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This post seems to gloss over the point about VALUE. Sure, sell your app for $9.99 if you want. But it'd better be worth it. And almost all of the apps ON the

This post seems to gloss over the point about VALUE. Sure, sell your app for $9.99 if you want. But it'd better be worth it. And almost all of the apps ON the app store are little quick pieces of fluff, barely even worth 99 cents. Even the better pieces of software are mostly timesavers or memory aids, games notwithstanding. The problem seems to stem from the fact that there is this expection to spend a few weeks and crank out an app, then live on it for a year, when I just don't think this could be the case. iPhone apps just aren't as big or useful as desktop apps. I'm not saying there aren't useful apps, but come on, you're not gonna see Photoshop or Visual Studio or.. World or Warcraft for the iPhone any time soon. And this doesn't even get into the fact that a lot of apps I could use can be replicated just by opening the browser and going to a website. And that one app I WOULD buy, I can't, without jailbreaking. (Ah, Podcaster. C'est la vie. And that app is only 4.99 too.)

Raphael 18y ago
Is a ring tone worth $3? To many people, it is.
potatolicious 18y ago
Some of the apps are genuinely useful - there's an app that will capture a sample of a song and identify it. I would pay at least a few bucks for that. Maybe not $10, but $5 easily. But on the store it's free, without ads. I don't get it. That's throwing money away.
- briansmith 18y ago
  Don't they use affiliate links for when you purchase the song from the (iTunes?) music store.
  - potatolicious 18y ago
    They could've done both...
LPTS 18y ago
Omnifocus for iPhone was 19.99 and worth every penny. I could of paid 199.99 and it would of been good value. This app lets me offload the kinds of thinking my brain is bad at into something I always carry. You can't put a price on having that in your pocket. I'd hesitate to say I had any desktop apps more useful then omnifocus iPhone, which effects me more like a neural upgrade from a sci fi novel then a cell phone app. iPhone apps could be like primitive cyborg upgrades with a primitive MMI solution grafted onto the part where the human interacts with the machine part. I hope people support apps with high prices and really cool stuff gets developed. the problem isn't price or value or anything like that, it's that no one has any interesting vision of what the future of this phone could hold.
- markessien 18y ago
  "it could of been" is written "it could have been", and "which effects me more" is written "which affects me more". Do you also say those words the same way?
  - LPTS 18y ago
    yeah, I can't tell some words apart. Hooked on phonics phucked me up. I also had speech disorders and couldn't talk so others understood me till I was four. There are still some words I never say right. I could give a shit. I lost enough sleep over it. Are you one of the idiots who thinks spelling indicates intelligence? All U do correcting otherz is show how 1950s yur thinking iz.
    - markessien 18y ago
      Most spelling mistakes don't mean a thing, but when I read people who write 'of' and 'effect', I assume it's because they don't read a lot. It has nothing to do with intelligence.
      - LPTS 18y ago
        When i read people who assume intelligence has anything to do with perfectly mimicing others systematically, I assume it's because they read so much they can't think for themselves, and stick so closely to analyzing the text that they don't engage the ideas. People making systematic mistakes is why we don't all speak shakespearian. It's how the DNA of ideas evolves. I'z skateboarden on yur sidewak, levin u behind. Yur Rulez u wasted yur life mastezing our obsoletest. Possible realities are like a fractal wave and evolving languages holographically in the 21st century is more useful then rigidly adhering to rules made by 20th century monkeys thinking 19th century ways. Can u deal with it, grandpa?
cpr 18y ago
What do you all think of our graphing calculator app, Grafly (http://grafly.com http://grafly.com)? Is it worth $9.99? We think it is, in that there's nothing like it on any other platform at any price. Like all the "please rate my web site" posts, I'm interested in what HN denizens think. Thanks.
- markessien 18y ago
  It looks cool, but only for a particular small market. Have you figured out how to reach the relevant market yet?
  - cpr 18y ago
    Not yet; that's what we're working on. The initial response was strong, but, like most apps, sunk quickly into the morass as the AppStore became overwhelmed with lots of silly little apps.
- jgrahamc 18y ago
  What's the market size for physical graphing calculators?
- potatolicious 18y ago
  I'm sorry to say, but I don't perceive it to be useful at all. I'm probably in your target demographic - college student in engineering, and I have to tell you that anyone who's going to be doing any sort of work with graphing calculators would prefer to buy one than use their iPhone. Here's why: - Physical buttons: when you're chewing through problems you absolutely MUST have physical buttons with tactile feedback. Like the calculator app on the iPhone (the default one) the buttons are way too small to even begin operating quickly. - Battery life. My exams are often 3-4 hours long, and an iPhone would not be allowed as a legal calculator. Even if it were, the iPhone would have trouble holding a charge through the entire exam. I just don't see much of a market for it. At a lower price point maybe - I see this app as being useful for possibly one-off equations, but nobody who needs this sort of software will use this app as their primary graphing calculator. Now, what I would gladly pay for is a graphing calculator software that comes with a USB keypad. I have my graphing calculator with me always, but sometimes it's slow and the screen sucks. It would be wonderful to have the friendly physical user interface of the calculator and the power of the PC.
nonrecursive 18y ago
I think the author addresses the point about value decently enough. He says that you'd better build an app that's worth what you're charging, or you're going to og out of business. The comparison between iphone apps and desktop apps is strange to me. I don't think anyone would actually want to have photoshop on an iphone. Desktop computers and mobile devices are obviously used in different contexts and thus their software have different criteria for usefulness.

Raphael 18y ago

Is a ring tone worth $3? To many people, it is.

potatolicious 18y ago

Some of the apps are genuinely useful - there's an app that will capture a sample of a song and identify it. I would pay at least a few bucks for that. Maybe not $10, but $5 easily. But on the store it's free, without ads. I don't get it. That's throwing money away.

briansmith 18y ago
Don't they use affiliate links for when you purchase the song from the (iTunes?) music store.
- potatolicious 18y ago
  They could've done both...

LPTS 18y ago

Omnifocus for iPhone was 19.99 and worth every penny. I could of paid 199.99 and it would of been good value. This app lets me offload the kinds of thinking my brain is bad at into something I always carry. You can't put a price on having that in your pocket. I'd hesitate to say I had any desktop apps more useful then omnifocus iPhone, which effects me more like a neural upgrade from a sci fi novel then a cell phone app. iPhone apps could be like primitive cyborg upgrades with a primitive MMI solution grafted onto the part where the human interacts with the machine part. I hope people support apps with high prices and really cool stuff gets developed. the problem isn't price or value or anything like that, it's that no one has any interesting vision of what the future of this phone could hold.

markessien 18y ago
"it could of been" is written "it could have been", and "which effects me more" is written "which affects me more". Do you also say those words the same way?
- LPTS 18y ago
  yeah, I can't tell some words apart. Hooked on phonics phucked me up. I also had speech disorders and couldn't talk so others understood me till I was four. There are still some words I never say right. I could give a shit. I lost enough sleep over it. Are you one of the idiots who thinks spelling indicates intelligence? All U do correcting otherz is show how 1950s yur thinking iz.
  - markessien 18y ago
    Most spelling mistakes don't mean a thing, but when I read people who write 'of' and 'effect', I assume it's because they don't read a lot. It has nothing to do with intelligence.
    - LPTS 18y ago
      When i read people who assume intelligence has anything to do with perfectly mimicing others systematically, I assume it's because they read so much they can't think for themselves, and stick so closely to analyzing the text that they don't engage the ideas. People making systematic mistakes is why we don't all speak shakespearian. It's how the DNA of ideas evolves. I'z skateboarden on yur sidewak, levin u behind. Yur Rulez u wasted yur life mastezing our obsoletest. Possible realities are like a fractal wave and evolving languages holographically in the 21st century is more useful then rigidly adhering to rules made by 20th century monkeys thinking 19th century ways. Can u deal with it, grandpa?

cpr 18y ago

What do you all think of our graphing calculator app, Grafly (http://grafly.com http://grafly.com)? Is it worth $9.99? We think it is, in that there's nothing like it on any other platform at any price. Like all the "please rate my web site" posts, I'm interested in what HN denizens think. Thanks.

markessien 18y ago
It looks cool, but only for a particular small market. Have you figured out how to reach the relevant market yet?
- cpr 18y ago
  Not yet; that's what we're working on. The initial response was strong, but, like most apps, sunk quickly into the morass as the AppStore became overwhelmed with lots of silly little apps.
jgrahamc 18y ago
What's the market size for physical graphing calculators?
potatolicious 18y ago
I'm sorry to say, but I don't perceive it to be useful at all. I'm probably in your target demographic - college student in engineering, and I have to tell you that anyone who's going to be doing any sort of work with graphing calculators would prefer to buy one than use their iPhone. Here's why: - Physical buttons: when you're chewing through problems you absolutely MUST have physical buttons with tactile feedback. Like the calculator app on the iPhone (the default one) the buttons are way too small to even begin operating quickly. - Battery life. My exams are often 3-4 hours long, and an iPhone would not be allowed as a legal calculator. Even if it were, the iPhone would have trouble holding a charge through the entire exam. I just don't see much of a market for it. At a lower price point maybe - I see this app as being useful for possibly one-off equations, but nobody who needs this sort of software will use this app as their primary graphing calculator. Now, what I would gladly pay for is a graphing calculator software that comes with a USB keypad. I have my graphing calculator with me always, but sometimes it's slow and the screen sucks. It would be wonderful to have the friendly physical user interface of the calculator and the power of the PC.

nonrecursive 18y ago

I think the author addresses the point about value decently enough. He says that you'd better build an app that's worth what you're charging, or you're going to og out of business. The comparison between iphone apps and desktop apps is strange to me. I don't think anyone would actually want to have photoshop on an iphone. Desktop computers and mobile devices are obviously used in different contexts and thus their software have different criteria for usefulness.