm 6y ago
megablast 6y ago
Still, 30% is a huge improvement on what it was before the App Store. Publishers would take 60-80% in the old days.
- sgc 6y ago
  No it's not, because you could previously self publish apps for any major os and not be locked out by default from virtually all devices. I understand the benefits of an app store and walled garden (not that I want one for myself, but I understand), it's always been way too much nonetheless.
  - dogweather 6y ago
    That's still the case for computers. But before the iOS app store, there was none.
- kalleboo 6y ago
  Before the App Store I sold software on my web page and the only fees were the 5% PayPal takes and $9/mo for dreamhost
  - smabie 6y ago
    You can still do that.
    - foepys 6y ago
      You can't side load on iOS.
      - smabie 6y ago
        Yeah but you access the same exact markets as the old days, just maybe not the new ones.
      - baddox 6y ago
        What changed though? Before iOS and iPhones existed, you also couldn’t sideload on iOS, but no one was complaining. Apple created a new product essentially from scratch, and it has some limitations to how software can be distributed to it. Your car infotainment center and your fancy air purifier probably also don’t provide an easy way to install arbitrary software on them. But creating a new device that can’t do every conceivable task doesn’t change how you can sell other software online.
antris 6y ago
> If they shut you down on the App Store, you're done. Your iOS app is worthless on any other platform. > I shit you not, I've personally had apps rejected by the review board because they didn't like the screenshots. Those were screenshots of the app itself. My experience sending applications to the app store was certainly frustrating as a first-comer as the App Store has numerous rules about the screenshots, descriptions, naming etc. that you have to follow. However, every time the app got rejected, the reviewer sent clear feedback on which rules the submissions were violating and how to fix those issues. After that, you could send your app for another review. Calling that "shutting you down" is slightly harsh in my ear. We fixed the problems they had with our submission and then we got approved.
- Diesel555 6y ago
  I agree with this partially. I have had very good feedback from the reviewers when my app was rejected. I could find and fix their issues, I may not agree with it, but the terms were clear. Also... I've submitted a minor bug fix and got flagged on something I did not change that was previously approved and their terms did not change. That gets frustrating. I feel like every update is a gamble. Some parts of it seem pretty vague. Sometimes I just resubmit and get a new reviewer and he approves on the iffy ones. But with people in the loop interpretation is always a thing and I can't get too mad over it.
  - hutattedonmyarm 6y ago
    > Also... I've submitted a minor bug fix and got flagged on something I did not change that was previously approved and their terms did not change Luckily, this is something they recently said they won’t do anymore
    - whakim 6y ago
      Since when? This happened to me a week ago.
      - hutattedonmyarm 6y ago
quest88 6y ago
Some of these businesses wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the appstore. 30% is comfortably fair for many.
- qzw 6y ago
  And the AppStore wouldn’t exist without apps. Just ask Microsoft.
risyachka 6y ago
Usually this is because your app is low quality of looks bad. I've published lots of apps and followed changes of Apple policy for years, and in 99% those increased the quality of apps published and user experience. If someone doesn't deserve 30% it is Google. With Apple at least I speak to a human (or if this in an AI - cudos to the developers, it is super real). While with Google all you get is a bot reply "Sorry, we can't tell you shit. Go figure out a problem and unless you do we will block your account and all RELATED accounts". Well that is some wild shit.
- monadic2 6y ago
  I have no idea how Apple could claim to make a decision about quality for me with a straight face. Just look at the gaming section: it's full of abusive software with repeatable in-app purchases. Apple is fully responsible for the use of addictive psychology to con people out of their money. They don't even allow you to filter this crap out in their app store. If there were any justice in the world this would be criminal.
jjtheblunt 6y ago
Considering the business partner angle, i wonder how expensive it was, 20 years ago, to market, securely deliver to consumers, and process payments from customers for small developers selling in CompUSA or BestBuy, while providing analytics on sales. I wonder if it gave rise or "justification" to the 30% thing, but don't know.
- crowbahr 6y ago
  Compared with other publishers of software 30% was probably pretty reasonable. Now it's just simply not.
- CuriouslyC 6y ago
  The margins on retailers are razor slim, and publishers did handle a lot of marketing and front money. Apple has a muppet play with the app for a bit then they add a row to a database. They are absolutely bleeding developers to capitalize on their silly mindshare.
kapp 6y ago
Apple considers the iPhone a single product. It has many features: some of them require extra payment. For example, you can purchase a feature that allows you to play a game about Pokemon. Apple outsources the development of some of iPhone features to 3rd parties. Some of those 3rd party iPhone feature developers mistakenly think of themselves as independent application developers. Apple mercifully allows such miscategorization because it does not really matter for them or their customers.

by pier25 6y ago

CharlesW 6y ago

> I shit you not, I've personally had apps rejected by the review board because they didn't like the screenshots. Those were screenshots of the app itself. That kind of editorial feedback seems like a good thing, no? Do you feel like that process improved how your app was presented to users?

mhh__ 6y ago
I don't know how much time the average app get looked at for but is it long enough to be feedback? I don't know what this app looks like, but if a screenshot of the app is a screenshot of the app what more can you do? Ideally, I would assume the creators of the app would know their customers well enough to choose.
- judge2020 6y ago
  Eh I mean we don't know what it was, but if it was something like the settings page or a screenshot with a lot of white-space I can see why it would be rejected, although it probably should be allowed at the developer's expense.
- CharlesW 6y ago
  > Ideally, I would assume the creators of the app would know their customers well enough to choose. Having worked with many creators in many mediums, that's often not the case. In the case of apps, independent developers who don't have a marketing person can often benefit from even the surface-level presentational help Apple was providing.

prepend 6y ago

I mean most retail software gives what 40-70% to retailers and wholesalers, right? If I sell something at Target for $50, I’m probably getting $25 tops. Don’t think I’m in partnership but definitely an important relationship.

slindz 6y ago
True... But the difference here is that you've prepared an asset that can only be sold in one place.
mhh__ 6y ago
As for Target, it's a brick and mortar store. Apple do have some hefty expenditures, sure, but they're luxuries (e.g. Making your own CPUs is cool but ultimately not all that for a product that most users won't have even the slightest clue of the trade-offs that went into that decision) - 30% is quite a lot for software, especially in a market like apple's.
- jachee 6y ago
  A lot compared to what? What other market is like Apple's?
  - mhh__ 6y ago
    As in Steam also charge 30%, but Steam don't exclusively control access to their customers. If you sell your game on the epic store it's 12%. Apple exclusively control the gates to their customers in a way not found in any other device of comparable stature (Microsoft and Sony are gatekeepers for their consoles, but they aren't a "utility" in the same way some would argue a phone is)
- surfpel 6y ago
  I would like to see some good arguments as to why a brick and mortar store deserves a significantly larger cut. > Making your own CPUs is cool but ultimately not all that for a product that most users won't have even the slightest clue of the trade-offs that went into that decision Is developing better hardware not a valid reason? It’s too much of a luxury to legitimize fees?

kemayo 6y ago

Interestingly (sort of), 5%-or-$1 wouldn't work out well for Apple. This is because credit card processing fees are generally structured as a flat fee plus a percentage of the transaction. Something like 5 cents + 1.3% would be a great deal on payment processing, generally. Apple is a behemoth, so let's assume they're getting a good deal. For a $1 purchase that'd be ~$0.07 to the transaction processor... which is more than the flat percentage already. Then Apple has some amount of costs involved (bandwidth, maintenance of systems, general overhead, etc) even if they started running the App Store at cost as they originally claimed they'd do. There's definitely room to lower the cut Apple takes... it's just that somewhere in the 10-20% range is still a reasonable fee to cover their costs. It's also worth considering how gift cards affect what Apple can charge. Apple sells gift cards through retailers, who are getting a cut of those sales. That cut comes directly out of Apple's portion of the sale, so they have to account for some percentage of transactions having that effective cost, which is probably higher than the aforementioned payment-processing cost. (There are some markets where gift cards are incredibly common. Kids get given them a lot. They're super common in Japan and other countries for everyone.) (The flat $1 fee wouldn't fall apart on processing costs until you reached really expensive in-app purchases... but it'd massively change the economics of the App Store, where $1 apps / in-app purchases are pretty common. I have no idea if that's a good idea or not.)

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
cnst 6y ago
Wait a moment, how do you get from 5 cents + 1.3% to the 10-20% range all of a sudden?! Electricity and processing power aren't that expensive. They'd probably do just fine if they'd lower the fee to 10%, and stop enforcing that you don't have third-party payments.
- sebastien_bois 6y ago
  > They'd probably do just fine if they'd lower the fee to 10%, and stop enforcing that you don't have third-party payments. Especially considering they're a) charging a yearly fee and b) selling ads on the AppStore (which as someone else here pointed out is their aim to grow ad sales by clamping down on the ad identifier to make ads outside of the AppStore less useful).

usefulcat 6y ago

As long as there are still plenty of people making apps for iOS, I don't see how Apple has much incentive at all to change their behavior. If this stuff is that big of a problem for the average iOS developer, then shouldn't this at least be an opportunity for Google (to attract more developers to its platform, possibly exclusively)? Or no because G has pretty much the same incentives that Apple does? Or is this already happening and I'm just not aware of it?

crooked-v 6y ago
From what I understand, Google, Microsoft, and Sony all also charge 30% for the app marketplaces on their devices. There may be some game-theory pressure here not to lower the cut for risk that the others will do the same and a race to the bottom will ensue.
- d3nj4l 6y ago
  Epic basically started that race to the bottom in the PC gaming space. Time will tell if it will actually drive Steam's cut down.
  - Bekwnn 6y ago
    Steam already lowered their cut directed mostly at AAA games with sales over $10 million dropping to 25% and sales over $50 million dropping to 20%. AAA devs were already trying to leave steam as much as possible, so they tried to bring them back while doing nothing for smaller studios and indies who can't afford to exist off steam.
    - foepys 6y ago
      Doesn't Steam allow indie developers to generate as many keys as they want for free? The Humble Bundle gave me a lot of Steam keys the last time I bought something from them and Steam didn't get a 30% cut from it.
    - hutattedonmyarm 6y ago

megablast 6y ago

Still, 30% is a huge improvement on what it was before the App Store. Publishers would take 60-80% in the old days.

sgc 6y ago
No it's not, because you could previously self publish apps for any major os and not be locked out by default from virtually all devices. I understand the benefits of an app store and walled garden (not that I want one for myself, but I understand), it's always been way too much nonetheless.
- dogweather 6y ago
  That's still the case for computers. But before the iOS app store, there was none.
kalleboo 6y ago
Before the App Store I sold software on my web page and the only fees were the 5% PayPal takes and $9/mo for dreamhost
- smabie 6y ago
  You can still do that.
  - foepys 6y ago
    You can't side load on iOS.
    - smabie 6y ago
      Yeah but you access the same exact markets as the old days, just maybe not the new ones.
    - baddox 6y ago
      What changed though? Before iOS and iPhones existed, you also couldn’t sideload on iOS, but no one was complaining. Apple created a new product essentially from scratch, and it has some limitations to how software can be distributed to it. Your car infotainment center and your fancy air purifier probably also don’t provide an easy way to install arbitrary software on them. But creating a new device that can’t do every conceivable task doesn’t change how you can sell other software online.

antris 6y ago

> If they shut you down on the App Store, you're done. Your iOS app is worthless on any other platform. > I shit you not, I've personally had apps rejected by the review board because they didn't like the screenshots. Those were screenshots of the app itself. My experience sending applications to the app store was certainly frustrating as a first-comer as the App Store has numerous rules about the screenshots, descriptions, naming etc. that you have to follow. However, every time the app got rejected, the reviewer sent clear feedback on which rules the submissions were violating and how to fix those issues. After that, you could send your app for another review. Calling that "shutting you down" is slightly harsh in my ear. We fixed the problems they had with our submission and then we got approved.

Diesel555 6y ago
I agree with this partially. I have had very good feedback from the reviewers when my app was rejected. I could find and fix their issues, I may not agree with it, but the terms were clear. Also... I've submitted a minor bug fix and got flagged on something I did not change that was previously approved and their terms did not change. That gets frustrating. I feel like every update is a gamble. Some parts of it seem pretty vague. Sometimes I just resubmit and get a new reviewer and he approves on the iffy ones. But with people in the loop interpretation is always a thing and I can't get too mad over it.
- hutattedonmyarm 6y ago
  > Also... I've submitted a minor bug fix and got flagged on something I did not change that was previously approved and their terms did not change Luckily, this is something they recently said they won’t do anymore
  - whakim 6y ago
    Since when? This happened to me a week ago.
    - hutattedonmyarm 6y ago

quest88 6y ago

Some of these businesses wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the appstore. 30% is comfortably fair for many.

qzw 6y ago
And the AppStore wouldn’t exist without apps. Just ask Microsoft.

risyachka 6y ago

Usually this is because your app is low quality of looks bad. I've published lots of apps and followed changes of Apple policy for years, and in 99% those increased the quality of apps published and user experience. If someone doesn't deserve 30% it is Google. With Apple at least I speak to a human (or if this in an AI - cudos to the developers, it is super real). While with Google all you get is a bot reply "Sorry, we can't tell you shit. Go figure out a problem and unless you do we will block your account and all RELATED accounts". Well that is some wild shit.

monadic2 6y ago
I have no idea how Apple could claim to make a decision about quality for me with a straight face. Just look at the gaming section: it's full of abusive software with repeatable in-app purchases. Apple is fully responsible for the use of addictive psychology to con people out of their money. They don't even allow you to filter this crap out in their app store. If there were any justice in the world this would be criminal.

jjtheblunt 6y ago

Considering the business partner angle, i wonder how expensive it was, 20 years ago, to market, securely deliver to consumers, and process payments from customers for small developers selling in CompUSA or BestBuy, while providing analytics on sales. I wonder if it gave rise or "justification" to the 30% thing, but don't know.

crowbahr 6y ago
Compared with other publishers of software 30% was probably pretty reasonable. Now it's just simply not.
CuriouslyC 6y ago
The margins on retailers are razor slim, and publishers did handle a lot of marketing and front money. Apple has a muppet play with the app for a bit then they add a row to a database. They are absolutely bleeding developers to capitalize on their silly mindshare.

kapp 6y ago

Apple considers the iPhone a single product. It has many features: some of them require extra payment. For example, you can purchase a feature that allows you to play a game about Pokemon. Apple outsources the development of some of iPhone features to 3rd parties. Some of those 3rd party iPhone feature developers mistakenly think of themselves as independent application developers. Apple mercifully allows such miscategorization because it does not really matter for them or their customers.