Exactly, developers seem to flock to platforms like Apple, Facebook and Twitter based on the fact that they have a large and growing user base without giving th

Exactly, developers seem to flock to platforms like Apple, Facebook and Twitter based on the fact that they have a large and growing user base without giving thought to this issue of commoditization of complements and how it ultimately destroy the business or livelihood of these developers. Most people building products or sharecropping on other people's platform never make meaningful income and yet those platform prefer to announce large sums paid out to developers to encourage you to keep building complements. Apple will claim they paid out $5 billion but when spread out or divided among the numerous app developers it becomes peanut and not enough to pay their bills. You won't hear Apple give you the breakdown as that will expose them and destroy the wrong picture they want to paint to developers. Neither will they tell you that to pay out $5bn they made atleast $2billion based on their 30% cut, off your work and yet countless app developers are not making enough to live on. They don't tell you that iOS app success is a "lottery": 60% (or more) of developers don't break even http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/05/ios-app-success-is-a-lottery-and-60-of-developers-dont-break-even/ http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/05/ios-app-success-is-a-lo... http://andrewchen.co/2012/08/15/mobile-app-startups-are-failing-like-its-1999/ http://andrewchen.co/2012/08/15/mobile-app-startups-are-fail... I really hope people will think hard before building their business on the back of Apple, Facebook, Twitter or any such platform. You can use them as as distribution without making your business model entirely dependent on them and that is the way to go. Be your own bitch and not a Twitter, Apple or Facebook bitch: http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/23/fred-wilson-be-your-own-bitch/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/23/fred-wilson-be-your-own-bit...