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Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

blogs.windows.com

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Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#71

Post by [deleted] »

MSJo wrote: post #67
burtonator wrote: post #18

That's cool... assuming you can get in: https://getpolarized.io/2019/02/28/dear-app-stores-dont-bloc... I found out that our app was crushed after 2 weeks of development. Basically, they won't let us in because we use Electron. Electron is developed in part (primarily) due to Github which they now own. TWO WEEKS I spent porting to the MS App Store only to have them just crush us ... It's great that I can make 95% of…

Hi, I'm a Microsoft employee and own the certification for apps. Electron is allowed. I checked with my team it. The failure is related to browsing capabilities which have to comply with 10.2.1.

[deleted]

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#72

Post by JoshuaJB »

kop316 wrote: post #37
JoshuaJB wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, half the problem is that there are far too many options to maintain, many of them legacy. Smart card authentication has worked great in Edge on Office 365 for years without any plugins at Microsoft, so I imagine your employer has got the wrong box checked somewhere triggering a fall back to ActiveX.

So the smart card authentication works (I can log in), it's using the smart card to encrypt/sign emails.

Oh, I could certainly see that. I don't recall encryption/signing working very well in the best of cases. If you haven't yet, I'd suggest submitting a bug report (I think there's a button somewhere in the O365 web interface). ActiveX is very deprecated and likely will be removed from Edge as part of the move to Chromium (just my personal speculation - I don't know if that's the official plan).

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#74

Post by gpm »

burtonator wrote: post #18

That's cool... assuming you can get in: https://getpolarized.io/2019/02/28/dear-app-stores-dont-bloc... I found out that our app was crushed after 2 weeks of development. Basically, they won't let us in because we use Electron. Electron is developed in part (primarily) due to Github which they now own. TWO WEEKS I spent porting to the MS App Store only to have them just crush us ... It's great that I can make 95% of…

This strikes me as a very deceptive post - I hope not intentionally.

They aren't rejecting your code because you use Electron. They are rejecting your code because you use Electron to browse the web.

To see why this is a bad idea, one only has to look so far as the third post currently on the from page of HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19321775 Do you think that microsoft can reasonably rely on this patch being promptly applied to all the electron apps in it's store?

Electron may primarily be developed by GitHub, a recent acquisition, but it is not well suited for this purpose.

You can see that this post is tricking other people in the replies to it, e.g. the one discussing slack, the first reaction of the microsoft employee that kindly replied, and the person who replied saying "I have a electron app in the microsoft store".

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#75

Post by [deleted] »

ductionist wrote: post #59
AlexandrB wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? How? Of the services on offer, only payment processing has significant cost to Microsoft. Things like crash reporting are solved problems whose cost should be approximately equal to the cost of hosting the data.

I'd add hosting on top of that - like Apple, Google, etc., they don't charge you for distributing your app (which could be hefty, per paid transaction, if you have a low-converting trial or freemium app).

[deleted]

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#76

Post by gpm »

burtonator wrote: post #57
JeremyBanks wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does your application allow arbitrary web browsing, or just display its own content in a web view?

You preview content on the web, then capture it locally. It's not really 'browsing' as you give it one URL and if that URL works you 'capture' it for offline storage.

Call it whatever you want, you're running untrusted third party code in electron, which is exactly what they should be worried about and preventing.

You weren't even blocking code from common malware providers such as ad networks last I checked... Glancing at the code it looks like you still aren't.

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#77

Post by lemoncucumber »

keerthiko wrote: post #64
omouse wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's obvious from that structure that Microsoft realizes they are part of a larger ecosystem and that they aren't a dominant channel. > if you rely mostly on your own marketing methods, then it should get less That's usually how it is. You rely on your own website and blog for organic results and Google or Facebook or some other channel (billboards, TV, podcasts, etc.) for paid advertising. Microsoft and other app st…

> That's usually how it is. That's usually how it should be. But if you collect payments through Apple App Store or Google Play because your apps are available on their platforms, even if customers didn't discover it from the stores but through your own marketing methods, the platforms get the full 30%. There are some ways to circumvent this, but not really. [assumed flow is potential customer sees marketing/advertis…

The Mac would be a better comparison than iOS. On the Mac, developers are free to circumvent the Mac App Store entirely and keep 100% of the revenue (minus whatever it costs them to process the payments, distribute the binaries, etc.)

And in fact this change specifically excludes Xbox (and, curiously, all games in general), which is the (remaining) Microsoft platform that's closest to iOS in terms of being locked down.

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#79

Post by gpm »

gpm wrote: post #74
burtonator wrote: post #18

That's cool... assuming you can get in: https://getpolarized.io/2019/02/28/dear-app-stores-dont-bloc... I found out that our app was crushed after 2 weeks of development. Basically, they won't let us in because we use Electron. Electron is developed in part (primarily) due to Github which they now own. TWO WEEKS I spent porting to the MS App Store only to have them just crush us ... It's great that I can make 95% of…

This strikes me as a very deceptive post - I hope not intentionally. They aren't rejecting your code because you use Electron. They are rejecting your code because you use Electron to browse the web. To see why this is a bad idea, one only has to look so far as the third post currently on the from page of HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19321775 Do you think that microsoft can reasonably rely on this patch b…

In fact, while I may be mistaken, it looks to me like you are currently serving binaries vulnerable to the exploit linked, which is known to be being attacked in the wild.

Your package-lock.json references electron 3.1.3, which was released at the end of January, while that vulnerability was only patched Feb 27. I think (but you should check) that 3.1.5 includes the patch. Edit: It doesn't. The only way to get this patch seems to be to update to Electron 5.x.

Re: Updated Microsoft Store App Developer Agreement: New Revenue Share

#80

Post by busterarm »

AlexandrB wrote: post #52
valuearb wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s insanely good deal. MSFT has to be losing money on that.

What? How? Of the services on offer, only payment processing has significant cost to Microsoft. Things like crash reporting are solved problems whose cost should be approximately equal to the cost of hosting the data.

PayPal has established the absolute rock-bottom industry-floor of 2.9% + $0.30 for payment processing + fraud reduction.

Fraud reduction accounts for the majority of that percentage.

Patreon has established that they will completely go out of business at 5%.

Steam is taking 30% and Epic is taking 12%. Salaries, servers and regulation are expensive.

Microsoft offering 5% is a steal.

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