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Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

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Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#21

Post by stcredzero »

georgemcbay wrote: post #4

It would be pretty fitting if the end result of Apple's new pricing rules were that everyone refocused on mobile webapps, thereby reducing the value of iOS drastically and allowing it to much more easily be supplanted by commodity Android devices. If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway. Apple will sti…

If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway.

Yes, but what about reading offline? Is the convenience of using the iPad going to suffer?

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#22

Post by zohebv »

nika wrote: post #8
georgemcbay wrote: post #4

It would be pretty fitting if the end result of Apple's new pricing rules were that everyone refocused on mobile webapps, thereby reducing the value of iOS drastically and allowing it to much more easily be supplanted by commodity Android devices. If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway. Apple will sti…

I find it kinda amazing how rumor becomes mythology which eventually morphs into accepted fact. Apple has good relationships with game developers. They may not kowtow to egomaniacs, and it always seems a roll of the dice whether a given iteration of hardware compromises results in a pan or a plug from carmack. I develop apps. This is how I make my living. It would take a complete reversal of apple's attitudes and dir…

> As a developer for and a user of iOS this just furthers Apple's value to me

So, the disappearance of Pandora, Kindle & Netflix is great for the iOS user, because you can now subscribe without pulling out your credit card.

> They may not kowtow to egomaniacs

It is great that you make a good living off iOS, but labeling everyone who will be put out of business because of Apple's price fixing arrangement and prohibition of external purchase links as egomania is amazingly blinkered. All the discussion that has followed Apple's announcement is clear and simple, how egomania enters here is beyond me. If anything, what is amazing is your inability to appreciate the significance of events if they do not impact you negatively.

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#23

Post by stcredzero »

msbarnett wrote: post #20
naner wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You own a Kindle and prefer to read Kindle books on the iPad?

It entirely depends on the book. My second-generation Kindle sees a lot of use for novels. My iPad+Kindle.app get a lot of use for software books, textbooks, and other things with a lot of fixed-flow content and tables that benefit from the much larger screen.

I've been using my iPad for software books. The speed of search/navigation is critical for that.

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#24

Post by ghshephard »

naner wrote: post #6
Derbasti wrote: post #3

So, would I still be able to read my whole library of books offline on my iPad? Seriously, if the Kindle app would get pulled from my iPad, the iPad would lose half its value for me. That would be a terrible shame.

You own a Kindle and prefer to read Kindle books on the iPad?

I own a K2 and K3, in addition to my iPad. If I'm reading linear text outdoors in bright sunlight, or at the beach, I prefer the kindles. For all other situations (Office, Home, Bed, textbooks, random-text (references) - I use my iPad. I've got about 15 textbooks (though I ended up having to buy Radia Perlman's Interconnections from O'Reilly's "Safari Books Online" one PDF chapter at a time and read it through goodreader) and about thirty linear-text books. I'd say the ratio is about 70/30 right now in favor of the iPad.

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#25

Post by Pahalial »

nika wrote: post #8
georgemcbay wrote: post #4

It would be pretty fitting if the end result of Apple's new pricing rules were that everyone refocused on mobile webapps, thereby reducing the value of iOS drastically and allowing it to much more easily be supplanted by commodity Android devices. If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway. Apple will sti…

I find it kinda amazing how rumor becomes mythology which eventually morphs into accepted fact. Apple has good relationships with game developers. They may not kowtow to egomaniacs, and it always seems a roll of the dice whether a given iteration of hardware compromises results in a pan or a plug from carmack. I develop apps. This is how I make my living. It would take a complete reversal of apple's attitudes and dir…

You're completely shifting the argument. The point isn't that Apple's latest mandate affects iOS-only developers adversely or even at all; it's that it is intended to destroy cross-platform services, or at least leech their money.

If you have a freemium webapp which finally rolls out an iphone app, you now have to eat costs for people who download the app and sign up through there. You don't have any choice in the matter.

How you went from that entire issue to comparing iOS and Android APIs, I frankly have no idea.

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#26

Post by wvenable »

nika wrote: post #8
georgemcbay wrote: post #4

It would be pretty fitting if the end result of Apple's new pricing rules were that everyone refocused on mobile webapps, thereby reducing the value of iOS drastically and allowing it to much more easily be supplanted by commodity Android devices. If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway. Apple will sti…

I find it kinda amazing how rumor becomes mythology which eventually morphs into accepted fact. Apple has good relationships with game developers. They may not kowtow to egomaniacs, and it always seems a roll of the dice whether a given iteration of hardware compromises results in a pan or a plug from carmack. I develop apps. This is how I make my living. It would take a complete reversal of apple's attitudes and dir…

You missed the point completely. Yes, as a developer, having Apple handle subscriptions and take 30% off the top is really no big deal.

But what if your app presents content developed by other companies? Lets say, the going price for this content is $1. You purchase this content for 70 cents so when you sell it, you make 30 cents of revenue. With Apple's forced subscription plan, you no longer make any money at all. They take the 30 cents instead of you. You could raise prices, but you have to raise them everywhere since Apple doesn't allow you to have different prices outside the store than inside the store.

This is a mess.

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#27

Post by ghshephard »

wvenable wrote: post #26
nika wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it kinda amazing how rumor becomes mythology which eventually morphs into accepted fact. Apple has good relationships with game developers. They may not kowtow to egomaniacs, and it always seems a roll of the dice whether a given iteration of hardware compromises results in a pan or a plug from carmack. I develop apps. This is how I make my living. It would take a complete reversal of apple's attitudes and dir…

You missed the point completely. Yes, as a developer, having Apple handle subscriptions and take 30% off the top is really no big deal. But what if your app presents content developed by other companies? Lets say, the going price for this content is $1. You purchase this content for 70 cents so when you sell it, you make 30 cents of revenue. With Apple's forced subscription plan, you no longer make any money at all.…

It's a mess for the resellers who want to resell content on the IOS Platform. Presuming that Apple is able to establish a relationship with the content owners directly, then it is not a mess for Apple, the Content Owners, or the users.

But, and this is a big but, this is _only_ true if Apple is able to reproduce the experience and content richness that we users currently have through Netflix, HuluPlus, Pandora and Amazon Kindle. Apple wants all of that business. I think that, ultimately, they will neither be able to reproduce the experience I get from those resellers, and they will harm the long term value of their platform. They are killing the goose to get the golden egg.

I, personally, as a user, will be hurt by this new policy of Apple's because I really, really like my Kindle, and I like having the freedom to read the same books on my iPad and Kindle.

The new apple policy makes sense for the following categories of businesses:

  o Newspapers
  o Magazines
  o Music Labels
  o Movie Studios
  o Bands
  o Book Publishing Houses
It does _not_ make sense for:

  o Internet Radio Streaming resellers (Pandora and friends)
  o Movie/TV Streaming Resellers (Hulu/Netflix)
  o Content Resellers (Amazon, B&N, Readability)
  o Magazine/Newstands (Zinio/Press Reader)
All I can say is thank goodness for Android - it may suck for those of us who really like the iPad, but, this new 70/30 policy has just breathed a _ton_ of life into that platform as an option that all the content resellers will now likely be flocking to...

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#28

Post by mconnors »

georgemcbay wrote: post #4

It would be pretty fitting if the end result of Apple's new pricing rules were that everyone refocused on mobile webapps, thereby reducing the value of iOS drastically and allowing it to much more easily be supplanted by commodity Android devices. If everything you're consuming is through webkit, who cares if you're on Android or iOS? Might as well use the one with better Javascript performance anyway. Apple will sti…

The problem I am having-

1 can't sell the app itself, 2 the app doesn't live on the phone screen (unless they make a bookmark-button) 3 even though its 30% users are already tied into the store which lowers the mental barrier to purchase, meaning you don't have to get their credit card info. 4 no push notification

Re: Why Amazon Isn’t Worried About Apple’s In-App Purchasing Rules

#30

Post by Derbasti »

naner wrote: post #6
Derbasti wrote: post #3

So, would I still be able to read my whole library of books offline on my iPad? Seriously, if the Kindle app would get pulled from my iPad, the iPad would lose half its value for me. That would be a terrible shame.

You own a Kindle and prefer to read Kindle books on the iPad?

I don't own a Kindle, but I still occasionally buy books in the Kindle store to read them on my iPad. I like the iPad for technical books and occasionally fiction. But reading on the iPad is slightly more straining than reading from paper, so for leasure reading I prefer paper.
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