5 ms·

If Steam, Apple, Google, any of them made a physical cartridge of a developer's games for them, that would seem a lot more reasonable a fee.

by sova 6y ago

wil421 6y ago
What about what the virtual platform Apple provides? The cartridge is the feature rich phone and virtual services Apple provides to get to the device.
- spacemanmatt 6y ago
  For which a customer spends hundreds of dollars, comparable to purchasing a game console that took cartridges. Apple doesn't provide that, buyers provide that. Apple is trying use their leverage to dominate every angle of the action. Surprise, surprise, surpriiiiise.
  - ac29 6y ago
    And millions of developers pay $99/year, which likely more than covers Apple's costs of providing developer tooling, documentation, etc.
    - jpttsn 6y ago
      I wouldn’t be so sure. How many man hours go into developing ARKit, Foundation, Swift etc.? How many developer accounts would be required to fund all of that plus the R&D for the ideas that didn’t work out? I think the $99 is more of a filter, like a captcha, for developers that mean business.
- username90 6y ago
  The user paid for those when they bought the phone.
- 52-6F-62 6y ago
  Probably a more accurate analog to the cartridge would be the storage and distribution services. That takes some infrastructure in networking and storage.
  - sova 6y ago
    Developers still have to store application specific data on their own!
    - ratww 6y ago
      Apple actually gives developers 1PB of free storage per app with CloudKit, and it even has some nice privacy features for users. Of course it has limitations, so most developers prefer rolling their own backend.
    - 52-6F-62 6y ago
      How's that? I choose apps that store my data locally rather than their servers if I even do download apps. I was discussing the storage and distribution infrastructure.
      - sova 6y ago
        Consider a game that holds a leaderboard on steam, or any app that stores user progress on its servers. Not exactly pertinent to your comment but pertinent to the conversation as a whole: If Apple/Google/Steam stored all app data for developers and also did the marketing for developers, that is closer to what 30% is worth imho. For hosting the platform, yes your grandfather was the first to stab a flag into the digital real-estate, and for that I owe you 30%? Feudalism that manages to shift cost to both consumer and developer at the same time -- impressive, but not very noble.
        52-6F-62 6y ago
        That's not a good analogue for a cartridge, though. The cartridge or the device itself stored data locally. Modern gaming consoles store their data on HDD's. Anything beyond that is entirely developer's prerogative. And according to another user, they do offer storage through CloudKit... which it appears they do, included in the dev account/App Store distribution model—1 PB: https://developer.apple.com/icloud/cloudkit/ https://developer.apple.com/icloud/cloudkit/
awinder 6y ago
This is a super literal take. In the 80s/90s the expense-incurring activity was physical cartridge production. Today it’s bandwidth & delivery infrastructure, card processing, any myriad of things.
- matthewdgreen 6y ago
  Yes, but it's hard to imagine that 30 years of technological progress has not changed the underlying cost structures of these businesses. After all, it's changed the cost structure of almost every other business that has some connection to computing and data delivery by orders of magnitude. Yet, strangely the 30% cut has not changed a bit.
  - c22 6y ago
    NES carts used to cost like fifty bucks. Aren't most apps in the few-dollars range?
    - matthewdgreen 6y ago
      Nintendo console games still cost $50, and seem to outsell $1-$5 games despite the fact that the vast majority of users already own a phone, and consoles cost extra (and there are more than two platforms to choose from.) So I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that the market does not consider these to be equivalent products.
      - awinder 6y ago
        The still costs $50 is interesting to me, because inflation adjusted this is a pretty steep discount. The 30% stayed the same, but inflation adjusted on something like this the revenue netted is down to what 15% would have previously got you. All I’m really getting at is that the layers of complication are thick. I feel like one could unwind this with a lot of effort, but I doubt anyone is being utterly fleeced (or is utterly innocent, for that matter).
- ardy42 6y ago

If Steam, Apple, Google, any of them made a physical cartridge of a developer's games for them, that would seem a lot more reasonable a fee.

by sova 6y ago

If Steam, Apple, Google, any of them made a physical cartridge of a developer's games for them, that would seem a lot more reasonable a fee.

wil421 6y ago

What about what the virtual platform Apple provides? The cartridge is the feature rich phone and virtual services Apple provides to get to the device.

spacemanmatt 6y ago
For which a customer spends hundreds of dollars, comparable to purchasing a game console that took cartridges. Apple doesn't provide that, buyers provide that. Apple is trying use their leverage to dominate every angle of the action. Surprise, surprise, surpriiiiise.
- ac29 6y ago
  And millions of developers pay $99/year, which likely more than covers Apple's costs of providing developer tooling, documentation, etc.
  - jpttsn 6y ago
    I wouldn’t be so sure. How many man hours go into developing ARKit, Foundation, Swift etc.? How many developer accounts would be required to fund all of that plus the R&D for the ideas that didn’t work out? I think the $99 is more of a filter, like a captcha, for developers that mean business.
username90 6y ago
The user paid for those when they bought the phone.
52-6F-62 6y ago
Probably a more accurate analog to the cartridge would be the storage and distribution services. That takes some infrastructure in networking and storage.
- sova 6y ago
  Developers still have to store application specific data on their own!
  - ratww 6y ago
    Apple actually gives developers 1PB of free storage per app with CloudKit, and it even has some nice privacy features for users. Of course it has limitations, so most developers prefer rolling their own backend.
  - 52-6F-62 6y ago
    How's that? I choose apps that store my data locally rather than their servers if I even do download apps. I was discussing the storage and distribution infrastructure.
    - sova 6y ago
      Consider a game that holds a leaderboard on steam, or any app that stores user progress on its servers. Not exactly pertinent to your comment but pertinent to the conversation as a whole: If Apple/Google/Steam stored all app data for developers and also did the marketing for developers, that is closer to what 30% is worth imho. For hosting the platform, yes your grandfather was the first to stab a flag into the digital real-estate, and for that I owe you 30%? Feudalism that manages to shift cost to both consumer and developer at the same time -- impressive, but not very noble.
      - 52-6F-62 6y ago
        That's not a good analogue for a cartridge, though. The cartridge or the device itself stored data locally. Modern gaming consoles store their data on HDD's. Anything beyond that is entirely developer's prerogative. And according to another user, they do offer storage through CloudKit... which it appears they do, included in the dev account/App Store distribution model—1 PB: https://developer.apple.com/icloud/cloudkit/ https://developer.apple.com/icloud/cloudkit/

awinder 6y ago

This is a super literal take. In the 80s/90s the expense-incurring activity was physical cartridge production. Today it’s bandwidth & delivery infrastructure, card processing, any myriad of things.

matthewdgreen 6y ago
Yes, but it's hard to imagine that 30 years of technological progress has not changed the underlying cost structures of these businesses. After all, it's changed the cost structure of almost every other business that has some connection to computing and data delivery by orders of magnitude. Yet, strangely the 30% cut has not changed a bit.
- c22 6y ago
  NES carts used to cost like fifty bucks. Aren't most apps in the few-dollars range?
  - matthewdgreen 6y ago
    Nintendo console games still cost $50, and seem to outsell $1-$5 games despite the fact that the vast majority of users already own a phone, and consoles cost extra (and there are more than two platforms to choose from.) So I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that the market does not consider these to be equivalent products.
    - awinder 6y ago
      The still costs $50 is interesting to me, because inflation adjusted this is a pretty steep discount. The 30% stayed the same, but inflation adjusted on something like this the revenue netted is down to what 15% would have previously got you. All I’m really getting at is that the layers of complication are thick. I feel like one could unwind this with a lot of effort, but I doubt anyone is being utterly fleeced (or is utterly innocent, for that matter).
ardy42 6y ago