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Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

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Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#391

Post by Spivak »

hajile wrote: post #131
madeofpalk wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this is aimed at helping us small developers I doubt this was the aim. It suspect its aim was to fend off all this scrutiny on their App Store business. Who knows whether it'll work in avoiding attention from law makers and regulators, but this will do nothing to address the developer's concerns and problem with the App Store.

It seems to hurt their argument. They don't need that big of a cut for expenses, they just want it and can do whatever they like. It still doesn't solve the fundamental issue. Let users have the option of using third-party stores, but losing Apple's safety net. They claim users want that net. If so, the third party stores will go bust. If not, they're simply being anti-consumer.

It's a percentage cut and they cut it in half for a segment that brings in the smallest amount of revenue. I don't really think this affects their argument at all except that they now make enough from large players to pay for everyone else and the good PR is more valuable than the cash

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#392

Post by zaroth »

ethbr0 wrote: post #362
zaroth wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which just goes to show how Google’s and Apple’s investment of tens of billions of dollars building out their respective ecosystem presents a tremendous opportunity to developers. Amazon made a half-hearted effort to compete in the space and the result is “less than 2%” in your case.

> tens of billions of dollars building out their respective ecosystem presents a tremendous opportunity to developers That's... one way to look at it. Another way is that they'd be spending even more if there were more healthy competition in the alternative app store market. Amazon is incentived to run an Android app store now, in the same way Microsoft was incentivized to maintain an ARM build of Windows: it's not a…

Amazon made a bunch of poorly performing and uncompetitive Android phones, and then bailed before doing the hard work of actually differentiating their product. The results are totally expected and if anything demonstrate the market is competitive, not anti-competitive.

Users don’t want an “alternative App Store market”. They want a place where they know the apps they download won’t steal their data or crash their device, where the billing policies are clear and predictable, where you can set parental controls and get refunds on accidental purchases.

Apple doesn’t have customers because they are the only one who you can buy water, electricity, or internet from at your home address. Apple has customers because people willingly and happily shovel their hard-earned money at them because their products are freaking amazing.

In no universe can anyone say that the progression / advancement of smartphones and smartphone applications indicates a stagnant market or one in need of forced government intervention.

From what I can see iPhone 1 with its 400MHz Samsung CPU and 320x480 display and its half dozen apps -> iPhone 12 with its 8 core 3GHz A14, 2532x1170 display, and millions of apps demonstrates conclusively that consumers are winning out tremendously over the last 13 years due to a highly competitive market driving truly massive R&D investment in this space.

I think the problem that people actually have with Apple is that they are so far ahead of the pack, and people don’t see where the inevitable disruption is going to come from just yet.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#393

Post by valuearb »

sneak wrote: post #312
valuearb wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even better!

Not for users who wish to use the macOS without engaging in Apple's services business. It's already impossible on iOS, due to the fact that you cannot install any software except via the App Store, which requires an Apple ID. At the moment it is possible to continue to use a mac and download and run software without an Apple ID, but if the trend of only releasing software via the App Store continues, that will become…

Apple leadership has repeatedly said they aren't going to further restrict app installs on MacOS. Craig Fredaspaghetti just spoke about this in interviews on the Apple Silicon/Big Sur release. They use MacOS every day themselves, and deeply care about what it's different use case requires.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#394

Post by gtsteve »

estreeper wrote: post #136
gtsteve wrote: post #21

Looks nice but it doesn't solve my fundamental problem: 1. I invest loads of time and effort developing an app 2. Apple rejects it -or- 2. Apple approves it 3. I ship a new update 4. Apple rejects the update and now decides my app should have been rejected retroactively. I'm especially concerned about what happened to Hey and others but my customers are demanding smartphone apps and there are still limits to what can…

> there are still limits to what can be done with a mobile web browser This is true, but perhaps not as many as some may think! Progressive Web Applications can now do quite a lot on mobile and tablets, with a notable exception of push notifications on iOS. They are an increasingly interesting option for those whose use case allows it. https://simplabs.com/blog/2020/06/10/the-state-of-pwa-suppor...

My key issue is working offline, if I could make that work in a convincing way with good usability that'd be ideal. You can still only store 5mb in local storage, so you can't sync a load of data to the device and allow the user to use it in the field. Also, there is now a 7-day age limit for data in local storage - I understand why this was done (for user privacy) but it just makes things more hostile for developers attempting to use it in a legitimate way.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#395

Post by anchpop »

zepto wrote: post #377
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seriously, who cares if Epic earns 14 bzillionty dollars this month, or 20 bzillionty dollars? The narrative here is amazing, because you're not sympathizing with Epic because they're so big and have so much money... but they're still the little guy compared to Apple. The scale of Apple's monopoly profit makes Epic look like a corner pharmacy in Montana.

Epic is part of TenCent which is close to having a monopoly on games these days. But separately, the only reason to root for ‘the little guy’ is if the little guy is somehow hard done by. We dislike the fact that Apple makes some money by charging developers 30% for payment services, software delivery, and operating a storefront that users feel safe to buy from. We say 30% is too much to change for that, because the…

TenCent has a stake in Epic but Tim Sweeney still is the majority shareholder

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#396

Post by user-the-name »

coder543 wrote: post #323
user-the-name wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because those APIs can be used for extremely sketchy activity.

Many APIs can be used for sketchy things. Supposedly, that’s one thing the App Store review process is meant to catch.

You can't detect everything in review.

iOS has always been designed as not to offer APIs that can be used for particularly harmful purposes.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#397

Post by DizzyDoo »

An a full-time indie game developer what I find fascinating is that Steam do the opposite of this. The more you make, the less you pay Steam, but the thresholds are in the millions. If you make more than $50 million then Steam take 20% not 30%. I understand the reasoning; Steam want to keep some of the big publishers like Rockstar Games, PUBG Corp and EA happy and not so tempted to move to their own platform (or to Epic).

But if you're a developer who isn't making more than $50 million (like me!) you end up paying more than the enormous corporations. Unless you're on the App Store, where it's the opposite. It's funny how the focus is different here.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#398

Post by whimsicalism »

zaroth wrote: post #387
whimsicalism wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a company that is competing like hell The problem is when by "competing like hell", you compete so hard that you suppress your competition. The issue that anti-competition laws seek to redress is the suppression of other competition.

Except the competition isn’t suppressed, and there’s no actual monopoly here. What we have is a pretty clear case of a minuscule minority of users bitterly complaining that a company isn’t making its products exactly the way they want them to. A store is allowed to charge what it wants for its products. A store is allowed to set the policies that it wants for the goods that it sells in its own stores. It just so happ…

> A store is allowed to charge what it wants for its products. A store is allowed to set the policies that it wants for the goods that it sells in its own stores.

A store is allowed to block you from using any other store? These aren't natural continuations or logical extensions of meatspace, stop pretending they are.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#399

Post by Spivak »

coder543 wrote: post #336
leadingthenet wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple wants developers to use the App Store and be subject to their fees and review process. As do I, an end-user of Apple's platforms.

You’re welcome to use App Store apps... I don’t see the problem. Safari PWAs protect your privacy better than native apps, because Safari trusts no one. The App Store review process is trying to find a malicious needle in a haystack because iOS by default trusts native apps more than it should, due to the existence of that nebulous review process. Apple is slowly locking down native apps with each successive iOS vers…

I'm not welcome to buy your app on the App Store though. This seems to be the big disconnect about alternative app stores or distribution methods. It doesn't enable user choice unless every app is available on every store. It enables publisher choice and creates this loop where publishers who have a customer bases just move to the store with the fewest restrictions and fees. It's a race to the bottom where the user loses.

Re: Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

#400

Post by wraptile »

DizzyDoo wrote: post #397

An a full-time indie game developer what I find fascinating is that Steam do the opposite of this. The more you make, the less you pay Steam, but the thresholds are in the millions. If you make more than $50 million then Steam take 20% not 30%. I understand the reasoning; Steam want to keep some of the big publishers like Rockstar Games, PUBG Corp and EA happy and not so tempted to move to their own platform (or to E…

The difference of course is that Steam has competition but Apple's app store doesn't.
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