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Android is for startups

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Re: Android is for startups

#121

Post by mooreds »

slantyyz wrote: post #51
jcromartie wrote: post #21

I know that Android users are starved for slick apps that look good and work well, because I'm one of them (when using my Nexus 7). But as a developer I know that I can't make money from them. There is no way forward for (paid) Android apps that can make a living. You need to sell on iOS in order to make any sort of revenue. So if your startup is built on a free app, then by all means use Android to test your idea. B…

>> There is no way forward for (paid) Android apps that can make a living. You need to sell on iOS in order to make any sort of revenue. Yes, that is kind of sad. As someone who does pay for Android software, I imagine I'm in the minority. I've got extended family members who balk at the notion of paying even a dollar for software on Android. OTOH, I'm curious how many paid apps on the iOS App store actually hit the…

As of May 2012, 60% of developers didn't break even. http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/05/ios-app-success-is-a-lo...

Re: Android is for startups

#122

Post by ryderm »

speeder wrote: post #115
corresation wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that…

Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?

I rarely spend money on the app store, but if I get a card I'll buy many more apps and games than I otherwise would have.

Re: Android is for startups

#123

Post by [deleted] »

speeder wrote: post #115
corresation wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that…

Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?

[deleted]

Re: Android is for startups

#124

Post by CodeCube »

speeder wrote: post #115
corresation wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that…

Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?

Kids don't have credit cards connected to their iTunes account, and thus receive iTunes gift cards for music, which they turn around and use for apps, IAPs for games, etc.

I don't have any source for that, or even necessarily believe it (I don't disbelieve it either) ... I'm just pointing out what OP meant by that comment.

Re: Android is for startups

#125

Post by corresation »

speeder wrote: post #115
corresation wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I entirely agree with your lead in, your last bit is very "where the puck was" thinking. Two years ago the Play store yielded 1/10th the revenue of the App Store, by common metrics. One year ago it was 1/4. The most recent stat is 1/2 -- still months old. Do you see where this is going? The #1 source of revenue for many games and other media on the App Store is via gifted iTunes cards. This is a mechanism that…

Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?

iTunes cards are a hugely popular gift for children / teenagers / college kids, quickly exchanged for fart apps and in app smurfberries. The nascent Google simile of this is still minuscule in comparison, making gifting in the Android market a much less pleasant affair. I would gather that the KitKat promotion is partly to help spread awareness of Play cards.

As a second effect, people don't think of things like iTunes cards as real money. Give someone $50 on an iTunes cards and, I suspect, it will see much less discretion than a $50 bill.

Re: Android is for startups

#126

Post by mncolinlee »

benihana wrote: post #39

Another post on the top of Hacker News making the mistake of thinking paying customers give a crap about how easy it is to [write|deploy|test|debug] your app. Even with all the pain associated with the App Store people still write more apps for it than ever. Why? Cause people pay for apps there. They don't on the Play Store.

The quantity in dollars is completely and utterly irrelevant to the validated learning lean startups need. The OP's point is that Android allows you to start learning sooner and faster and to produce a better app which will make you more money.

iOS might make you more money right now if you're lucky enough to chance on an app which matches what users already want, but even that ship may soon be sailing.

Suppose iOS apps pay two times as much on average right now. Tell me: what is two times one-tenth of what you should be earning? You're hobbling yourself by MUCH MORE building an app that inadequately addresses your user's needs.

Re: Android is for startups

#127

Post by speeder »

corresation wrote: post #125
speeder wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to elaborate on the iTunes cards thing?? It is not just a 50 USD card (or other similar values) that people buy and gift around? What this has to do with games?

iTunes cards are a hugely popular gift for children / teenagers / college kids, quickly exchanged for fart apps and in app smurfberries. The nascent Google simile of this is still minuscule in comparison, making gifting in the Android market a much less pleasant affair. I would gather that the KitKat promotion is partly to help spread awareness of Play cards. As a second effect, people don't think of things like iTun…

I see...

I was wondering about it...

Gift cards do not exist on my country, neither on my target markets, thus why I was kinda confused about it!

Re: Android is for startups

#128

Post by alex_c »

aryastark wrote: post #114
ensmotko wrote: post #31

Another thing that bothers me with development for iOS is that you need apple hardware and software. I can't develop an iOS on my Linux machine (I've tried running OSX in virtualbox, but it's slow and not to mention illegal). I really wish Apple would make their platform a little more available. Lowering the $100 yearly fee would be a good start...

> you need apple hardware and software It's worse than that, I'm afraid. You need the absolute latest of both. My perfectly fine Macbook from 2008 should be more than adequate for developing iOS apps. It's a core2 duo with 2GB of RAM. I mean, these aren't exactly the days of Pentium 60 vs. XT 8088. Yet the max OS I can upgrade to is Lion. And that's with going through Snow Leopard first. And who knows how much longer…

"5 years old" is a pretty far cry from "absolute latest". My 2008 Core2 Duo MacBook, upgraded to 5GB of RAM and an SSD, works like a champ for iPhone development. I don't understand this complaint.

Re: Android is for startups

#129

Post by mooreds »

badman_ting wrote: post #14

This is such a weird piece. It seems to get why, despite the onerous restrictions Apple puts on devs, iOS has great apps and huge numbers in every direction, but then just says Android is better. Perhaps a better argument would be to understand why the gain is worth the pain, and then move to saying that the gain without the pain would be even sweeter. I dunno, I make web stuff. I just like watching you guys duke it…

What I took from the piece is that Android is far more developer friendly in terms of ease of development, deployment to devices for testing, and releasing.

Whether that is enough to make it a 'better' platform depends on what your needs are.

If I were doing a mobile startup and needed fast feedback on devices, Android's fast turnaround sure would be interesting. Not the deciding factor, but definitely a check in the Android column.

Re: Android is for startups

#130

Post by akmiller »

grbalaffa wrote: post #98

All this talk about process, but not a word about the quality of the SDK itself. Android is quite frankly still very far behind when it comes to really basic things. Here's just one example: iOS has had easy support for custom fonts in native UI elements since the early days, meanwhile here is the situation on Android: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2973270/using-a-custom-ty... (Yes, the thread was started in 201…

This is anecdotal (but frankly so is yours)...

We have mainly been doing iOS apps but we are hearing demand from customers about having an option in Android so one of our developers (who is definitely much more of an Apple fan) has been experimenting with the Android SDK and he has been very impressed with the Android SDK. He has found many things to be far easier in the Android SDK than with iOS. His main complaint is with the emulator which is extremely frustrating to use but since it's dead easy to use your device that's not as big of a deal.

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