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Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

macrumors.com

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Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#41

Post by crag »

blinkingled wrote: post #14
Anechoic wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think we are close to the tipping point where a majority of developers begin to favor webapps to iOS native apps Isn't this pretty much what Apple wanted in the first place?

No. It just meant that they did not have the native application development SDK and the associated App Store infrastructure ready that time. Saying "who needs native apps when there is the Web" up until releasing the native App Store is typical of Apple - "who wants to watch video on small screen", "People don't read anymore" etc. come to mind.

Actually you have evidence of that? Cause I don't believe that for a second. I was a member of the ADC at that time. And I don't remember seeing ANYTHING about a iphone (this was before it was renamed to ios) dev kit.

But my email was full of guidelines to create web apps for the phone. What I think happened is that (at that time) Apple wanted Mac developers to make iphone apps, badly. And mac dev's wanted to do it natively. A half a year later, I see the beta of the dev kit.

I doubt Apple imagined the app store market at that time. And like most grand success stories, there was a lot of luck involved.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#42

Post by recoiledsnake »

ThomPete wrote: post #34
dstein wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valid points, but the subscription tax is on top of application delivery fees. That's going too far, and I think we're about to see a watershed event where nearly all publishers begin to flee the App Store. Watch it happen.

But here is the question. Do people buy the iPad because of the magazines or the magazines because of the iPad? In other words. Does it really make a difference if they leave? Is that really anything to worry about? Will that really mean the end of native apps? Again apple is not depending on the subscription apps to make money. It's the other way around.

>Again apple is not depending on the subscription apps to make money. It's the other way around.

Won't their value diminish if there no apps and no content to subscribe to, except through Safari? Why do you think Jobs advertizes 400K apps with a tile of icons on screen?

What if Netflix and Kindle were yanked on June 30? Many people buy iDevices just to access those. Will be interesting June 30th

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#43

Post by recoiledsnake »

guelo wrote: post #27
ThomPete wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because their platform is superior to everything else out there. Because mobile apps is not even close to providing proper user experience. People expect snappy as hell execution on the iOS, the actual flow of the app is often more important than the looks. And in my experience the web apps just aren't there yet. Apple make no money on the app store it more or less goes to operations. You can call it a tax or you can…

If FT fans expect snappy iOS apps and all they can get is a substandard HTML app don't you think they'll considering ditching iOS when their contract is up?

Would be interesting if FT put a FAQ on a page for mobile apps regarding why there's no iOS version.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#44

Post by blinkingled »

crag wrote: post #41
blinkingled wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It just meant that they did not have the native application development SDK and the associated App Store infrastructure ready that time. Saying "who needs native apps when there is the Web" up until releasing the native App Store is typical of Apple - "who wants to watch video on small screen", "People don't read anymore" etc. come to mind.

Actually you have evidence of that? Cause I don't believe that for a second. I was a member of the ADC at that time. And I don't remember seeing ANYTHING about a iphone (this was before it was renamed to ios) dev kit. But my email was full of guidelines to create web apps for the phone. What I think happened is that (at that time) Apple wanted Mac developers to make iphone apps, badly. And mac dev's wanted to do it n…

Evidence of what? You seem to concur that native sdk and app store did not exist at the time when Apple said Web Apps are good enough.

Sure they didn't wanted to lose developer attention and had to keep them engaged with web apps etc. until they figured out the strategy on native development and the app store.

And I can't believe that Apple had totally closed the door or hadn't thought about native apps at all when they initially released the iPhone - there wasn't any sensible reason not to - it wasn't a new thing, at least some of the phone platforms had native apps and there were even App Stores before that. It was just a matter of time.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#45

Post by Anechoic »

Anechoic wrote: post #9
dstein wrote: post #5

I think we are close to the tipping point where a majority of developers begin to favor webapps to iOS native apps. I've seen this coming a mile away. Apple almost lost a big portion of its development community 2 years ago with that whole 3rd party development platform issue. Apple relented, and they are now turning a different crank with the big subscription tax. They are playing a game of monopoly here. It's the s…

> I think we are close to the tipping point where a majority of developers begin to favor webapps to iOS native apps Isn't this pretty much what Apple wanted in the first place?

To the downvoters: this is what I'm talking about: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/06/11iphone.html

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#46

Post by Anechoic »

blinkingled wrote: post #44
crag wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually you have evidence of that? Cause I don't believe that for a second. I was a member of the ADC at that time. And I don't remember seeing ANYTHING about a iphone (this was before it was renamed to ios) dev kit. But my email was full of guidelines to create web apps for the phone. What I think happened is that (at that time) Apple wanted Mac developers to make iphone apps, badly. And mac dev's wanted to do it n…

Evidence of what? You seem to concur that native sdk and app store did not exist at the time when Apple said Web Apps are good enough. Sure they didn't wanted to lose developer attention and had to keep them engaged with web apps etc. until they figured out the strategy on native development and the app store. And I can't believe that Apple had totally closed the door or hadn't thought about native apps at all when t…

Looking at the 2007 WWDC press release, it looks like Web apps was they way Apple seriously wanted to go: "Developers can create Web 2.0 applications which look and behave just like the applications built into iPhone, and which can seamlessly access iPhone’s services, including making a phone call, sending an email and displaying a location in Google Maps." If nothing else, it gave them a much larger potential developer base than relying on native development alone and by sticking to standards it insures that the iPhone would always have a place in the table.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#47

Post by drivebyacct2 »

scrod wrote: post #31
recoiledsnake wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Oh, so these features are comparable in effort and scale to an entire web browser Didn't Apple take the KHTML (Konqueror was a full fledged browser) code and then had to release their code because it was GPL. I remember reading about a complaint from the KHTML that Apple was releasing the code as a big blob and this was hindering KHTML integration.

> Didn't Apple take the KHTML (Konqueror was a full fledged browser) code... WebKit has vastly evolved from the original KHTML library, to the point of being almost an entirely different product. The KHTML team has been pulling changes from WebKit ( http://trac.webkit.org/browser ) for many years now.

So if Apple does it, they're "evolving" an existing project... but the vast work that the Chrome team has put into WebKit is just nothing?

Your bias is showing. Hard.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#48

Post by drivebyacct2 »

sid0 wrote: post #39
ThomPete wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because their platform is superior to everything else out there. Because mobile apps is not even close to providing proper user experience. People expect snappy as hell execution on the iOS, the actual flow of the app is often more important than the looks. And in my experience the web apps just aren't there yet. Apple make no money on the app store it more or less goes to operations. You can call it a tax or you can…

Because their platform is superior to everything else out there. This seems like opinion presented as fact. I've used iOS and currently own an Android phone, and there's no doubt in my mind that the Android UX is miles ahead of the iOS UX. Of course, I include things like a browser with sync to desktop (Firefox) in my definition of UX, since things like that affect the experience I have while using the product quite…

Sadly, you will find that HN tends to be very anti-Android from a UI perspective. Haven't you noticed the praise of the notification system and other changes to iOS that have existed in Android for ages. Or the obsession with iMessage despite the existence of Google Voice.

At one point in time, iOS was prettier than Android. Too few HNers have actually used Froyo or Gingerbread to understand the UI improvements that have occurred and too many use Android as a dev platform or played with a phone in a store to understand the power of actual multitasking or the power of the back button.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#49

Post by dstein »

crag wrote: post #32
dstein wrote: post #5

I think we are close to the tipping point where a majority of developers begin to favor webapps to iOS native apps. I've seen this coming a mile away. Apple almost lost a big portion of its development community 2 years ago with that whole 3rd party development platform issue. Apple relented, and they are now turning a different crank with the big subscription tax. They are playing a game of monopoly here. It's the s…

What? MS lost to linux? The server (enterprise) market is the ONLY area where linux competes head-to-head with MS (or anyone really). And even in Enterprise there are plenty of MS shops. If you bring up the fabled "linux desktop" I'm gonna start laughing. Though I am impressed at what the folks at Ubuntu are doing. Also, when the iphone was first released Apple had no developer kit (API's). You could download guideli…

Microsoft long ago lost the mindset of developers. It's been a long time since I've met someone doing Windows-desktop software. All innovation appears to be happening outside of Microsoft technologies. MS fought for years (using IE) to make it as difficult as possible to build web applications and I'll spit up my milk if developers fall for it again by developing HTML/JS-based Windows 8 apps.

Re: Financial Times Won't Give Apple A Cut, Drops iOS for Web App

#50

Post by Steko »

crag wrote: post #32
dstein wrote: post #5

I think we are close to the tipping point where a majority of developers begin to favor webapps to iOS native apps. I've seen this coming a mile away. Apple almost lost a big portion of its development community 2 years ago with that whole 3rd party development platform issue. Apple relented, and they are now turning a different crank with the big subscription tax. They are playing a game of monopoly here. It's the s…

What? MS lost to linux? The server (enterprise) market is the ONLY area where linux competes head-to-head with MS (or anyone really). And even in Enterprise there are plenty of MS shops. If you bring up the fabled "linux desktop" I'm gonna start laughing. Though I am impressed at what the folks at Ubuntu are doing. Also, when the iphone was first released Apple had no developer kit (API's). You could download guideli…

"The server (enterprise) market is the ONLY area where linux competes head-to-head with MS (or anyone really)."

Linux as Android is killing MS in mobile.

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