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Another post on the top of Hacker News making the mistake of thinking paying customers give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug] your app. E

Another post on the top of Hacker News making the mistake of thinking paying customers give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug] your app. Even with all the pain associated with the App Store people still write more apps for it than ever. Why? Cause people pay for apps there. They don't on the Play Store.

myko 13y ago
> Why? Cause people pay for apps there. They don't on the Play Store. Is this based on your opinion, or what?
- rpedela 13y ago
  There is some research that backs up the claim. http://www.idigitaltimes.com/articles/17985/20130531/ios-app-sales-vs-android-apples-itunes.htm http://www.idigitaltimes.com/articles/17985/20130531/ios-app...
- calbear81 13y ago
  There's some evidence of that here: http://blog.appannie.com/app-annie-index-market-q2-2013/ http://blog.appannie.com/app-annie-index-market-q2-2013/ People on iOS are more willing to buy apps and do more in-app purchases but the gap doesn't seem that wide to bridge, especially as iOS users move to Android.
  - winslow 13y ago
    I think a lot of that comes from the iTunes gift cards that everybody seems to get for Christmas, Birthdays, etc. I purchased my first app with "real" money a month or two ago for android.
    - vmarsy 13y ago
      Even if it's true, I don't think developers care if the money they got at the end of the month comes from a gift card or a credit card. Google Play gift cards exist too, I don't know if you can buy music with it though, if not it's logic that iTunes cards sells better.
      - warfangle 13y ago
        Nobody knows that Google Play gift cards exist. I've been using Android since I got rid of the iPhone 3G (circa Nexus One), and this thread is the _first_ time I've heard of it being available.
        nl 13y ago
        Google Play gift cards have been available less than a month in most of the world. I'm not sure when they were first made available in the US.
        fpgeek 13y ago
        Google Play gift cards in the US go back to August 2012, IIRC.
        wallflower 13y ago
        To clarify the parent comment, I see iTunes gift cards for sale at grocery store checkout lines. Perfect spontaneous purchases. Where do you even buy a Google Play gift card?
        aka_butters 13y ago
        I see them at Safeway and Target here in Mt. View all the time. My location might be relevant though :)
        nl 13y ago
        In Australia I've seen them in BigW (kinda a Kmart/Walmart equivalent).
ajross 13y ago
This is another post that seems to have missed the point of the linked article. The last graph I saw estimated total revenue from iOS apps was about 2x that of total Play Store revenue (though to be fair, this undercounts Android a little as you can monetize apps via Amazon et. al. too). And of course Android is growing much faster. The contention in the linked article is that by pushing your "startup" app (which they imply to be a high quality app in a novel category) into the Android ecosystem first you can take advantage of the generally poorer app quality to get a "bigger piece of the pie". (This is the same argument that was made for years about Mac game development, btw.) I'm not quite sure I buy all of that, but arguing against is has to be a lot more subtle than asserting that Android users "don't pay for apps".
- Steko 13y ago
  The last graph I saw estimated total revenue from iOS apps was about 2x that of total Play Store revenue If Google had sent that much to developers they'd be saying something. 90% of the data points we see are of the form: My app made X on Android and 5-10X on iOS
  - ajross 13y ago
    I had to dig up a cite. This isn't the article that I remember looking at, but it's probably reporting the same number (specifically that iOS revenue is 2.3x that of Android): http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/31/android-in-app-downloads/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/31/android-in-app-downloads/ The reason those "data points" are skewed is psychology. No one is inspired to write a vitriolic blog post whining that their Android app only makes 73% as much as the iOS version. Nor is the iOS-centric HN echo chamber well equipped to give you a random sample of these things. And, frankly, lots of those bigger numbers are simply old. Android's market share is growing rapidly. Three years ago, I think 10x was probably correct.
    - sbuk 13y ago
      One can tell that Apple have sent invites for a town hall event, the negative stories are ramping up. > Nor is the iOS-centric HN echo chamber... Read the comments here. The significant majority are pro-Android. The whole 'plucky little Android' schtick is extremely tiresome and frankly devalues your point. The "psychology" that you cite is basically confirmation bias, so beautifully illustrated by your comment. Whilst Android is making gains is some markets, so Apple is in others. Apple is up before a hardware update in the UK, France and US, taking share away from Android.
marcosdumay 13y ago
People also write more apps for the Play Store than ever. Users do care how easy it is to develop, they care by proxy when they choose the earlier to market, better designed or most inovative one.
devx 13y ago
Android has just passed 1 million apps (so clearly more apps are added to Android, faster), and has more app downloads than Apple now. It's also just passed 1 billion devices. Whatever the story of Android has been in the passed, things are rapidly changing, and it's better to be there first, instead of coming in later to an established competition.
jeffasinger 13y ago
I think this article is more directed at startups that are offering some kind of mobile mostly functionality, they should think about doing development Android first. Tests about different directions to take, or anything, really, are much simpler with a faster turnaround.
corresation 13y ago
While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that is only now finding its way to Android.
- jcampbell1 13y ago
  I'd also add that Apple had a head start on doing payments in many countries. Google is catching up in this respect as well. If Google were to promote paid apps a bit more, we could see developer revenue parity a year or so. It is also a bit comical that iTunes Connect is down today.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- speeder 13y ago
  Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?
  - ryderm 13y ago
    I rarely spend money on the app store, but if I get a card I'll buy many more apps and games than I otherwise would have.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - CodeCube 13y ago
    Kids don't have credit cards connected to their iTunes account, and thus receive iTunes gift cards for music, which they turn around and use for apps, IAPs for games, etc. I don't have any source for that, or even necessarily believe it (I don't disbelieve it either) ... I'm just pointing out what OP meant by that comment.
mekoka 13y ago
You missed the point as well. Author is a proponent of the lean startup approach to product development: customer development -> validation -> pivot -> mvp -> product market fit -> etc. It's not about customer caring how you're building your app, it's about building a product truly worth their while, while saving time and money. Author posits that as it stands, the iOS ecosystem hinders on that approach, while Android's encourages it or at least does not discourage it. Author notes that oddly enough, many startups still choose to go iOS first even as it makes less and less sense. On a personal level, I'm currently witnessing the phenomenon. We're at the moment creating a mobile app for an organization. When development of the Android version ended, people at the organization chose to shun it and decided to rather wait to test the iOS version, thinking that delivery was just around the corner. It's been 3 months now.
mncolinlee 13y ago
The quantity in dollars is completely and utterly irrelevant to the validated learning lean startups need. The OP's point is that Android allows you to start learning sooner and faster and to produce a better app which will make you more money. iOS might make you more money right now if you're lucky enough to chance on an app which matches what users already want, but even that ship may soon be sailing. Suppose iOS apps pay two times as much on average right now. Tell me: what is two times one-tenth of what you should be earning? You're hobbling yourself by MUCH MORE building an app that inadequately addresses your user's needs.
- engrenage 13y ago
  This is all predicated on the idea that you being able to release apks easily gets users who care enough too give you valuable feedback that you can use to learn and improve your app faster. There are more apps on the play store than the iOS store, and apks have always been easy to work with and had this same advantage. If this advantage has always been present, why aren't the apps already better than iOS apps?
  - fpgeek 13y ago
    You've been able to share apks "forever" (since before the G1, I believe), but Google's official beta-testing framework (Play Store integration [don't even need unknown sources], rolling/controlled updates, beta test volunteers, etc. plus the pattern of tying that to a G+ community) is brand-new since I/O this year. And it seems to be a compelling package - pretty much every app beta I care about has switched to it (even those that already had an existing off-Play-Store setup).
  - mncolinlee 13y ago
    Just because you have potential does not guarantee you use it. Many businesses started on iOS first, producing an Android version as an afterthought by contractors. Others produced a minimum viable product which made them money, so they felt no need to iterate. This means upstart competitors can easily take away the market share of established products. It's a good thing for startups.
cbsmith 13y ago
Another comment on the top of a Hacker News post making the mistake of thinking that all good revenue sources are good revenue sources for startups. Customers don't give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug], but if you add a lot of friction to the iterative process, you take away a lot of the advantage a small startup might have over an established business operating in the same space. Established businesses actually have a lot of efficiencies when it comes to maintaining the status quo and slowly evolving change, and the Apple AppStore model adds enough friction such that status quo and slowly evolving change are much more of the terrain than not. Keep in mind the innovator's dilemma, and think about how startups exploit it. You want to pick some area where the established businesses aren't competitive, which has narrow margins, larger scale, faster development cycles... and then when you've got a lean and mean product, you go after the established territory.
johnbender 13y ago
"the mistake of thinking paying customers give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug] your app" In general I agree but if those things have a material effect on how good the app is (e.g. "focused" functionality) then I think the customers would "give a crap".
zmmmmm 13y ago
> They don't on the Play Store. What is it that causes people to indulge in such hyperbole on this point? It's such an utterly ridiculous statement (obviously, people do buy things on the Play Store, there are plenty of paid apps with tens of thousands of purchases), yet it gets trotted out time and time again as an absolute as if it is an obvious accepted fact. How about a tiny bit of moderation: "People pay for things less often on the Play Store" You will sound a lot less like a troll.
slykat 13y ago
Agreed. Best developer platform != best platform for your startup Your [potential] users & their value should drive the platform decision.
aufreak3 13y ago
It looks to me like the trend on the iOS app store is also downwards to the cheap/free end - i.e. a race to the bottom. My paid niche app ($5) used to get a couple of downloads a week. I made it free for one week, during which I got about 500 downloads. There is interest, but no willingness to pay for it. I think the overall statistic of $5B paid to devs with about 500,000 apps on the app store gives an average of $10k per app. So one app can get you, what, one month's salary? Even that's rosy I think, 'cos the distribution is not uniform but a long tail exponential, which means the me-the-solo-dev is more likely to fall on the tail than near the elite end of the exponential. Bottom line is that I'm beginning to think that a mobile-only company strategy is likely to be doomed. Anyone thinks otherwise?

myko 13y ago

> Why? Cause people pay for apps there. They don't on the Play Store. Is this based on your opinion, or what?

rpedela 13y ago
There is some research that backs up the claim. http://www.idigitaltimes.com/articles/17985/20130531/ios-app-sales-vs-android-apples-itunes.htm http://www.idigitaltimes.com/articles/17985/20130531/ios-app...
calbear81 13y ago
There's some evidence of that here: http://blog.appannie.com/app-annie-index-market-q2-2013/ http://blog.appannie.com/app-annie-index-market-q2-2013/ People on iOS are more willing to buy apps and do more in-app purchases but the gap doesn't seem that wide to bridge, especially as iOS users move to Android.
- winslow 13y ago
  I think a lot of that comes from the iTunes gift cards that everybody seems to get for Christmas, Birthdays, etc. I purchased my first app with "real" money a month or two ago for android.
  - vmarsy 13y ago
    Even if it's true, I don't think developers care if the money they got at the end of the month comes from a gift card or a credit card. Google Play gift cards exist too, I don't know if you can buy music with it though, if not it's logic that iTunes cards sells better.
    - warfangle 13y ago
      Nobody knows that Google Play gift cards exist. I've been using Android since I got rid of the iPhone 3G (circa Nexus One), and this thread is the _first_ time I've heard of it being available.
      - nl 13y ago
        Google Play gift cards have been available less than a month in most of the world. I'm not sure when they were first made available in the US.
        fpgeek 13y ago
        Google Play gift cards in the US go back to August 2012, IIRC.
        wallflower 13y ago
        To clarify the parent comment, I see iTunes gift cards for sale at grocery store checkout lines. Perfect spontaneous purchases. Where do you even buy a Google Play gift card?
        aka_butters 13y ago
        I see them at Safeway and Target here in Mt. View all the time. My location might be relevant though :)
        nl 13y ago
        In Australia I've seen them in BigW (kinda a Kmart/Walmart equivalent).

ajross 13y ago

This is another post that seems to have missed the point of the linked article. The last graph I saw estimated total revenue from iOS apps was about 2x that of total Play Store revenue (though to be fair, this undercounts Android a little as you can monetize apps via Amazon et. al. too). And of course Android is growing much faster. The contention in the linked article is that by pushing your "startup" app (which they imply to be a high quality app in a novel category) into the Android ecosystem first you can take advantage of the generally poorer app quality to get a "bigger piece of the pie". (This is the same argument that was made for years about Mac game development, btw.) I'm not quite sure I buy all of that, but arguing against is has to be a lot more subtle than asserting that Android users "don't pay for apps".

Steko 13y ago
The last graph I saw estimated total revenue from iOS apps was about 2x that of total Play Store revenue If Google had sent that much to developers they'd be saying something. 90% of the data points we see are of the form: My app made X on Android and 5-10X on iOS
- ajross 13y ago
  I had to dig up a cite. This isn't the article that I remember looking at, but it's probably reporting the same number (specifically that iOS revenue is 2.3x that of Android): http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/31/android-in-app-downloads/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/31/android-in-app-downloads/ The reason those "data points" are skewed is psychology. No one is inspired to write a vitriolic blog post whining that their Android app only makes 73% as much as the iOS version. Nor is the iOS-centric HN echo chamber well equipped to give you a random sample of these things. And, frankly, lots of those bigger numbers are simply old. Android's market share is growing rapidly. Three years ago, I think 10x was probably correct.
  - sbuk 13y ago
    One can tell that Apple have sent invites for a town hall event, the negative stories are ramping up. > Nor is the iOS-centric HN echo chamber... Read the comments here. The significant majority are pro-Android. The whole 'plucky little Android' schtick is extremely tiresome and frankly devalues your point. The "psychology" that you cite is basically confirmation bias, so beautifully illustrated by your comment. Whilst Android is making gains is some markets, so Apple is in others. Apple is up before a hardware update in the UK, France and US, taking share away from Android.

marcosdumay 13y ago

People also write more apps for the Play Store than ever. Users do care how easy it is to develop, they care by proxy when they choose the earlier to market, better designed or most inovative one.

devx 13y ago

Android has just passed 1 million apps (so clearly more apps are added to Android, faster), and has more app downloads than Apple now. It's also just passed 1 billion devices. Whatever the story of Android has been in the passed, things are rapidly changing, and it's better to be there first, instead of coming in later to an established competition.

jeffasinger 13y ago

I think this article is more directed at startups that are offering some kind of mobile mostly functionality, they should think about doing development Android first. Tests about different directions to take, or anything, really, are much simpler with a faster turnaround.

corresation 13y ago

While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that is only now finding its way to Android.

jcampbell1 13y ago
I'd also add that Apple had a head start on doing payments in many countries. Google is catching up in this respect as well. If Google were to promote paid apps a bit more, we could see developer revenue parity a year or so. It is also a bit comical that iTunes Connect is down today.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
speeder 13y ago
Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?
- ryderm 13y ago
  I rarely spend money on the app store, but if I get a card I'll buy many more apps and games than I otherwise would have.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- CodeCube 13y ago
  Kids don't have credit cards connected to their iTunes account, and thus receive iTunes gift cards for music, which they turn around and use for apps, IAPs for games, etc. I don't have any source for that, or even necessarily believe it (I don't disbelieve it either) ... I'm just pointing out what OP meant by that comment.

mekoka 13y ago

You missed the point as well. Author is a proponent of the lean startup approach to product development: customer development -> validation -> pivot -> mvp -> product market fit -> etc. It's not about customer caring how you're building your app, it's about building a product truly worth their while, while saving time and money. Author posits that as it stands, the iOS ecosystem hinders on that approach, while Android's encourages it or at least does not discourage it. Author notes that oddly enough, many startups still choose to go iOS first even as it makes less and less sense. On a personal level, I'm currently witnessing the phenomenon. We're at the moment creating a mobile app for an organization. When development of the Android version ended, people at the organization chose to shun it and decided to rather wait to test the iOS version, thinking that delivery was just around the corner. It's been 3 months now.

mncolinlee 13y ago

The quantity in dollars is completely and utterly irrelevant to the validated learning lean startups need. The OP's point is that Android allows you to start learning sooner and faster and to produce a better app which will make you more money. iOS might make you more money right now if you're lucky enough to chance on an app which matches what users already want, but even that ship may soon be sailing. Suppose iOS apps pay two times as much on average right now. Tell me: what is two times one-tenth of what you should be earning? You're hobbling yourself by MUCH MORE building an app that inadequately addresses your user's needs.

engrenage 13y ago
This is all predicated on the idea that you being able to release apks easily gets users who care enough too give you valuable feedback that you can use to learn and improve your app faster. There are more apps on the play store than the iOS store, and apks have always been easy to work with and had this same advantage. If this advantage has always been present, why aren't the apps already better than iOS apps?
- fpgeek 13y ago
  You've been able to share apks "forever" (since before the G1, I believe), but Google's official beta-testing framework (Play Store integration [don't even need unknown sources], rolling/controlled updates, beta test volunteers, etc. plus the pattern of tying that to a G+ community) is brand-new since I/O this year. And it seems to be a compelling package - pretty much every app beta I care about has switched to it (even those that already had an existing off-Play-Store setup).
- mncolinlee 13y ago
  Just because you have potential does not guarantee you use it. Many businesses started on iOS first, producing an Android version as an afterthought by contractors. Others produced a minimum viable product which made them money, so they felt no need to iterate. This means upstart competitors can easily take away the market share of established products. It's a good thing for startups.

cbsmith 13y ago

Another comment on the top of a Hacker News post making the mistake of thinking that all good revenue sources are good revenue sources for startups. Customers don't give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug], but if you add a lot of friction to the iterative process, you take away a lot of the advantage a small startup might have over an established business operating in the same space. Established businesses actually have a lot of efficiencies when it comes to maintaining the status quo and slowly evolving change, and the Apple AppStore model adds enough friction such that status quo and slowly evolving change are much more of the terrain than not. Keep in mind the innovator's dilemma, and think about how startups exploit it. You want to pick some area where the established businesses aren't competitive, which has narrow margins, larger scale, faster development cycles... and then when you've got a lean and mean product, you go after the established territory.

johnbender 13y ago

"the mistake of thinking paying customers give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug] your app" In general I agree but if those things have a material effect on how good the app is (e.g. "focused" functionality) then I think the customers would "give a crap".

zmmmmm 13y ago

> They don't on the Play Store. What is it that causes people to indulge in such hyperbole on this point? It's such an utterly ridiculous statement (obviously, people do buy things on the Play Store, there are plenty of paid apps with tens of thousands of purchases), yet it gets trotted out time and time again as an absolute as if it is an obvious accepted fact. How about a tiny bit of moderation: "People pay for things less often on the Play Store" You will sound a lot less like a troll.

slykat 13y ago

Agreed. Best developer platform != best platform for your startup Your [potential] users & their value should drive the platform decision.

aufreak3 13y ago

It looks to me like the trend on the iOS app store is also downwards to the cheap/free end - i.e. a race to the bottom. My paid niche app ($5) used to get a couple of downloads a week. I made it free for one week, during which I got about 500 downloads. There is interest, but no willingness to pay for it. I think the overall statistic of $5B paid to devs with about 500,000 apps on the app store gives an average of $10k per app. So one app can get you, what, one month's salary? Even that's rosy I think, 'cos the distribution is not uniform but a long tail exponential, which means the me-the-solo-dev is more likely to fall on the tail than near the elite end of the exponential. Bottom line is that I'm beginning to think that a mobile-only company strategy is likely to be doomed. Anyone thinks otherwise?