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I get why smaller companies use generic janky frameworks to throw up an app quickly and keep maintenance costs down. But why doesn't Amazon have the most stream
by jessriedel 5y ago
I get why smaller companies use generic janky frameworks to throw up an app quickly and keep maintenance costs down. But why doesn't Amazon have the most streamlined and elegant app on the planet? They have the resources, expertise, and scale for it to make sense to invest heavily.
- grafs50 5y agoAmazon isn't going to care about the size of the app if consumers don't care. And the majority don't probably even realize.
- jessriedel 5y agoBut if 10% or even just 1% of users do care, it's absolutely worth it for Amazon. That's the point.
- zdragnar 5y agoWill that 1% stop buying from Amazon, or will they just use the website instead? Gut instinct (and personal experience) says they're not really losing anything here.
- PaulHoule 5y agoIf I had a choice between an app and a web site the web site almost always wins. ("app" rhymes with "crap")
- jessriedel 5y agoYes, I think people absolutely will buy less from Amazon if the mobile experience is just a bit slower or more annoying. We know from both other companies and Amazon's behavior that reducing friction has substantial impact on amount purchased.
- IgorPartola 5y agoWill you actually not buy things from Amazon due to their app size? If the answer is that you’ll continue spending money with them, you don’t care.
- ipaddr 5y agoIt would stopping app usage and promote website usage.
- spicybright 5y agoeven if they buy less because of the bloated app, you're still balancing dev resources against profit margins. It might just not be worth the effort for that extra tiny bit of revenue the app will generate by being small.
- jessriedel 5y agoBut that's my point about scale: if the revenue-vs-developer-time tradeoff makes it worth it for any company to make a good app, it will be worth it for Amazon. They are so huge that a 0.01% increase in sales translates to many millions of dollars per year.
- spicybright 5y agoEverything else they do also scales though. Not proportionally to each other, but I wouldn't be surprised if putting their devs on, say, better product recommendations is much more revenue than app size.
- jessriedel 5y agoThen they should hire more devs.
- spicybright 5y ago
- thrdbndndn 5y agoI doubt even 0.1% users care.
- mibollma 5y agoI use the Amazon app regularly and my phone has enough storage to fit the app more that 600 times. It's not a particularly expensive phone either. Given that I'm not sure why I should care as long as it works. As a dev I agree it's technically interesting to find out why, as a user I think it just doesn't matter.
- ipaddr 5y agoYou have over 100 gig of storage space free on your 'old' phone? I just upgraded a year ago to 32 total gigs. I can see why jumbo app wouldn't affect you. I've got 7t on my desktop. Would you mind if chrome automatically updated to 1t. It's not a new computer pre-owned 2015
- oblio 5y agoI don't know your exact context, but a ~$200 phone from Samsung comes with 64GB of storage... https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_a32_5g-10648.php https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_a32_5g-10648.php
- mibollma 5y agoI have a Realme GT Neo2 which comes with 128gig at about 330€. Of course if it occupies a significant portion, it would be an issue. On the other hand when I look at the kind of updates that Steam and Playstation are pulling, 200mb feels like nothing.
- Cthulhu_ 5y agoI'm confident the same question has been asked countless times before when it comes to their website as well. I don't have any answers, I don't know either. Familiarity I guess?
- numpad0 5y agoBusinesses don’t want irreplaceable anything, including engineers.