Problems on the Galaxy Store • Hacker News Board

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#11

Post by thih9 » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:14 PM UTC

Crosseye_Jack wrote: post #7

SSNLF wrote: post #2

Apps must not have unreasonably high prices. The price $10 is too high. Yet a Nigerian scammer continues offering an app for $300, even after an employee reports it.

TBF. losing $300 to a Nigerian scammer is pretty cheap (when compared to other scams out there) :-P EDIT: however, you should be allowed to set the pricing of your app however you like.

> you should be allowed to set the pricing of your app however you like.

What about being allowed to curate apps in your app store however you like?

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#12

Post by ldoughty » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:21 PM UTC

I get that it's frustrating waiting for an app to be approved... But there's nothing really technical, novel, or useful to others in this post except that, perhaps you should price at $9.99 instead of $10 in the Samsung store for reasons that are not terribly apparent.

I think this is just the developer is trying to resolve his frustration by "yelling for the manager" to make a PR incident.

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#13

Post by ldoughty » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:23 PM UTC

rozab wrote: post #5

At least the developers are able to easily get in touch with this Ron guy - seems he is being genuinely helpful. That alone makes it a better experience than other stores.

Ron appears to be the PR/support person, not a developer. But yes, compared to companies like Google, Facebook, Apple... it's nice to actually get human responses

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#14

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:25 PM UTC

ldoughty wrote: post #13

rozab wrote: post #5

At least the developers are able to easily get in touch with this Ron guy - seems he is being genuinely helpful. That alone makes it a better experience than other stores.

Ron appears to be the PR/support person, not a developer. But yes, compared to companies like Google, Facebook, Apple... it's nice to actually get human responses

[deleted]

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#15

Post by Crosseye_Jack » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:26 PM UTC

thih9 wrote: post #11

Crosseye_Jack wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TBF. losing $300 to a Nigerian scammer is pretty cheap (when compared to other scams out there) :-P EDIT: however, you should be allowed to set the pricing of your app however you like.

> you should be allowed to set the pricing of your app however you like. What about being allowed to curate apps in your app store however you like?

Sure, but it doesn't seem like they are rejecting the app because of its functionality or quality, but the price point. Software that serves a niche isn't going to get the mass downloads required to fund the development a low price point per sale requires. There is a use case for apps costing more than $10. The Samsung store allows for in-app subscriptions, at 2 bucks a month the app is going to cost the user more than $10 over the span of a year, heck even over the course of 6 months.

But yeah, if Samsung doesn't like it, I say screw 'em and just put it on the Play Store instead.

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#16

Post by CaptainZapp » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:29 PM UTC

SSNLF wrote: post #2

Apps must not have unreasonably high prices. The price $10 is too high. Yet a Nigerian scammer continues offering an app for $300, even after an employee reports it.

Well, there's the I Am Rich app[0], which essentially did nothing and cost US$999.99.

The crux was, however, that the developer was totally upfront about what you got for the price and apparently there still were douchebags around forking over the cash to buy "status".

Apple yanked the app due to the publicity. Which I thought was wrong. It didn't violate any App store rules and it was honest and up front in the description of the app.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_Rich

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#17

Post by andsoitis » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:43 PM UTC

turminal wrote: post #8

madeofpalk wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What monopoly? The Samsung Store is the alternative to the official Google Play store. Any Samsung android phone that has the Samsung Store also has the Play Store, no?

Yeah and they're both hostile to the user.

> Yeah and they're both hostile to the user.

If you had to pick the top thing that is hostile to the user, what do you think it is?

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#18

Post by jeroenhd » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:46 PM UTC

stuartjohnson12 wrote: post #3

The monopoly on app stores by device manufacturers is absurd, and doubly so when the governance is incompetent (which is always).

With Android 12, anyone can make an app store. Previously you had to let the user approve a bunch of prompts for every install or update, but the new API allows silent background updates just like on manufacturer apps.

Of course you need explicit permission from the user to install apps (that just makes common sense) but I've been using F-Droid Basic which works like a treat.

Only Amazon has tried to launch an alternative app store so far, and I'm it sure if they use the new API that makes automatic updates possible. However, there's nothing standing in anyone's way to bring competition to this market.

If you can come up with a better store, you can take one of the many open source app stores out there and add a sales feature to turn it into a business venture and take on Google and Samsung. I'm not sure how this will go down on iOS when they will eventually allow installing external apps, but I imagine the situation may be quite similar.

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#19

Post by marcosdumay » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:56 PM UTC

madeofpalk wrote: post #4

stuartjohnson12 wrote: post #3

The monopoly on app stores by device manufacturers is absurd, and doubly so when the governance is incompetent (which is always).

What monopoly? The Samsung Store is the alternative to the official Google Play store. Any Samsung android phone that has the Samsung Store also has the Play Store, no?

And on this case it's a duopoly. What doesn't make any difference at all, so people tend to not qualify their N-opoly words.

Re: Problems on the Galaxy Store

#20

Post by TazeTSchnitzel » Fri, Dec 08, 2023, 1:56 PM UTC

CaptainZapp wrote: post #16

SSNLF wrote: post #2

Apps must not have unreasonably high prices. The price $10 is too high. Yet a Nigerian scammer continues offering an app for $300, even after an employee reports it.

Well, there's the I Am Rich app[0], which essentially did nothing and cost US$999.99. The crux was, however, that the developer was totally upfront about what you got for the price and apparently there still were douchebags around forking over the cash to buy "status". Apple yanked the app due to the publicity. Which I thought was wrong. It didn't violate any App store rules and it was honest and up front in the desc…

I suspect they might actually have yanked it due to the high rate of refund requests and chargebacks. Not the developer's fault, but not something Apple want to have to deal with.