3 ms·

Why would they, when these apps make buckets of money and Apple gets a nice chunk of that at no cost to them?

by lukev 14y ago

DrJokepu 14y ago
At the end of the day, Apple makes money by selling iPhones and iPads. App Store revenues are rounding error. The App Store has one function for Apple: to help selling more iPhones and iPads. (In Q3 2012, iPhone and iPad sales constituted 72% of Apple’s revenue, while the iTunes Store, which includes the App Store, but also music, movies and TV shows, was only 6%.)
- caf 14y ago
  The proportion of net profits would be more interesting to know - I imagine the margin is quite a bit higher on iTunes Store revenues.
rwallace 14y ago
Sooner or later, parents are going to start making a lot of noise about the waste of their childrens' lives, and the media are going to start campaigning for the government to Do Something (tm). Legislation is a terribly blunt instrument. Apple might find it very much worth their while to take action before governments take it for them.
- btilly 14y ago
  The noise that parents make is not going to be the waste of their children's lives. It is going to be over the fact that these companies are preying on children. There have been a number of cases of kids discovering that they can make in game purchases really easily, doing so a lot, and by the time the parents find out thousands of dollars have been spent. See http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2012/04/parents-sue-apple-for-in-app-and-in-game-purchases-made-by-kids/ http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2012/04/parents-sue-a... for one lawsuit based on this. Admittedly it was over a bug where kids could spend thousands of dollars on a "free" app without needing the password. But kids learn parents' passwords all of the time. How long until there is a lawsuit over the problem of kids who got the necessary password running up huge bills?

3 ms·

Why would they, when these apps make buckets of money and Apple gets a nice chunk of that at no cost to them?

by lukev 14y ago

Why would they, when these apps make buckets of money and Apple gets a nice chunk of that at no cost to them?

DrJokepu 14y ago
At the end of the day, Apple makes money by selling iPhones and iPads. App Store revenues are rounding error. The App Store has one function for Apple: to help selling more iPhones and iPads. (In Q3 2012, iPhone and iPad sales constituted 72% of Apple’s revenue, while the iTunes Store, which includes the App Store, but also music, movies and TV shows, was only 6%.)
- caf 14y ago
  The proportion of net profits would be more interesting to know - I imagine the margin is quite a bit higher on iTunes Store revenues.
rwallace 14y ago
Sooner or later, parents are going to start making a lot of noise about the waste of their childrens' lives, and the media are going to start campaigning for the government to Do Something (tm). Legislation is a terribly blunt instrument. Apple might find it very much worth their while to take action before governments take it for them.
- btilly 14y ago
  The noise that parents make is not going to be the waste of their children's lives. It is going to be over the fact that these companies are preying on children. There have been a number of cases of kids discovering that they can make in game purchases really easily, doing so a lot, and by the time the parents find out thousands of dollars have been spent. See http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2012/04/parents-sue-apple-for-in-app-and-in-game-purchases-made-by-kids/ http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2012/04/parents-sue-a... for one lawsuit based on this. Admittedly it was over a bug where kids could spend thousands of dollars on a "free" app without needing the password. But kids learn parents' passwords all of the time. How long until there is a lawsuit over the problem of kids who got the necessary password running up huge bills?