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

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
> 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. Are the current-day costs of those "myriad things" in any way comparable in magnitude to the 80s cost of cartridge production? I highly doubt it. Bandwidth is cheap enough that single webpages are several megabytes each, if you load everything. Card processing fees are 3-4%. My bet the breakdown of Apple's 30% is >25% "licensing" and <5% cost of provided services.
- awinder 6y ago
  The cartridges are actually kinda a funny story to themselves if memory serves. Nintendo required that they manufacturer the cartridges themselves (and they had minimum orders), which was separate from the licensing side of things. Then you had disk based game systems come along early 90s which were a couple of bucks to manufacturer (on avg). I remember reading about wild deltas depending on your company size & how much you shipped on what you could expect your take to be on a title, which also makes it hard to compare.

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

> 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. Are the current-day costs of those "myriad things" in any way comparable in magnitude to the 80s cost of cartridge production? I highly doubt it. Bandwidth is cheap enough that single webpages are several megabytes each, if you load everything. Card processing fees are 3-4%. My bet the breakdown of Apple's 30% is >25% "licensing" and <5% cost of provided services.

awinder 6y ago
The cartridges are actually kinda a funny story to themselves if memory serves. Nintendo required that they manufacturer the cartridges themselves (and they had minimum orders), which was separate from the licensing side of things. Then you had disk based game systems come along early 90s which were a couple of bucks to manufacturer (on avg). I remember reading about wild deltas depending on your company size & how much you shipped on what you could expect your take to be on a title, which also makes it hard to compare.