Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work • Hacker News Board

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#111

Post by xarien » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 1:50 AM UTC

I didn't actually read the blog. Why am I commenting? I want to share the reason why I didn't read the blog.

I judge books by their covers. In fact, I don't know anyone who doesn't outside of trying very hard to convince others they do not.

The layout of the blog draws my attention to your picture and subsequently your "download my resume" link. I clicked since I was interested in learning a little about the author, his background, and what may have caused him to write such an article.

As soon as that link opened, I knew I would not read the blog post because the resume layout rendered the content difficult to read. Why does that bother me so much? The answer is simple: it ruined your brand for me before I even had a positive impression. Right off the bat, I'd give 2 suggestions to clean up your resume a little:

1) Do something about the half bar headers you are using as it currently divides the page when viewed, this wouldn't be an issue if you actually had a 2 column design which lined up, but it doesn't.

2) Never and I mean NEVER use justified alignment unless you're publishing a newspaper.

Sorry if I seem a bit harsh, but being that you're fairly young and these are very simple mistakes to correct, I thought I'd point them out.

Best of luck!

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#112

Post by uptownben » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 1:55 AM UTC

sirrocco wrote: post #74

algoshift wrote: post #45

Multiple reasons for this: First, too many stories along the lines of "I built this app for $1,000 in India and it is making me $50K per month". Second, kids who don't know how to value their time who'll work like slaves for $2,000. Third, bad programmers who deliver product cheaply enough, however, the underlying code is an absolute mess. They charge nothing, throw it together and move on. Fourth, people tend to com…

> Second, kids who don't know how to value their time who'll work like slaves for $2,000. That's not always the case - if you manage to work $2000 /8h/day/month in my country , you're already being paid in the top .. 10% programmers. Money has a different value based on location.

> Money has a different value based on location. I have a hard time understanding the mentality behind statements like that. While currency may have different values based on location, time, effort, knowledge, experience shouldn't be so different in value. Don't you agree? I don't want to single out any countries, but just as an example, let's say American developers typically charge ~US$100 per hour, why would Indian developers charge US$15.00 (or vice-versa) for the same work? Doesn't that kind of "race to the bottom" simply de-value the profession and make things harder all around? If you have made the investment of getting educated, learning the technology, learning the business and can produce; you should be charging and getting paid accordingly, depending on the market, not your local currency or local minimum wage. When dealing with your local market, you will need to take local rates into consideration, but I don't see any reason to apply local rates and limitation to an international (Internet) market. I would genuinely like to know if I am completely off base, and if anyone has more insight on this.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#113

Post by xarien » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 1:56 AM UTC

xarien wrote: post #111

I didn't actually read the blog. Why am I commenting? I want to share the reason why I didn't read the blog. I judge books by their covers. In fact, I don't know anyone who doesn't outside of trying very hard to convince others they do not. The layout of the blog draws my attention to your picture and subsequently your "download my resume" link. I clicked since I was interested in learning a little about the author,…

So I lied, I did end up skimming the post.

The problem is that you are generalizing way too much. Does every app need to communicate with a server? Nope. In fact, you don't even need to host the app download or transaction as it's done for you via itunes.

Additionally, even if client / server communication is necessary, what's to say the server doesn't already exist? Who's to say there's currently no communication with the server through web clients? If that's the case, you simply have to implement or expand the current interface...

Summary: Don't generalize....

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#114

Post by 6ren » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 2:49 AM UTC

From the referenced SO question http://stackoverflow.com/questions/209170/how-much-does-it-c... on apps costing $50-150-250K to develop.

Is there really enough money made from apps, to justify this cost?

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#115

Post by jnbiche » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:13 AM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #105

functionform wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

good and cheap?

Excellent choice, sir, the waiter will come by with your meal at some point in the next 20 years.

Yes!!

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#116

Post by yummyfajitas » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:15 AM UTC

funkyboy wrote: post #54

zavulon wrote: post #43

This is a message on NY Tech meetup mailing list, from about a half hour ago. All I could do is shake my head. _____________ I am seeking a telephony app. builder that can deliver a PhoneGap lie ( non-native) inexpensive app. for a telephony project. pay is: $350 + 1% equity stake in a newly formed Delaware Corp. and 2.5% on all residuals. possible board seat (future paid projects) if you can deliver an additional in…

This is the worst I have seen. In the past I have been proposed around 1000$ but this wins, hands down! The world is getting crowded of last minute entrepreneurs...

There are far worse. If you live in NY, you've surely run into Eric Leebow of FreezeCrowd:

http://nationaljobs.washingtonpost.com/a/all-jobs/list/q-fre...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQx_pJyyyxc

"Unpaid iPad Intern wanted to build a facebook killer."

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#117

Post by jnbiche » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:20 AM UTC

weixiyen wrote: post #93

csomar wrote: post #85

It's the same problem on Web Development. It's actually worse. As JavaScript and the DOM are quite hard to handle (cross-browser issues too) to build the simplest features and interactions. I found out that it's not worth it to mingle with offline-small business. Their budget is usually $1,000-$2,000. That's barely enough to buy a stock template, a couple of plug-ins, setup WordPress and customize it a little. The pr…

> It's the same problem on Web Development. It's actually worse. For me, on average, the same type of UI / interaction in iOS takes about 3-5x more to develop versus web.

He didn't say the time needed to develop an app was the same, he said the problem was the same. The problem seems to be that people undervalue programming/design work, and web development is not exempt from this.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#118

Post by 16s » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:22 AM UTC

I think one issue is the word "app" and how it's thrown around so easily these days by people who don't fully understand what an app is. It sounds so simple... "just make an app" or "there's an app for that". While devs know that "applications" are hard to write and take much planning, design and infrastructure to build and deploy and support, business people only hear the one syllable word "app" and they equate that that word with "easy and convenient". So bringing their expectations in line with reality is a challenge.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#119

Post by jnbiche » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:35 AM UTC

As a full-stack web developer with particular strengths in server-side development, this whole discussion has opened my eyes to a whole new potential clientele: iPhone developers. Building a nice RESTful API is something I enjoy doing and that I'm good at. I never imagined that I would end up marketing my services to other developers, but clearly there is a market there. I'll have to start hanging around mobile development forums, at least until Parse.com and its competitors put me out of business.

Re: Dear business people, an iOS app actually takes a lot of work

#120

Post by ootachi » Wed, Feb 01, 2012, 3:42 AM UTC

yummyfajitas wrote: post #116

funkyboy wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the worst I have seen. In the past I have been proposed around 1000$ but this wins, hands down! The world is getting crowded of last minute entrepreneurs...

There are far worse. If you live in NY, you've surely run into Eric Leebow of FreezeCrowd: http://nationaljobs.washingtonpost.com/a/all-jobs/list/q-fre... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQx_pJyyyxc "Unpaid iPad Intern wanted to build a facebook killer."

The depressing thing is that I suspect someone will actually take him up on his "offer".

Isn't that pretty much illegal anyhow? Unpaid interns are not supposed to actually create products.

Edit: It almost certainly is; part of the conditions for unpaid internships are that "the employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees, and on occasion the employer’s operations may actually be impeded", and this is clearly false in his case. In other words, that job posting is not only immoral, but illegal.