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The thing everyone misses is that, commercially, the ONLY thing that matters is being on the App Store. It doesn't matter how draconian the rules are, it doesn'
by colinplamondon 17y ago
The thing everyone misses is that, commercially, the ONLY thing that matters is being on the App Store. It doesn't matter how draconian the rules are, it doesn't matter how long the wait is- these price points ONLY work if Apple is footing the marketing bill.
If you are in the Top 5 of any category then you have guaranteed impressions at a very high volume. That allows one to sell an app for 99 cents or $1.99. If you are promoting outside the App Store, your user acquisition cost will be too high to make that price point work, so you'll have to raise your prices. In raising your prices, you'll price yourself out of the Category Top 5's and the Overall Top 100- thus killing the upside.
If you're doing medical apps, no worries. If you're doing a book or a game app, however, publishing outside the App Store is suicide, 'free my device!' geekery aside.
- jhancock 17y agoWithout the App Store, there would be dozens of download portals and review sites and countless blogs for iPhone apps doing marketing for you, just as they work for every other product or service in the internet. I don't think anyone is missing this, geekery aside. A free market approach rewards competition. Anything else, diminishes it.
- colinplamondon 17y agoThere still are- 148apps, appcraver, appvee, etc. Cumulatively they just don't push the kind of volume that the App Store itself does. A more distributed system is only better for folks whose apps can't hack it in the Top 5 of their given category.
- jhancock 17y agoAll I'm arguing in favor of is multiple markets, which requires an unlocked device. If a software developer or consumer wants to use Apple's store, they can. If they want to use another, including Apple's they also have that choice. At the moment, you must use Apple's store. Currently, secondary markets, like appvee, have to first go through Apple's store for their secondary market to work with a locked iPhone. Some believe that free markets produce better results and others don't believe this. Further, some that believe free markets are the best approach also believe that precluding competition should be unlawful. This is an ideological argument, so I'll get off my soapbox now.