51–60 of 178 posts
This is perhaps the key bit of silliness: "And this is where we run into the first bit of craziness. Amazon decided that they should model the Alexa app store after the iPhone app store. So there is a certification process to get your app into the store. But think about the difference: you are not uploading a binary file to the Alexa app store, you are simply registering an URL. So Amazon has no real control over you…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amazon has just as much reason as Apple (or any platform provider) to want to restrict the types of apps that get published. As for the effectiveness of that control, there's little practical difference between "simply registering an URL" and uploading a binary; both can load external content or be modified (in terms of what the user actually sees/experiences) almost entirely after the initial review. There will alwa…
There's a huge difference. An URL is an absolute black box, a binary that you have to give Apple for certification on each change and that has to call Apple APIs to do anything useful (like network) is not. Apple will scan your App to check for basic violations, that's all automated. For instance is there a specific flag that you can initialize a socket with to listen in background. This is only allowed if your app i…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
"some .apk file" being the Amazon store. It's annoying but it's not nonsense. The store will then notify you about updates and perform them. It's half google's fault for not allowing the amazon store app to be listen in Play.
Why is that Google's fault? Amazon could use the Play Store to update the app, the same way that Netflix, Hulu, etc. does. Amazon doesn't want to because they want people to use their own Android platform. Except their Android platform is awful. They have no idea how to run a store (which is a hell of a liability for an ecommerce company, but their infrastructure and fulfillment processes are so top notch and their m…
Oh you want to make a youtube player that acts like every browser in the world, with the ability to minimize? Banned.
Fun fact: Jeff Bezos won't let anyone at Amazon buy a color printer.
This is perhaps the key bit of silliness: "And this is where we run into the first bit of craziness. Amazon decided that they should model the Alexa app store after the iPhone app store. So there is a certification process to get your app into the store. But think about the difference: you are not uploading a binary file to the Alexa app store, you are simply registering an URL. So Amazon has no real control over you…
I have an echo. I like it, but the skills store is awful for the consumer too. Too many silly apps (like the current #1 listing a fart app referenced below), and the app features a skills list, but no categorization, no option to filter apps by stars so unknown gems can be discovered, no stats on installs, no rating distribution graphs. All very strange. Worse still, there's no standard vocabulary to interact with sk…
Joseph Jaquinta expressed a similar sentiment when he wrote:
"Amazon's traditional areas (everything on AWS) follows a different model. They are more like a utility. Minimal engagement. No direct support. They provide a service. You take it or leave it. While this I think is a workable approach for a wide audience in a mature area, I do not think it is a wise approach for Alexa. But, that's if they give a hoot about 3rd party developers and think they are going to add any significant value to their platform. We don't know if this is so, because they won't say."
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are assuming that the only purpose of certification is to catch actively malicious developers. I can think of many other perfectly good reasons to have one: to make sure server response times are fast enough, to make sure it fits the guidelines for types of content they want in their ecosystem, to make sure it doesn't blatantly violate any trademarks, etc. I don't think the concept of a certification process is t…
You're definitely right that we don't actually know what checks they're prioritizing, but it's hard for me to believe they're actually doing any quality checking when this is the #1 skill you see in the app: http://i.imgur.com/Qp4Cv6k.png
http://venturebeat.com/2008/12/23/iphone-fart-app-pulls-in-n...
Also they need to improve the quality of the samples vs itunes. When you buy a rock song, there is usually is only one recording of that song. But if you buy classical music there will be many recordings with very different qualities. With the quality of the samples available now, it's almost impossible to tell if a recoding will be of a good quality or not. Itunes has much better quality.
It's really remarkable how much Amazon's reputation has been self-destructing in the last year or so. Even 6 months ago when I told people I thought Amazon was an all-around shitty company (having worked there) and shouldn't be mentioned in the same breath as Google, FB, etc., people looked at me like I was insane. Somehow the stock keeps going up... I don't have any material insider info but just on a hunch I doubt…
Their consumer electronics are getting more popular, which is making people aware of Amazon quality. Right now there's a Fire TV in front of me: - If you can get something for free because it's included in Prime, it still offers the ability to spend money on it, right beside the 'watch now for free'. If you're not paying attention, you can pay for something you already own. - Its killer feature is voice recognition.…
Perhaps I am just old but voice recognition is a great feature, but not one that would "kill" the competition or make me chuck my AppleTV 3rd. gen in the bin to rush out and buy an Amazon device. I would therefore not label it "killer".