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I Think Your App Should Be Free

blog.earbits.com

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Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#141

Post by dools »

earbitscom wrote: post #124
dools wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find that to be sort of like saying I'm a shop owner. My life would be shitloads easier if I didn't have to actually be there, and people could just put the money on the counter and make their own change (like clerks :) You're being an idealist - be more pragmatic and you'll live a life less angry. I may only be speaking for myself here, but I honestly think the law will take a century to catch up here. We're on th…

You're comparing a shop owner who doesn't want to protect their investment because they're lazy to an artist who cannot prevent their product from being taken without being paid for, unless they want to make it unavailable in the format that all of their customers want it in. It's just sad that asking people to pay for things they take is being an idealist. I'm not angry. I just prefer to speak out against it than ac…

It's not so much that wanting people to pay is being an idealist, but that wanting things to be some way other than way they clearly are is being an idealist.

In another, less sophisticated time, you would have found a reality not far removed from the shop owner I described - and they would not have been considered lazy.

But a shop owner who railed against the shifting sands of humanity, pining for simpler times lost as he was pilfered blind, would clearly be sorrowful idealist.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#142

Post by davidw »

fpgeek wrote: post #132
davidw wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I will say that I have discovered a lot of music with a very small fan base through the Internet and small regional labels. Meaning that they probably have day jobs and don't produce as much music as they could if they were able to work at it full time. This may or may not have anything to do with piracy, but I think the point of fewer digital goods being produced is one to consider.

But these particular musicians making as much or more music is only part of the puzzle. The same digital technology that makes piracy easier is what made it possible for baddox to find them in the first place. It is hard to imagine solutions to the problem of music piracy that wouldn't also make it harder to find these musicians. After all, music piracy has become easy because music is easy to copy and distribute...…

There's nothing that says that various technologies act in some sort coordinated, "equal and opposite" ways.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#143

Post by lwhi »

earbitscom wrote: post #140
lwhi wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound like a moron. There I said it. " It has nothing to do with not being able to innovate. Coming up with new music that people want is itself innovation, and people should be compensated if you would like them to keep innovating in that way. " I'm talking about the old-guard . I.e. the recording industry - not people who make music. People who make music have been doing so for tens of centuries or more. They d…

People who make music are not dependent on the music industry - they are the music industry. Moronic is the person who thinks that nothing can be done to foster a society where the creation of art is respected. Throwing your hands up and saying it's too late is just pathetic. Thankfully there are enough people out there who respect the value of recorded music that it's still a $9 Billion industry, and in fact, the "t…

"People who make music are not dependent on the music industry - they are the music industry."

Be realistic - a lot of people in the music industry do not make music.

--

The problem is; people need to be compensated, but the way they've traditionally been compensated in the past is no longer tenable. This is where innovative ideas are required. Conceptually, copying an MP3 is no more theft than quoting someone without permission to a friend is theft.

Charge people for the service - not for the goods; because the goods have no finite value.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#144

Post by adamc »

earbitscom wrote: post #125
buff-a wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And indeed the market has spoken, and most android developers have listened: Apps Should Be Free(mium). That's the difference between startups and Big Music. Startups figure out how to make money out of free apps.

Great idea. Let's start inserting commercials into our songs. Now you're onto something.

Songwriters figured out how to write jingles long ago.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#145

Post by tucosan »

buff-a wrote: post #119
davesims wrote: post #59

If musicians had nearly as much stake in their distributed product, from a percent standpoint, as a startup founder has in his/her business, or if the music industry were remotely as equitable, all things considered, as the software industry, then the essay's apparent allegory might ring a little more true to me. But the practical reality is musicians don't have a similar stake, or a similar chance at making a sustai…

And indeed the market has spoken, and most android developers have listened: Apps Should Be Free(mium). That's the difference between startups and Big Music. Startups figure out how to make money out of free apps.

>Startups figure out how to make money out of free apps.

I don't know if most of them do. If I look around in the android market there are some great apps, that very likely do not make any money although they offer actual value to the customer.

I don't get it, why should apps be released for free?

Especially on Android I am surprised as to how many free(mium) apps are available, which could and should be paid apps, since they offer value to the user. Many apps however useful may not generate enough revenue by offering an ad-supported version of their app.

It's sad to see that the developer community is shooting itself in the foot by releasing so many apps for free/ad-supported. I am pretty sure that most ad-supported apps will not create a great revenue stream for the developer. Buyers simply get accustomed to this trend. See the divergence of revenue models between Android and iOS. I don't know if it's the market that speaks here, or maybe just a trend in developers not trusting in the value of their own product. All in all it seems that this trend of releasing apps for free does nobody any good, since it will stall innovation at some point.

On a side note, I would really like to see a comparison of how some similar apps perform which are either paid, freemium or donate. Maybe there is some threshold for when it makes sense to publish an app either freemium or paid.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#146

Post by toyg »

earbitscom wrote: post #137
toyg wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how exactly is this different from any other trade out there? Plumbers are not born as such, they invest money and time to become skilled professionals; but when they fix your boiler, they don't ask for royalties every time you turn the boiler on, do they? They perform a service, you pay for the service, and everyone's happy. For example, there is no reason why the entire process shouldn't be monetized. A lot of…

There is nothing different about the plumber and the artist. The plumber comes to your house and leaves you with a working toilet. The artist goes to the studio and leaves you with a copy of a song. In both cases, you now have something of value created by another person. Both would like to be paid for their work. Last I checked, no artists are selling MP3s to consumers on a per stream royalty basis. They're asking f…

The difference is that the plumber fixes hundreds of sinks, the artist fixes one and then extracts rent from users.

"Last I checked, no artists are selling MP3s to consumers on a per stream royalty basis. "

Still, every time the record is aired in public (bars etc), royalties are paid. And even when selling to consumers, they'll sell a vinyl disk, then a cassette, then a cd, then an .mp3, then a .wtf... and every time, it's the same damn recording, and if you try doing the format shifting yourself, they'd like nothing more than throwing you in jail.

And let's be honest: most record companies and artists ALREADY make more money from merchandise than they make on recordings, the same way comic book publishers make more money from toys than from actual comic books. This myth of the starving artist being robbed of revenue by downloaders is just that, a myth.

Now, where's that cassette that killed music back in the 80s...

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#147

Post by oelewapperke »

earbitscom wrote: post #62
davesims wrote: post #59

If musicians had nearly as much stake in their distributed product, from a percent standpoint, as a startup founder has in his/her business, or if the music industry were remotely as equitable, all things considered, as the software industry, then the essay's apparent allegory might ring a little more true to me. But the practical reality is musicians don't have a similar stake, or a similar chance at making a sustai…

The simple fact is that most startup founders not only create the products that define their success, but drive that success almost entirely on their own, with modest help from their investors. As much as everyone likes to hate on record labels, the good ones do almost everything involved in the business of making your music successful. The artist is the product, but very rarely does the artist drive the business. Mo…

Or take another page from the music industry's book : 1) write a polite, but stern DMCA letter to google, takedown within 2 weeks 2) file a complaints against unknown parties, demanding (at least) double your app's price * number of downloads of the offending app + $5000 in legal fees (do this for all versions of the app). Get discovery going. 3) Send discovery letter to google, with the question of revealing the full identity and payment details of the offending parties, including a list of all payments they ever executed to this party 4) go back to court, amend your complaint to at least double the amount they got in sales and ad revenue, should it be higher, drag anyone inside America before the judge, you're sure to get a conviction 5) read on hacker news how it's "SO unfair" that a big corporation has sued and won against a copy app uploader 6) go to a collection agency, sell your conviction to them for 40% of the listed value

You'll have done Google, Android developers and yourself a big favor. You can probably live off this, and make more money than your app would have brought in, for a year or 2.

And, frankly, they deserve it.

PS. This does not constitute legal advice, laws vary per state and country, blah blah blah

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#148

Post by oelewapperke »

kylec wrote: post #13

This is nothing more than a thinly-disguised allegory about piracy in the music industry. There are several big differences between the music and the software industry which I won't go into, except to say that: even taking this story at face value, for the developers to then start suing everyone downloading the fake copies of the app would still be a huge dick move.

Just my .2c. The music industry is (mostly) suing people for uploading music, not downloading it.

The fact that using bittorrent to download a track obviously constitutes uploading of music and lots of people do this does not change the facts.

Re: I Think Your App Should Be Free

#150

Post by Triumvark »

The only argument for getting paid in this article is that sweat deserves a return.

That was Marx's labor theory of value. Marx was wrong.

You deserve a return only when you efficiently meet someone else's needs. The secret to economic success is not sweat, but creative sloth.

We measure value against the cost of substitutes, and other people already entertain me for free (without piracy).

Maybe entertainment just isn't a hard problem. Maybe the bottom 99% of entertainers are basically tagging cat pictures. Maybe we shouldn't encourage them.

I guess if you're an app dev, and want to learn one thing from the music industry, I'd find a way to connect with fans and give them a reason to buy: http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/12695

Then look for ways to be creatively lazy, and make sure your app can't be replaced by going for a walk on a spring day.

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