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I am 100% for holding a mirror up to the weird industry of Apple bloggers constantly patting each other on the back for being brave enough to support a giant co

I am 100% for holding a mirror up to the weird industry of Apple bloggers constantly patting each other on the back for being brave enough to support a giant company while throwing schoolyard insults at any one who dares compete with Apple (though I honestly just file them in the same department as sports writers now: rarely insightful, yet a highly amusing sideshow), but let's have some honesty here. The only reason Shift Jelly Android profits are beating iOS is that the fact that one of their main apps is a podcasting app. On iOS, while there is much room for improvement over Apple's offering, they are still competing with the company that essentially runs podcasting distribution and has their podcasting solution preinstalled. On Android, there is no preinstalled podcasting app/distribution market, so the demand is much higher. Not to mention that Google's own podcasting app is half baked and seemingly abandoned.

metafour 15y ago
I can't comment on the market for podcast apps in the Android Market since I don't own an Android phone but I do know that there are a number of podcast apps available for the iPhone. I've personally purchased two within the past couple of months, SimpleCasts and Instacast. I'm not really in the market to buy a third one when I've got two already. I don't know when ShiftyJelly released their podcast app initially but this might be another reason that their podcast app doesn't sell as well on iOS.
kwenty_jones 15y ago
Have you taken a look at iOS's podcasting functionality lately? It's the definition of "half baked and seemingly abandoned". Podcasting features were stripped from the iPad music app in iOS5 and podcasts aren't even recognized by Siri (and haven't been recognized by Voice Control since iOS3). It's truly atrocious. Podcasts are a niche activity anyway and I believe that majority of users on both platforms are highly knowledgeable and quite willing to search for alternate clients. Podcasting clients have also been featured by both Google and Apple in their respective app stores. I personally suspect that the reason for PocketCasts recent revenue surge on Android is because it's currently one of the highlighted apps in Google's Android Market.
beatle 15y ago
The man doesn't want to develop for Android. leave him alone.
nl 15y ago
This may be true, but most Android devices ship with some kind of weather widget built in (often on the home screen) in a much more visible way than the iOS weather app. You'd think that would mean there would be more demand for the iOS app. The 51/49% split there is interesting.
- hrktb 15y ago
  The visibility on iOS might depend on how often normal users access the status tray. I have the weather widget in it, so even when not interested I get to see the forcasts five or six times a day at least. I wouldn't imagine buying a app for basic weather checking.
  - nl 15y ago
    On Android it is usually even more in-your-face - here's a screenshot from the default setup for HTC Sense: http://smartphoneblogging.com/wp-content/gallery/htcsense/htcsense.png http://smartphoneblogging.com/wp-content/gallery/htcsense/ht... (that's just an example - Samsung, Motorola, Sony, LG are all similar) Every time you unlock your phone you see the weather.
Caballera 15y ago
I also notice that Pocket Cast is "only" $1.99 on the iOS App store compared to $2.99 on the Android market. Plus on iOS at least, they have some good competition from Podcaster and iCatcher etc. On the Android side, there seems to be less polished podcasting apps. The people in my office that use Android (i only use a dev android phone) all use Pocket Casts.

metafour 15y ago

I can't comment on the market for podcast apps in the Android Market since I don't own an Android phone but I do know that there are a number of podcast apps available for the iPhone. I've personally purchased two within the past couple of months, SimpleCasts and Instacast. I'm not really in the market to buy a third one when I've got two already. I don't know when ShiftyJelly released their podcast app initially but this might be another reason that their podcast app doesn't sell as well on iOS.

kwenty_jones 15y ago

Have you taken a look at iOS's podcasting functionality lately? It's the definition of "half baked and seemingly abandoned". Podcasting features were stripped from the iPad music app in iOS5 and podcasts aren't even recognized by Siri (and haven't been recognized by Voice Control since iOS3). It's truly atrocious. Podcasts are a niche activity anyway and I believe that majority of users on both platforms are highly knowledgeable and quite willing to search for alternate clients. Podcasting clients have also been featured by both Google and Apple in their respective app stores. I personally suspect that the reason for PocketCasts recent revenue surge on Android is because it's currently one of the highlighted apps in Google's Android Market.

beatle 15y ago

The man doesn't want to develop for Android. leave him alone.

nl 15y ago

This may be true, but most Android devices ship with some kind of weather widget built in (often on the home screen) in a much more visible way than the iOS weather app. You'd think that would mean there would be more demand for the iOS app. The 51/49% split there is interesting.

hrktb 15y ago
The visibility on iOS might depend on how often normal users access the status tray. I have the weather widget in it, so even when not interested I get to see the forcasts five or six times a day at least. I wouldn't imagine buying a app for basic weather checking.
- nl 15y ago
  On Android it is usually even more in-your-face - here's a screenshot from the default setup for HTC Sense: http://smartphoneblogging.com/wp-content/gallery/htcsense/htcsense.png http://smartphoneblogging.com/wp-content/gallery/htcsense/ht... (that's just an example - Samsung, Motorola, Sony, LG are all similar) Every time you unlock your phone you see the weather.

Caballera 15y ago

I also notice that Pocket Cast is "only" $1.99 on the iOS App store compared to $2.99 on the Android market. Plus on iOS at least, they have some good competition from Podcaster and iCatcher etc. On the Android side, there seems to be less polished podcasting apps. The people in my office that use Android (i only use a dev android phone) all use Pocket Casts.