Strava cuts off leaderboard for free users, reduces third party apps

Post by jhrmnn » Mon, May 18, 2020, 10:41 PM UTC

kingosticks wrote: post #21

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Giving zero days notice to your 3rd-party developers is one way to anger a relatively powerful bunch of your users. I understand the frustration, but I also understand Strava's desire to rip the band-aid off and just shut it down. When it comes to free APIs, a sunsetting period gives a lot of people the idea that they can change the company's mind if they complain loudly enough, make enough noise on social media, o…

I agree, I don't think they have much power. But what I said was they are relatively more powerful, and I meant compared to regular free users. Some 3rd-party devs will have apps with many, many users and those users will likely value the work the developer has put in. They will be forced to relay the news to all their users right now and I imagine they'll still be pretty angry about it. And I also entirely agree Str…

Post by tnorthcutt » Mon, May 18, 2020, 10:44 PM UTC

HugoDias wrote: post #38

Well, I started using Strava last week as a free user. Any good alternatives for bikers?

Post by floatingatoll » Mon, May 18, 2020, 10:52 PM UTC

appleiigs wrote: post #32

floatingatoll wrote: post #8

This is a great example of why it’s important to charge money for things up front, rather than later on. If they’d charged for these features from day 1, this could have been a glowing article about how their revenue model has helped them support feature development and build a third-party app ecosystem. They should have charged for it sooner.

But i don’t think they’d be as popular without being free. I have a Garmin watch which has an app, iPhone has fitness tracking built in. Nike has a free app. The list of competitors goes on and on. Now that they have network effects and switching costs (all my historical data), time to squeeze and monetize.

Post by gamblor956 » Mon, May 18, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

jhrmnn wrote: post #41

kingosticks wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, I don't think they have much power. But what I said was they are relatively more powerful, and I meant compared to regular free users. Some 3rd-party devs will have apps with many, many users and those users will likely value the work the developer has put in. They will be forced to relay the news to all their users right now and I imagine they'll still be pretty angry about it. And I also entirely agree Str…

At least Strava is reasonable about getting your own data out of it. Not sure if this applies just to EU users, but it's easy to download a full archive with the original uploaded gpx/fit files (whether they came from a manual upload or a 3rd party). Last time I checked (which wasn't too long after GDPR was introduced), Garmin didn't really support a bulk download of the raw data, and neither did Fitbit.

Post by stbtrax » Mon, May 18, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

andromeduck wrote: post #13

Strava integration with apple watch and apple health is so poor I stopped using it directly, relying instead of stuff like health fit. Having tried Summit I honestly don't understand why anyone would pay for such a lackluster experience especially for swimming. If the Activity app would allow for a bit more detailed workout sharing and basic social like likes and comments I'd be done with it entirely.