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App Rot

marco.org

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Re: App Rot

#41

Post by walterbell »

tomjen3 wrote: post #35
walterbell wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why aren't developers choosing to build PC apps instead? Stardock said that their worst-performing PC game earned more revenue than most iOS or Android apps for which they could obtain revenue numbers. On PCs, it is still possible for developers to sell from their own website, without paying a 30% fee to a platform app store. PCs may be a numerically smaller (hundreds of millions vs. billions of devices) market, but…

I know some indie game developers. Plenty don't develop for any particular platform. You write your code in Unity3D, and then build for all the platforms it can (Android, IOS, etc) then you build your app for Steam where you make it run on all platforms (ie Windows, Mac and Linux) which is easy because it is almost just a button in Unity. Then you hope that enough people buy your game to earn the development cost bac…

Does the Steam ecosystem provide any support for marketing and discovery of new games, or are users relying on word of mouth networking?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(software) mentioned Steam Greenlight for estimating demand for new games, but it is apparently being phased out.

Is it limiting when a platform (Apple, Valve, Amazon, etc) owns the customer relationship? Seems like it would be difficult to apply conventional marketing techniques to learn about customers, if the platform provider owns the user's contact info.

Re: App Rot

#42

Post by andybak »

It's interesting that the trends Marco says are inevitable:

1. Use platform conventions over custom widgets

2. Favour responsive layouts over layouts tailored for each screen

have long been the norm on Android. And since Holo - (1) has been far from a handicap. Apps that stuck to Holo (and now 'Material design') conventions were usually the most attractive.

With regard to (2) - the way this has forced Apple's hand in hardware choices has been fascinating. Having to double resolution via retina rather than grow incrementally and the long delayed and slightly painful transition to a new aspect ratio for the iPhone 5.

Re: App Rot

#43

Post by coldtea »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #29
coldtea wrote: post #19

TL;DR; 1) In a store with close to 1 million apps, a lot of them aren't actively developed anymore or updated to the latest iOS. (DUH!) 2) Hard work and effort are not automagically rewarded with large sales. (DUH!) 3) Not all hundrends of thousands or millions of app programmers competing with each other can live by their app income alone. In fact, few can. (DUH!)

> 3) Not all hundrends of thousands or millions of app programmers competing with each other can live by their app income alone. In fact, few can. (DUH!) This doesn't deserve your "DUH!". It reflects the fact that making these apps is easy. If it were so difficult or time-consuming that hobbyists starved trying to get an app done, everyone in the app store would be living on their app income.

>This doesn't deserve your "DUH!". It reflects the fact that making these apps is easy. If it were so difficult or time-consuming that hobbyists starved trying to get an app done, everyone in the app store would be living on their app income.

It just reflects the fact that there are too many of them.

How hard something is is not a predictor of there being any market for it. Deep scholarly knowledge in dead languages literatures is hard too, but hardly a career. Same with Brainfuck the other guy mentioned.

Or, to give an even more specific example: there are apps in the app store that are very difficult to make, and took extreme expertise, and still they make far less money that some fart apps or dize-a-dozen platformer games (some doesn't even break even).

Re: App Rot

#44

Post by mnem »

walterbell wrote: post #41
tomjen3 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know some indie game developers. Plenty don't develop for any particular platform. You write your code in Unity3D, and then build for all the platforms it can (Android, IOS, etc) then you build your app for Steam where you make it run on all platforms (ie Windows, Mac and Linux) which is easy because it is almost just a button in Unity. Then you hope that enough people buy your game to earn the development cost bac…

Does the Steam ecosystem provide any support for marketing and discovery of new games, or are users relying on word of mouth networking? http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(software) mentioned Steam Greenlight for estimating demand for new games, but it is apparently being phased out. Is it limiting when a platform (Apple, Valve, Amazon, etc) owns the customer relationship? Seems like it would be difficult to apply…

An interesting recent article about publishing on Steam: http://gamasutra.com/blogs/BurakTezateser/20140717/220624/Dy...

Generally, you still have to do your own marketing. There's no great meritocratic system out there for discovering games (and pretty unlikely one can arise IMO - it's impossible to objectively class a game as good or bad).

Re: App Rot

#45

Post by notduncansmith »

janlukacs wrote: post #33

I simply hate the appstore - it's so full of useless bad quality apps - don't even get me started on games. i have only oppened it a couple of times in the past two years. They killed discovery for me, i'm not even interested in checking out new apps (still no trials?!).

A friend of mine runs a great magazine dedicated to uncovering the best games in the App Store. You might find it valuable: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/app-gamer-magazine-ultimate/...

Re: App Rot

#46

Post by minikomi »

phloxicon wrote: post #39
bruceboughton wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would your list look like with apps you owned removed? 8. FartApp 10. Flashlight or 8. FartApp 9. Flashlight In the first, with 9. Angry Birds removed, it looks like the data hasn't loaded properly. In the second, Flashlight has been promoted from number 10 to number 9, falsely inflating its ranking. You could solve this by leaving a gap or indicator where 9. Angry Birds should have been but then the user's wond…

It could just show the ten best selling apps that don't include the one you already have installed. So instead of 1, 3, 4, it would push 3 up to 2 and 4 up to 3. I'd also like if the store didn't keep showing things it's shown me a dozen times before. If I haven't downloaded them after seeing them advertised this many times, I'm never going to download them.

I've often thought I'd like a "hide until next version" or "hide indefinitely" for the app store. There's just so much I'm not interested in - especially in the Japanese app store which is dominated by casual games / social games .. http://www.rainbowapps.com/

Re: App Rot

#47

Post by tomjen3 »

walterbell wrote: post #41
tomjen3 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know some indie game developers. Plenty don't develop for any particular platform. You write your code in Unity3D, and then build for all the platforms it can (Android, IOS, etc) then you build your app for Steam where you make it run on all platforms (ie Windows, Mac and Linux) which is easy because it is almost just a button in Unity. Then you hope that enough people buy your game to earn the development cost bac…

Does the Steam ecosystem provide any support for marketing and discovery of new games, or are users relying on word of mouth networking? http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(software) mentioned Steam Greenlight for estimating demand for new games, but it is apparently being phased out. Is it limiting when a platform (Apple, Valve, Amazon, etc) owns the customer relationship? Seems like it would be difficult to apply…

Steam gives you some free advertising, but not much. You may also be featured, if you are lucky.

Re: App Rot

#48

Post by pi-err »

The article is not about the growing share of obsolete apps in the App Store (as I thought). It's about the coming of age of the iOS app market - ie: more contenders, more competition, lower exposure. And the lack of perceived value of ipad development (says the author).

I understand this as: people are leaving our craftsman market in city center to stop by the big retailers in suburbia and are happy with it. And the craftsmen can't make their shops attractive enough vs big retailers.

I find Marco is pessimistic here (ad hom: as often).

1/ even matured and commoditized, the App Store is the largest money transfer to software vendors _ever_ , with a favorable cut going to indies/small makers. Even if less affluent, the small city center is still getting tons of attention.

2/ still on the craftsman metaphor: city centers are actually thriving again _along_ big suburbia retail thanks to a very intimate, qualitative experience. There's an exploding market fed by a better information flow. So yes, x% buyers are currently buying from an App Store "top list" - what about all other sources of traffic towards an app? Pretty sure you've lost if you bet on a top list from the start (just like buying a sign off an highway for an artisan). There are other leverages as well.

And 3/ from a consumer perspective, software is so different than devs imagine. In my mind, real people see 3 very different types of app: - give me fun (news, games, many social apps) - improve me and help me (smart home, smart features, assistants, productivity, work etc) - talk to people (many social apps)

The "fun" and "talk" apps are totally commoditized. Freemium at best. Yes, that's were the attention is, so what?

The "improve" market is just starting. It's harder to crack because people want a perfect experience with it- it's intimate. That's why I see it as a perfect opportunity for indie app makers.

Actually that's why I hope to launch an app studio next year to make it easier for EU devs to build and integrate their apps.

Side note, hopefully Apple also removes soon enough the thousands of apps left unattended for >3y. I don't thing Apple needs to hold that much to the total app figures by now, can remove 50% of the old crust.

Re: App Rot

#49

Post by WorldWideWayne »

tomjen3 wrote: post #36
martinald wrote: post #2

Really interesting. Anecdotally, I'm seeing people starting to abandon their iPads and go back to laptops (generally macbooks/ultrabooks) in meetings and the like. I think the keyboard is just too useful for most people. Smartphone usage is definitely not following a similar trend, though.

That is going to change with the new IOS 8 keyboards. Believe me as an Android user it makes a world of difference in regards to how fast you can type.

I wonder how useful the keyboard is with iOS software?

Windows can be fully operated with just a keyboard and ~90% of OS X is operable via keyboard, but I don't see that being the case with iOS or Android.

Re: App Rot

#50

Post by WorldWideWayne »

nl wrote: post #17

This is interesting and it begs the question: is now (finally) the time where HTML5 app development makes sense - at least for some applications? The technology is pretty good, and the single code base for iPhone, iPad, Android and Web makes it as tempting as it ever has. More importantly, now it lets you diversify your sources of revenue. That wasn't important when it was easy to make money in the AppStore, but - ma…

I think HTML5 apps barely even make sense for enterprise desktop apps because HTML is still held back by poor standards compared to native environments.

For instance - I have never seen a set of rich HTML components that does keyboard acceleration well. With desktop tech, I get full control over the keyboard and it's important because people who do tons of data entry (call centers, etc) need to be able navigate things like tree views, tab views and grids with a keyboard.

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