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Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

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Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#191

Post by icey »

lzw wrote: post #106
icey wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not suggesting it would be an evil master plan. I could easily see Steve Jobs deciding that the Mac experience would be much simpler and better if Apple reviewed all software that went on the Mac, exactly the same way he's decided that for the iPhone and iPad.

No, you're just spreading FUD, and it is a dead horse. One thing Apple has over most other businesses is a much higher level of integrity.

What does this have to do with integrity? It wouldn't be evil if Steve Jobs / Apple decided to make OSX more iOS like. We may not like it, but it's not evil.

Today OSX users are very fortunate that they don't have to deal with viruses or spyware, but the good times will change eventually and Apple will lose the marketing advantage of being able to brag about being worry-free. If they felt that their market would be interested in some kind of Apple version of Microsoft Bob then why wouldn't they pursue that?

You clearly seem to be a fan of Apple's products, help me understand how speculating on the possibility of Apple converging its operating systems is even remotely FUD?

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#192

Post by astrange »

orangecat wrote: post #170
danilocampos wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not so excited about this... this might be the first step in locking down the platform. Of course you're not excited about this. You're a brilliant nerd who founded a startup that invented a new programming language . This isn't for you. Or for me. Getting to be Nerd Jesus every time a computer runs into trouble is gratifying. We get to be important. We get to trick out our gear to do all kinds of goofy, custom…

I don't understand the geek self-flagellation that iOS has caused. It seems to have instigated the meme that if a platform appeals to geeks then it must necessarily be unfriendly to normal users, and I would think Mac OS X itself shows that to be false... What the iPad, and the iPhone before it, has taught us is simple: people want a computer they understand. They want technology, but optimizing for Nerd Jesus has gi…

Who is getting rid of the Terminal here, exactly?

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#193

Post by acangiano »

bad_user wrote: post #97
jcromartie wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would probably be able to reach a lot more people and give them a better purchase/install/update experience that could easily compensate for that lost %30.

So why not go ahead with both means of distribution?

I believe that's what most people will do, unless Apple expressly forbids it.

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#194

Post by danilocampos »

mkramlich wrote: post #142
mkramlich wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree it's unsolved. Folks have been distributing and monetizing software for desktop-class machines since the 80's, just's fine, thanks. Been there, done that, have the T-shirt, and the T-shirt still fits fine.

Negative -1? Really? Voting system is broken. I recommend for the Nth time that only trusted admins be allowed to take any piece of content down below 1 point. Right now, if any particular user simply disagrees with a given comment, they have the power to penalize and reduce another user's karma. Not because the user said something rude, trollish, juvenile or "evil", but merely because they might disagree. That to me…

I missed you being in negative land, but it may have been a simple result of your remark being both silly and flip at the same time. Silly in that you don't address the substance of the point and flip in that you felt the need to invoke the T-Shirt cliche.

Obviously getting software onto desktop computers has happened before. You're ignoring the power of Apple's approach.

I mean, what, should we stick with distributing everything on 3.5" floppy disks because that, once upon a time, worked? Cardboard boxes? Advocating to maintain a 30 year status quo on anything is... questionable, but doubly so on something as crucially important and evolving as digital distribution.

Similarly, I think you'd be downvoted for saying something like "Already do styling in HTML, works fine, t-shirt, blurgh" in a thread about the power of CSS3. Sure one works. But the new method works better.

The amount of work you simply do not have to do with Apple as your App Store distribution partner is incredible. Instead of giving away a piece of software because it wouldn't bring in enough money to offset the trouble and cost of a licensing mechanism and merchant account, you can throw it onto the App Store for $5 and make a bit of cash in a few clicks.

That's new.

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#195

Post by msbarnett »

iloveponies wrote: post #185
derefr wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To put it another way: how would you develop (and more importantly QA) OSX apps, if you couldn't do it on a Mac? Would they put out "OSX SDK Edition"?

Scarier idea: Charging, or restricting access to Xcode only for those who have paid the developers subscription.

Scarier idea: Apple charging $400,000 for special developer-only hardware.

I mean, if we are going to be making up unlikely scenarios out of whole cloth, why stop at half-measures?

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#196

Post by msbarnett »

dasil003 wrote: post #72
rcoder wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an approval guidelines document for the Mac App Store up on the Apple developer site now. It's behind a login wall, so I assume it's under the usual NDA, but if you're a registered Apple dev, you should be able to get it at the following URL: https://developer.apple.com/appstore/mac/resources/approval/...

Isn't about time this NDA got tested in court? It seems so ridiculous that anyone can get in and read it, but no one can talk about it due to the NDA.

Non-Disclosure Agreements are well-tested legal territory, and not uncommon for proprietary SDKs (you should see some of the terms you have to agree to for some company's hardware dev kits).

What about this particular NDA strikes you as being exceptional or impermissible?

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#197

Post by aphexairlines »

dasil003 wrote: post #72
rcoder wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an approval guidelines document for the Mac App Store up on the Apple developer site now. It's behind a login wall, so I assume it's under the usual NDA, but if you're a registered Apple dev, you should be able to get it at the following URL: https://developer.apple.com/appstore/mac/resources/approval/...

Isn't about time this NDA got tested in court? It seems so ridiculous that anyone can get in and read it, but no one can talk about it due to the NDA.

Does Apple have a reason for the NDA other than letting their developers know who's the boss?

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#198

Post by muhfuhkuh »

amackera wrote: post #188
danilocampos wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not so excited about this... this might be the first step in locking down the platform. Of course you're not excited about this. You're a brilliant nerd who founded a startup that invented a new programming language . This isn't for you. Or for me. Getting to be Nerd Jesus every time a computer runs into trouble is gratifying. We get to be important. We get to trick out our gear to do all kinds of goofy, custom…

I simply refuse to believe that locking a platform down is the best way to improve user experience. There has to be a better way!

It's one strategy. The other is opening it up so much that no one breakout distribution, application, or interface could possibly emerge "victorious" (meaning, the vast majority uses it), which is what Linux does. There is so much room for experimentation, so many flavors and choices and configurations and ways to do it, that no one but the most hardcore and devoted users can seriously figure out how to do things with any respectable degree of confidence.

I've run Linux on the desktop in one form or another (laptop, desktop, or server) since Red Hat Linux 6.2. That was over a decade ago. And, guess what? We're still fighting over GNOME vs. KDE (or fluxbox), and apt-get vs yum (or port), .rpm vs .deb (or .tar.gz). You still can't grab a package from Ubuntu and install it on your Fedora box (well, not without a tremendous amount of headache), and if you go strictly upstream, you have to be at the terminal every time a new version comes out (./configure + remember the build options you want, make, make install).

Windows, unfortunately, is in the middle, and it's still, 15 years later, a virus-prone rooted-zombie mess, albeit with a supposedly pretty good modern browser coming real soon now.

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#199

Post by callahad »

JofArnold wrote: post #139
YooLi wrote: post #137

I guess next will be iAds availability for desktop Apps? I am not seeing anything about Free apps in the description of the Mac App Store, but free with iAds makes sense.

Good spot! In the deep dark recesses of my memory I'm fairly sure Apple applied for a patent on desktop iAd integration...

Yep, here's AppleInsider's coverage of that patent: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/07/22/apple_shows_co...

Re: Apple brings App Store to Mac OS X

#200

Post by zppx »

mjfern wrote: post #187

Today, Apple announced four key products at its “Back to the Mac” event: - An application store for OS X - Facetime for the Mac, which links with Facetime on other Apple devices - An instant-on MacBook Air, 11” and 13” models, starting at $999 - The next major version of the Mac OS X, “Lion” (and iLife 11) Individually and as a collection, these new product announcements are interesting. Apple is extending the value…

Ten years ago everyone talked about the burst of the Bubble, about how Microsoft would dominate the world, although Linux was growing, nobody saw it fighting for prominence in various areas, nobody saw the the prominence of Facebook in the network (or even the idea of social network), nobody saw the rise of Apple, only a small fraction saw virtualization as a game changer in the industry, the majority of players in the field were already there 10 years ago (Parallels and VMware) or came out of nowhere (Xen, Qumranet and Virtualbox).

Now the buzz is that Apple or Google will dominate, but real people are there, working anonymously in the next revolution, in the next previously unthought idea, time will come when Apple will not be so shiny, maybe 10 or 20 years from now, maybe even longer, this industry (consumer electronics and its sub-industries) have only a small history, yet there were cases of powerful companies going from heaven to hell in question of years, cases of previously anonymous players leading the directions of the industry, so I kindly disagree that Apple or Google will be the only companies in the new decade, maybe there are some unheard, powerful and new technology, but as Microsoft suffered to understand there are more things shaping the industry than just power and money.

But besides of that, you got an upvote from me.

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