7 ms·

iOS 6 App Store is a disaster for developers

102 points by novaleaf 14y ago

king_magic 14y ago
It certainly feels like a disaster for users. I hate the single card view. It drives me crazy.
- taligent 14y ago
  Weird. I prefer it. I much prefer to see a screenshot of the app than just an icon and title.
  - mitchty 14y ago
    I don't mind the single card bit, its the search that is horrid. Example from today, I searched for "Jasmine", which is a youtube client app. It is #5 on the list, the first "match" is "My Princess Diary". However they are ranking apps is making things as painful for users as developers. Almost doubly so for the latter.
  - rscale 14y ago
    I prefer it as well. In the old system I opened each item and looked at the screenshot, then went back to the list, lather rinse, repeat. In the new system I just swipe swipe buy.
josephlord 14y ago
My App Store experiment is still ticking along with no big reduction in its modest number of daily downloads although maybe it has just enough reviews not to disappear (4.5 stars UK and US stores). The update going into store did help, I think that there might be a penalty for not having issued an update recently. I issued an update for the iPhone 5 and the numbers picked up (got my record daily download yesterday). http://itunes.com/apps/fastlists http://itunes.com/apps/fastlists It's a lists app but I want it to be the best damn lists app. It is particularly designed for repeated use lists like packing and shopping. All free at the moment but some in-app purchases will be coming soon although existing users won't lose any features.
speg 14y ago
Their main complaint was there is no new releases section, but there's still a new & noteworthy section.. and each category has its own 'new' section. Isn't that the same thing?
- walru 14y ago
  From experience, I can tell you each layer you ask the user to travel down eliminates 75-90% of the audience.
- kranner 14y ago
  It looks like the 'paid' and 'free' sections are new releases, sorted by newness. There does seem to be some curation comparing results vis-a-vis iOS 5. The 'new' section for each category seems to be previous 'new and noteworthy' titles for that category. This would all be a good thing except for the single-card layout on the smaller devices.
CubicleNinjas 14y ago
Let's look at the source shall we? When I arrive I'm treated with a bar across the bottom that asks me to turn on cookies. Cookies are on. That's a good sign. Looking around I see the "Hot Topics", the first two news stories are fake. It took about 24 hours to vette though so they are still riding off residual traffic from old lies. Reviewing the article, the rousing source for this news: some guy's blog. The article's title could be "Chris doesn't like the new approach and believes heavily in metaphor.". The card idea in the app store hasn't changed my purchasing behavior. The ability to see the list is still there, but added functionality to browser WHILE downloading has been included. This minor item ensures that when I'm spending, I keep spending. It means more money will be spent and I can guarantee the numbers will show this in the coming months.
walru 14y ago
One of my main problems with the store is that the single card view doesn't even work well. Perhaps it's because I'm on an iPhone 4, but the loading time that comes with this new configuration absolutely destroys the experience for anyone wanting to find anything. Perhaps when we all have gigabit connections on our phones this card view will reign supreme, but until that point it's a completely short sighted attempt at improvement. Btw, I also speak as a developer who has had their sales slashed enormously due the concert of changes that started in late July. My main title has sold at least a handful of copies @ 2.99 a day for the past two years; that was until the store started to limit the amount of queries a user would get from their search. We have a very sexy icon, and very unique concept for the game. I actually thought the high rate of piracy at the beginning of the app's life was the reason for the continued sales, but after the changes started to take place; sales are now limited to about 1-2 a week, I know it was because of the app icon and screen shots. Anyway, I mostly speak here as a user, and this new App Store has not been welcomed. I miss Steve.
- pedro-alejandro 14y ago
  I miss him too. I bet he would have been pretty pissed at this design.
  - vvhn 14y ago
    so everybody now knows exactly what Steve Jobs would or would not have done ( i.e. whatever you don't agree with ) ?
    - devcpp 14y ago
      I think we are all just surprised there are so many design decisions we can't agree with, precisely with the first major update for iOS comes since Jobs died. Up until the iPhone 4, I don't think I've had any criticism towards the design of Apple products... since Jobs came back to Apple. I don't think these are coincidences. Jobs may have been more than a good businessman. He was a source of inspiration.
      - 14y ago
pedro-alejandro 14y ago
The layout also limits the space allocated to the app's title. When scrolling though the top paid apps, it seems it cuts off the title at 7 characters. Basically, almost every app ends with "..." due to space. This is terrible. The card view is slow, and my App Store crashed once I reached search result #100 (I was searching for my own app). I'm on a 4S, which should be albe to handle the load. They did introduce the "Related" tab within an apps page, but I'm curious to see how that affects sales after a few weeks.
- kolinko 14y ago
  Pedro, use our tool like AppCod.es (ours) for tracking your position. It costs, but it will save you time you'd spend on scrolling :)
robomartin 14y ago
I think the problem goes far deeper than this. Apple has never had good search and discovery technology across it's products. Searching using iTunes on the desktop isn't any better. I won't get into the details. I'm sure a lot of you share my sentiments. In many ways it is a parallel with Maps. Google has great search and great maps. Apple has bad search and now less-than-stellar maps. Trend?
- megablast 14y ago
  itunes searching for apps works so much better than google play searching for apps. Google play search is an embarrassing joke. Searching for USA travel guides brings in french travel guides, spanish travel guides, and london maps.
  - click170 14y ago
    Honestly I find it easier to go to Google.com and search for whatever your looking for appended with "android app". I'm surprised there's such a large difference in the quality of search between Google Play search and Google Search.
    - fpgeek 14y ago
      Absolutely. I have no idea why they haven't replaced whatever they're doing with: <search> site:play.google.com Then they would just need to resolve apps the way the Play Store already does when presented with a URL and tack on any appropriate filtering (country-level, carrier-level. etc.). This has been a problem for a long time (my standard suggestion used to include "site:market.android.com"). And Google has done a lot with the Play Store app in the interim, so there must be some constraint I'm missing. I just can't see what it is.
moocow01 14y ago
Its most likely not a disaster for Apple in that Im sure it was purposeful. Id assume their thinking is that for every "unproven" app that gets surfaced to the user could be lost revenue in place of giving more focus to an established app with a higher likelihood of a buy. To me it seems like one of those short sighted how do we grow our revenue in the app store by 12% business maneuvers. The long term and bigger picture impact of those decisions on Apple I guess we will have to wait and see.
- 31reasons 14y ago
  iOS devices are successful because of the developers, just ask Microsoft. Now they are killing the hen that laid golden apps. I am surprised how quickly Apple lost its way after Steve.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - Ygg2 14y ago
    What makes you think Steve Jobs, wouldn't approve of it? I mean maps probably wouldn't get out of the door, but this seems fine albeit different. I kinda feel sad about all the "What would Steve do. He'd do exactly as I want" I constantly see. If memory doesn't fool me, Final Cut Pro X was panned by users, while Steve Jobs was at the helm. The only difference now it seems there is no RDF deployed.
dangero 14y ago
The iOS 6 app store is less dynamic than other prior app store iterations. Example being I have an app listed as number 19 under a particular search. I've been checking that search every day and we are always 19 on the list. No change whatsoever even though our downloads have fluctuated in that time. Why are we 19? No idea. Before it meant we had less downloads than the people before us. Now I have no idea. It reminds me a lot of the Chomp search results. Not really sure what Chomp said to convince Apple that their search algorithm was better than what Apple was using.
- kolinko 14y ago
  The previous system was easier to gamble. You put up a new app, pay for ads/bots/whatever, get a plenty of downloads and start showing up on the top for all the search queries (even if your app is crap), this in turn causes even more sales. Also, in the previous system you could've positioned for a term completely unrelated to your app (e.g. you have a weight tracker, and you position for celebrity phrases because they're more popular). My guess is they try to stop that. Oh, and even in the past it wasn't just popularity that guided the results. We did a detailed analysis of this ( techcrunch.com/2012/03/12/appcod-es-launches-app-store-prediction-tool-tells-developers-which-keywords-work/ )
  - dangero 14y ago
    As a developer, I had a path to improve my ranking which was to find a way to increase my downloads. I agree, the keywords model is somewhat of a fail in general because people can pick unrelated words, but this new version is actually worse than that.
geuis 14y ago
How has anyone ever sold a product before? You market it. The App Store isn't the sole place you should be marketing your app. If you have ever counted on just releasing your app into the store and have it somehow gain traction with no other effort, you've always been doomed to failure. The App Store should be treated like a supermarket, after a fashion. You may get your product on the shelf, but simply relying on people walking by and seeing it is a terrible way to get people to try it. It always takes outside marketing to get people to look for your product or learn about it. So you already have put a lot of work into making your application. Now go do some more legwork and get people talking about it.
- gurkendoktor 14y ago
  If you have any data on this, can you please link to any? From an iOS user POV, I always buy apps by browsing through the App Store. Starting to learn Chinese? - Download all free Chinese dictionaries and see what sticks. etc... It's exactly like buying music - I have lots of friends who buy iOS apps, but no two of us have the same taste in apps, so everybody ends up browsing for themselves.
  - adjwilli 14y ago
    This is a great insight into how people actually search and use apps. It makes the case for free-to-download with in-app purchases. People won't think twice about downloading a free app to try it out, and if they like it, they'll spend the extra couple bucks or so to unlock its full feature set. My guess is that this is more profitable to everyone than Android's "erase in whatever time" to get a refund scheme.
- cube13 14y ago
  I agree completely. I'm trying to remember the last app I download(let alone purchased) by browsing through the top whatever in the app store. I think it was the flashlight app I got when I first bought my iPhone. Now, I don't even bother with trying to browse apps. If I'm going to buy an app on either iTunes or Google Play, I'm searching for the specific one I want.
- 14y ago
niggler 14y ago
For all this talk about App Store discovery, why hasn't anyone set up an alternative means of discovery? After all, all you need is a link to the item on itunes. It should be theoretically easy to set up a mobile webpage with a list of indie apps, and with improved searching it'd be very easy to bootstrap such a site with at most a week's worth of effort.
- natrius 14y ago
  That's what App.net was going to build (hence the name) until Facebook threatened to revoke API access if they didn't agree to an aquihire. Spreading via Facebook is pretty much required for something like that to take off, but Facebook has decided that they want to be in that business (https://www.facebook.com/appcenter/ https://www.facebook.com/appcenter/).
  - 0x0 14y ago
    Wow, I had no idea. I guess that explains why they picked such an odd name for a twitter clone!
bbbbbbbbb 14y ago
The new search layout shows very little information,is heavy and crashes now and then(true on 4S but not so on the new iPad where the search result displays more information at once with no crashes so far). The Genius tab is a real loss for me as I don't use it at all. I like to browse by category but now I have to tap twice where once was ok... The result in itself are also plainly wrong most of the time. I've stopped using it and I've switched to AppShopper, way better(I am absolutely not affiliated with this app^^)
ianstormtaylor 14y ago
Sorry to go off topic, but did anyone else close the article right when they got to the ad with the "Article continues below" link above it? They've got stats showing that users don't realize their articles continue because they throw ads right in the middle of them, and they fixed the problem with an anchor link? Good god.
sandstrom 14y ago
So discovery is hampered, more focus on the screenshot and title is limited to 7 characters. Sounds like Apple want users to find fewer, but higher quality apps: - browsing fewer apps, with users looking closer at each of them; - screenshot of the app, you buy the app, not the icon and title; - shorter title, less stuffed with keywords [good apps often have short names: Skype, Spotify, Instagram, Twitter]. I think this is a good thing, the app store has been too much about churning out low-quality apps.
- alanctgardner2 14y ago
  > good apps often have short names: Skype, Spotify, Instagram, Twitter I think you mean 'well-recognized brands have short names'. If you're trying to discover a new Twitter client, it might help for them to have their name, and 'Twitter', in the title. The goal with search isn't to deliver the user to exactly the app they already know they want, but to display apps they might want. Discovery is really hard given one screenshot and 7 characters.
jyap 14y ago
Apple is a company that doesn't make very many acquisitions. I think that the team at Chomp pretty much took over the App Store or at least have a very big say. All the changes are worse for indie developers. The changes also favor raw app download count. This means that free or freemium apps rank higher. This isn't good for quality apps which are paid purchases but have fewer downloads compared to a mediocre quality but free app. I want things back the way they were or at the very least, give apps with high star ratings with x amount of ratings a bigger influence in search results. Hopefully Apple will see the app download statistics and see that that they are top heavy. The long tail is gone which hurts the ecosystem. Then they will question what went wrong and make some positive adjustments. That's what I'm hoping.
program 14y ago
The 3 and 1/4 icons displayed on a single row is a bad idea. Not because it's bad UX but because it seems that the application doesn't cache any hidden icons. Every time I scroll the list that's a (very) small loading time that block the natural scroll. Anyway I like the "See all" view (but I haven't used it from day one, I don't know way but it didn't catch my attention). Finally Apple has implemented infinite scroll. I found myself more inclined to continue to scroll the list part application #20. On the old App Store you had to tap the "show 20 more" cell. For me It's a sort of psychological barrier. It's like saying "there are more apps, I don't show them to you cause they are not very good". I don't know if I explained it well.
- adjwilli 14y ago
  Yes, the whole App Store seems laggy now. When you're on the 25th card, it takes a while for card #26 to show its edge, leading the user to think there aren't more apps and if there are no one wants to download them anyways.
lnanek2 14y ago
Same exact thing happened with Google Play. Google removed the recently updated view almost everywhere, while at the same time claiming they were optimizing the store for visibility for everyone's apps. But they took away the one thing that was actually doing that. Throw in how they added responding to comments, but only by an elite few with special marks by their names that aren't earned by numbers, and there you go, it's a pretty harsh world for the small guys.
chmars 14y ago
The revised iOS 6 App Store app has disadvantages from a user perspective too. In-app purchases in particular are no longer prominently shown near the app name but somewhere below on the description page and it is therefore no longer possible to immediately see whether a 'free' app is actually free.
visarg 14y ago
The interface is laggy and sometimes frozen (especially when I have updates in the background). It's a bust.
tayl0r 14y ago
My sales seems to have dropped but I really think we need more time to know for sure. With only 3 days of sales data since the iOS 6 launch (according to iTunes Connect Mobile) how are any of you able to say for sure one way or the other that the discovery is actually worse? Here are my sales: https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251273647262691328/photo/1/large https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251273647262691328/photo/1... The past 3 days I've only had 1 sale per day. The last time I had 1 sale per day for 3 days was back in May. My other app: https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251275489241624577/photo/1/large https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251275489241624577/photo/1... Only 2 sales this week (Sep 17 - Sep 23). In the past 26 weeks there have only been 2 weeks where I had 2 or less sales. So, both of my apps have seen their sales go down but that is with only 3 days worth of sales data. (fwiw I made these 2 apps in my spare time over 3 years ago and haven't updated them since)
- tayl0r 14y ago
  Actually it looks like the web view of iTunes Connect sales reports has data up to yesterday and my sales went back up. So, I'm not really seeing any change and I'm as "indie" as they come.
tayl0r 14y ago
No one in this thread is offering up any data showing that their sales have gone down since the iOS 6 App Store has rolled out. My app sales seem to be unchanged. In fact, my free version downloads have actually gone up since the iOS 6 release. Another person is reporting their downloads also unchanged, "My App Store experiment is still ticking along with no big reduction in its modest number of daily downloads".

102 points by novaleaf 14y ago

king_magic 14y ago

It certainly feels like a disaster for users. I hate the single card view. It drives me crazy.

taligent 14y ago
Weird. I prefer it. I much prefer to see a screenshot of the app than just an icon and title.
- mitchty 14y ago
  I don't mind the single card bit, its the search that is horrid. Example from today, I searched for "Jasmine", which is a youtube client app. It is #5 on the list, the first "match" is "My Princess Diary". However they are ranking apps is making things as painful for users as developers. Almost doubly so for the latter.
- rscale 14y ago
  I prefer it as well. In the old system I opened each item and looked at the screenshot, then went back to the list, lather rinse, repeat. In the new system I just swipe swipe buy.

josephlord 14y ago

My App Store experiment is still ticking along with no big reduction in its modest number of daily downloads although maybe it has just enough reviews not to disappear (4.5 stars UK and US stores). The update going into store did help, I think that there might be a penalty for not having issued an update recently. I issued an update for the iPhone 5 and the numbers picked up (got my record daily download yesterday). http://itunes.com/apps/fastlists http://itunes.com/apps/fastlists It's a lists app but I want it to be the best damn lists app. It is particularly designed for repeated use lists like packing and shopping. All free at the moment but some in-app purchases will be coming soon although existing users won't lose any features.

speg 14y ago

Their main complaint was there is no new releases section, but there's still a new & noteworthy section.. and each category has its own 'new' section. Isn't that the same thing?

walru 14y ago
From experience, I can tell you each layer you ask the user to travel down eliminates 75-90% of the audience.
kranner 14y ago
It looks like the 'paid' and 'free' sections are new releases, sorted by newness. There does seem to be some curation comparing results vis-a-vis iOS 5. The 'new' section for each category seems to be previous 'new and noteworthy' titles for that category. This would all be a good thing except for the single-card layout on the smaller devices.

CubicleNinjas 14y ago

Let's look at the source shall we? When I arrive I'm treated with a bar across the bottom that asks me to turn on cookies. Cookies are on. That's a good sign. Looking around I see the "Hot Topics", the first two news stories are fake. It took about 24 hours to vette though so they are still riding off residual traffic from old lies. Reviewing the article, the rousing source for this news: some guy's blog. The article's title could be "Chris doesn't like the new approach and believes heavily in metaphor.". The card idea in the app store hasn't changed my purchasing behavior. The ability to see the list is still there, but added functionality to browser WHILE downloading has been included. This minor item ensures that when I'm spending, I keep spending. It means more money will be spent and I can guarantee the numbers will show this in the coming months.

walru 14y ago

One of my main problems with the store is that the single card view doesn't even work well. Perhaps it's because I'm on an iPhone 4, but the loading time that comes with this new configuration absolutely destroys the experience for anyone wanting to find anything. Perhaps when we all have gigabit connections on our phones this card view will reign supreme, but until that point it's a completely short sighted attempt at improvement. Btw, I also speak as a developer who has had their sales slashed enormously due the concert of changes that started in late July. My main title has sold at least a handful of copies @ 2.99 a day for the past two years; that was until the store started to limit the amount of queries a user would get from their search. We have a very sexy icon, and very unique concept for the game. I actually thought the high rate of piracy at the beginning of the app's life was the reason for the continued sales, but after the changes started to take place; sales are now limited to about 1-2 a week, I know it was because of the app icon and screen shots. Anyway, I mostly speak here as a user, and this new App Store has not been welcomed. I miss Steve.

pedro-alejandro 14y ago
I miss him too. I bet he would have been pretty pissed at this design.
- vvhn 14y ago
  so everybody now knows exactly what Steve Jobs would or would not have done ( i.e. whatever you don't agree with ) ?
  - devcpp 14y ago
    I think we are all just surprised there are so many design decisions we can't agree with, precisely with the first major update for iOS comes since Jobs died. Up until the iPhone 4, I don't think I've had any criticism towards the design of Apple products... since Jobs came back to Apple. I don't think these are coincidences. Jobs may have been more than a good businessman. He was a source of inspiration.
    - 14y ago

pedro-alejandro 14y ago

The layout also limits the space allocated to the app's title. When scrolling though the top paid apps, it seems it cuts off the title at 7 characters. Basically, almost every app ends with "..." due to space. This is terrible. The card view is slow, and my App Store crashed once I reached search result #100 (I was searching for my own app). I'm on a 4S, which should be albe to handle the load. They did introduce the "Related" tab within an apps page, but I'm curious to see how that affects sales after a few weeks.

kolinko 14y ago
Pedro, use our tool like AppCod.es (ours) for tracking your position. It costs, but it will save you time you'd spend on scrolling :)

robomartin 14y ago

I think the problem goes far deeper than this. Apple has never had good search and discovery technology across it's products. Searching using iTunes on the desktop isn't any better. I won't get into the details. I'm sure a lot of you share my sentiments. In many ways it is a parallel with Maps. Google has great search and great maps. Apple has bad search and now less-than-stellar maps. Trend?

megablast 14y ago
itunes searching for apps works so much better than google play searching for apps. Google play search is an embarrassing joke. Searching for USA travel guides brings in french travel guides, spanish travel guides, and london maps.
- click170 14y ago
  Honestly I find it easier to go to Google.com and search for whatever your looking for appended with "android app". I'm surprised there's such a large difference in the quality of search between Google Play search and Google Search.
  - fpgeek 14y ago
    Absolutely. I have no idea why they haven't replaced whatever they're doing with: <search> site:play.google.com Then they would just need to resolve apps the way the Play Store already does when presented with a URL and tack on any appropriate filtering (country-level, carrier-level. etc.). This has been a problem for a long time (my standard suggestion used to include "site:market.android.com"). And Google has done a lot with the Play Store app in the interim, so there must be some constraint I'm missing. I just can't see what it is.

moocow01 14y ago

Its most likely not a disaster for Apple in that Im sure it was purposeful. Id assume their thinking is that for every "unproven" app that gets surfaced to the user could be lost revenue in place of giving more focus to an established app with a higher likelihood of a buy. To me it seems like one of those short sighted how do we grow our revenue in the app store by 12% business maneuvers. The long term and bigger picture impact of those decisions on Apple I guess we will have to wait and see.

31reasons 14y ago
iOS devices are successful because of the developers, just ask Microsoft. Now they are killing the hen that laid golden apps. I am surprised how quickly Apple lost its way after Steve.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- Ygg2 14y ago
  What makes you think Steve Jobs, wouldn't approve of it? I mean maps probably wouldn't get out of the door, but this seems fine albeit different. I kinda feel sad about all the "What would Steve do. He'd do exactly as I want" I constantly see. If memory doesn't fool me, Final Cut Pro X was panned by users, while Steve Jobs was at the helm. The only difference now it seems there is no RDF deployed.

dangero 14y ago

The iOS 6 app store is less dynamic than other prior app store iterations. Example being I have an app listed as number 19 under a particular search. I've been checking that search every day and we are always 19 on the list. No change whatsoever even though our downloads have fluctuated in that time. Why are we 19? No idea. Before it meant we had less downloads than the people before us. Now I have no idea. It reminds me a lot of the Chomp search results. Not really sure what Chomp said to convince Apple that their search algorithm was better than what Apple was using.

kolinko 14y ago
The previous system was easier to gamble. You put up a new app, pay for ads/bots/whatever, get a plenty of downloads and start showing up on the top for all the search queries (even if your app is crap), this in turn causes even more sales. Also, in the previous system you could've positioned for a term completely unrelated to your app (e.g. you have a weight tracker, and you position for celebrity phrases because they're more popular). My guess is they try to stop that. Oh, and even in the past it wasn't just popularity that guided the results. We did a detailed analysis of this ( techcrunch.com/2012/03/12/appcod-es-launches-app-store-prediction-tool-tells-developers-which-keywords-work/ )
- dangero 14y ago
  As a developer, I had a path to improve my ranking which was to find a way to increase my downloads. I agree, the keywords model is somewhat of a fail in general because people can pick unrelated words, but this new version is actually worse than that.

geuis 14y ago

How has anyone ever sold a product before? You market it. The App Store isn't the sole place you should be marketing your app. If you have ever counted on just releasing your app into the store and have it somehow gain traction with no other effort, you've always been doomed to failure. The App Store should be treated like a supermarket, after a fashion. You may get your product on the shelf, but simply relying on people walking by and seeing it is a terrible way to get people to try it. It always takes outside marketing to get people to look for your product or learn about it. So you already have put a lot of work into making your application. Now go do some more legwork and get people talking about it.

gurkendoktor 14y ago
If you have any data on this, can you please link to any? From an iOS user POV, I always buy apps by browsing through the App Store. Starting to learn Chinese? - Download all free Chinese dictionaries and see what sticks. etc... It's exactly like buying music - I have lots of friends who buy iOS apps, but no two of us have the same taste in apps, so everybody ends up browsing for themselves.
- adjwilli 14y ago
  This is a great insight into how people actually search and use apps. It makes the case for free-to-download with in-app purchases. People won't think twice about downloading a free app to try it out, and if they like it, they'll spend the extra couple bucks or so to unlock its full feature set. My guess is that this is more profitable to everyone than Android's "erase in whatever time" to get a refund scheme.
cube13 14y ago
I agree completely. I'm trying to remember the last app I download(let alone purchased) by browsing through the top whatever in the app store. I think it was the flashlight app I got when I first bought my iPhone. Now, I don't even bother with trying to browse apps. If I'm going to buy an app on either iTunes or Google Play, I'm searching for the specific one I want.
14y ago

niggler 14y ago

For all this talk about App Store discovery, why hasn't anyone set up an alternative means of discovery? After all, all you need is a link to the item on itunes. It should be theoretically easy to set up a mobile webpage with a list of indie apps, and with improved searching it'd be very easy to bootstrap such a site with at most a week's worth of effort.

natrius 14y ago
That's what App.net was going to build (hence the name) until Facebook threatened to revoke API access if they didn't agree to an aquihire. Spreading via Facebook is pretty much required for something like that to take off, but Facebook has decided that they want to be in that business (https://www.facebook.com/appcenter/ https://www.facebook.com/appcenter/).
- 0x0 14y ago
  Wow, I had no idea. I guess that explains why they picked such an odd name for a twitter clone!

bbbbbbbbb 14y ago

The new search layout shows very little information,is heavy and crashes now and then(true on 4S but not so on the new iPad where the search result displays more information at once with no crashes so far). The Genius tab is a real loss for me as I don't use it at all. I like to browse by category but now I have to tap twice where once was ok... The result in itself are also plainly wrong most of the time. I've stopped using it and I've switched to AppShopper, way better(I am absolutely not affiliated with this app^^)

ianstormtaylor 14y ago

Sorry to go off topic, but did anyone else close the article right when they got to the ad with the "Article continues below" link above it? They've got stats showing that users don't realize their articles continue because they throw ads right in the middle of them, and they fixed the problem with an anchor link? Good god.

sandstrom 14y ago

So discovery is hampered, more focus on the screenshot and title is limited to 7 characters. Sounds like Apple want users to find fewer, but higher quality apps: - browsing fewer apps, with users looking closer at each of them; - screenshot of the app, you buy the app, not the icon and title; - shorter title, less stuffed with keywords [good apps often have short names: Skype, Spotify, Instagram, Twitter]. I think this is a good thing, the app store has been too much about churning out low-quality apps.

alanctgardner2 14y ago
> good apps often have short names: Skype, Spotify, Instagram, Twitter I think you mean 'well-recognized brands have short names'. If you're trying to discover a new Twitter client, it might help for them to have their name, and 'Twitter', in the title. The goal with search isn't to deliver the user to exactly the app they already know they want, but to display apps they might want. Discovery is really hard given one screenshot and 7 characters.

jyap 14y ago

Apple is a company that doesn't make very many acquisitions. I think that the team at Chomp pretty much took over the App Store or at least have a very big say. All the changes are worse for indie developers. The changes also favor raw app download count. This means that free or freemium apps rank higher. This isn't good for quality apps which are paid purchases but have fewer downloads compared to a mediocre quality but free app. I want things back the way they were or at the very least, give apps with high star ratings with x amount of ratings a bigger influence in search results. Hopefully Apple will see the app download statistics and see that that they are top heavy. The long tail is gone which hurts the ecosystem. Then they will question what went wrong and make some positive adjustments. That's what I'm hoping.

program 14y ago

The 3 and 1/4 icons displayed on a single row is a bad idea. Not because it's bad UX but because it seems that the application doesn't cache any hidden icons. Every time I scroll the list that's a (very) small loading time that block the natural scroll. Anyway I like the "See all" view (but I haven't used it from day one, I don't know way but it didn't catch my attention). Finally Apple has implemented infinite scroll. I found myself more inclined to continue to scroll the list part application #20. On the old App Store you had to tap the "show 20 more" cell. For me It's a sort of psychological barrier. It's like saying "there are more apps, I don't show them to you cause they are not very good". I don't know if I explained it well.

adjwilli 14y ago
Yes, the whole App Store seems laggy now. When you're on the 25th card, it takes a while for card #26 to show its edge, leading the user to think there aren't more apps and if there are no one wants to download them anyways.

lnanek2 14y ago

Same exact thing happened with Google Play. Google removed the recently updated view almost everywhere, while at the same time claiming they were optimizing the store for visibility for everyone's apps. But they took away the one thing that was actually doing that. Throw in how they added responding to comments, but only by an elite few with special marks by their names that aren't earned by numbers, and there you go, it's a pretty harsh world for the small guys.

chmars 14y ago

The revised iOS 6 App Store app has disadvantages from a user perspective too. In-app purchases in particular are no longer prominently shown near the app name but somewhere below on the description page and it is therefore no longer possible to immediately see whether a 'free' app is actually free.

visarg 14y ago

The interface is laggy and sometimes frozen (especially when I have updates in the background). It's a bust.

tayl0r 14y ago

My sales seems to have dropped but I really think we need more time to know for sure. With only 3 days of sales data since the iOS 6 launch (according to iTunes Connect Mobile) how are any of you able to say for sure one way or the other that the discovery is actually worse? Here are my sales: https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251273647262691328/photo/1/large https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251273647262691328/photo/1... The past 3 days I've only had 1 sale per day. The last time I had 1 sale per day for 3 days was back in May. My other app: https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251275489241624577/photo/1/large https://twitter.com/tsteil/status/251275489241624577/photo/1... Only 2 sales this week (Sep 17 - Sep 23). In the past 26 weeks there have only been 2 weeks where I had 2 or less sales. So, both of my apps have seen their sales go down but that is with only 3 days worth of sales data. (fwiw I made these 2 apps in my spare time over 3 years ago and haven't updated them since)

tayl0r 14y ago
Actually it looks like the web view of iTunes Connect sales reports has data up to yesterday and my sales went back up. So, I'm not really seeing any change and I'm as "indie" as they come.

tayl0r 14y ago

No one in this thread is offering up any data showing that their sales have gone down since the iOS 6 App Store has rolled out. My app sales seem to be unchanged. In fact, my free version downloads have actually gone up since the iOS 6 release. Another person is reporting their downloads also unchanged, "My App Store experiment is still ticking along with no big reduction in its modest number of daily downloads".