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Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

blog.matthewbrunelle.com

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Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#81

Post by theshrike79 »

Zagorath wrote: post #73
hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An advertisement is not a contract, unfortunately. If we're going to talk legal, we need to talk in legalese.

They are (or were, at the time they had that slogan) an Australian company. I am an Australian citizen. Under Australian Consumer Law, an advertisement is absolutely legally binding. https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/advertising-and-promotions...

So if an Australian ad tells something is "the best" or something similar and you can prove it isn't, you can get your money back?

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#82

Post by theshrike79 »

renewiltord wrote: post #16
wmichelin wrote: post #3

To play devil's advocate here, clearly there are hosting costs and maintenance costs beyond a one time mobile app payment 14 years ago. Kinda sped read the article so apologies if I missed it, but why does the author here feel so entitled to something that clearly the company feels unreasonable to continuously maintain? They're clearly a struggling business, it feels like this author has a personal vendetta against t…

There's no reasonable devil's advocate. The answer is that one-time fee apps are not sustainable. There are ongoing costs with most businesses and one-time fees do not capture that. Therefore don't sell them. Sell everything on subscription or you will eventually fail to serve your customers and everyone will be unhappy. If you're a big business, it's risky to buy open-source applications, so don't do that unless the…

One time cost per major version is sustainable, you won't get Silicon Valley rich on it, but you can make a living.

Lifetime licenses only work in the beginning when you have people buying them at regular intervals, at some point the market is saturated and you need to have a subscription model.

Case in point: Unraid. I have two grandfathered "forever" licenses and I'll never need a third.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#83

Post by carlosjobim »

bathtub365 wrote: post #56
carlosjobim wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you never hear about free refills that they have in some restaurants. You're demanding more than a decade of free app updates for a small sum you paid ages ago. Why can't you instead be happy with all the value you got from the app? We aren't born to be small minded and stingy, look up to greater goals and a greater attitude in life. We only have so many years before it is cut from us.

The app updates aren’t free, I paid for them with my lifetime subscription. They could do what other apps have done and release a new SKU for a new business model or with a new feature set that justifies asking for more money. Reeder has done this, for example. I think JetBrains has one of the most fair and honest subscription schemes where you pay for a subscription but when you stop paying you’re free to keep using…

But you can still use the app you paid for during the rest of your life. Nobody is forcing you to do updates to your phone, certainly Pocket Cast aren't forcing you to update your phone.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#84

Post by jjulius »

carlosjobim wrote: post #80
jjulius wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You're demanding more than a decade of free app updates for a small sum you paid ages ago. I mean... that was the agreement between both parties. Really not that hard to grasp.

So how about those free refills at McDonalds? Clearly you have the right to return there every day for the rest of your life and fill up hundreds of cups each time. After all, it is in the agreement between both parties, so go for it!

That's an apples and oranges comparison.

While the timeline isn't explicitly stated, free refills are implied that it's for the duration of your visit. In fact you can see the implication given that's how it's used most of the time.

Telling someone they'll get "lifetime" access for a one-time payment is not the same.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#85

Post by jjulius »

carlosjobim wrote: post #83
bathtub365 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The app updates aren’t free, I paid for them with my lifetime subscription. They could do what other apps have done and release a new SKU for a new business model or with a new feature set that justifies asking for more money. Reeder has done this, for example. I think JetBrains has one of the most fair and honest subscription schemes where you pay for a subscription but when you stop paying you’re free to keep using…

But you can still use the app you paid for during the rest of your life. Nobody is forcing you to do updates to your phone, certainly Pocket Cast aren't forcing you to update your phone.

>But you can still use the app...

If we're doing "but"s...

But the original agreement was for updates for a lifetime. Of course people are going to be upset if they were promised one thing and ended up getting something else.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#86

Post by lycopodiopsida »

I am one of the later subscribers, but I was subscribing for 16 EUR/y, when they've bumped the subscription to eye-watering 45 EUR. So far they have respected the deal and I am still paying the initial amount.

I am sympathetic with author, but unfortunately it is also one, if not the best podcast app technically. It has this 0-bullshit UI which does what you expect without enforcing some maddening organization patterns (Castro) of fancy UI with hilarious amount of bugs (looking at you, Overcast).

It has the "mark as played" button, also in car play.

It is the only one I've found capable to pull the episode on Apple Watch over network, instead of relying on pre-caching from phone app.

I would be very sad if PocketCasts goes out of business.

P.S.: I checked and it seems that Overcast also has cellular streaming on AW - I need to test it again.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#87

Post by dcchambers »

__rito__ wrote: post #46

Since we are talking about podcasts, if you are looking for a podcast app for Android, use Antenna Pod [0]. I use it every day. It's smooth, seamless, and FOSS. Note that I am just a user, and not otherwise linked with them. [0]: https://antennapod.org

I've been super duper happy with AntennaPod since I discovered it a few years ago! It's perfectly useable right out of the gate but has nice customizations if you want/need it. And the Android Auto support is great (essential since I do most podcast listening in the car).

Caveat: I *only* listen to Podcasts on my phone so I don't have to think about syncing library/status between devices.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#88

Post by Zagorath »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #39
derektank wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is sort of incumbent upon you, as a business offering a lifetime membership, to properly invest some of that initial fee, such that the returns cover future operating costs. Many other companies work on this model. If the bank refused to return the money I loaned them, I would rightfully be very upset. I think it's similarly fair to be upset about a company revoking lifetime memberships. This particular si…

> it is sort of incumbent upon you, as a business offering a lifetime membership, to properly invest some of that initial fee, such that the returns cover future operating costs We may need a law that regulates "lifetime" purchases. One part is standardised disclosure. The other is putting fees into a trust.

I don't think a trust should be necessary. A plan for longterm sustainability should be.

The streaming video service Nebula, for example, has a lifetime membership. The company was very straightforward with potential customers: this is not their best deal, it's explicitly meant for people who want to help support the company (or who prefer not to have ongoing subscription costs), and they are doing it as an alternative to seeking outside investment money. The money they raise won't go into a trust, but into expanding the business in the same way a company might if it went to seek venture capital.

At the time I signed up for it, it cost roughly 10 years' worth of subscriptions.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#89

Post by Zagorath »

carlosjobim wrote: post #83
bathtub365 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The app updates aren’t free, I paid for them with my lifetime subscription. They could do what other apps have done and release a new SKU for a new business model or with a new feature set that justifies asking for more money. Reeder has done this, for example. I think JetBrains has one of the most fair and honest subscription schemes where you pay for a subscription but when you stop paying you’re free to keep using…

But you can still use the app you paid for during the rest of your life. Nobody is forcing you to do updates to your phone, certainly Pocket Cast aren't forcing you to update your phone.

They didn't warn us ahead of time that there would be ads. The patch notes didn't even mention the ads! Shifty Jelly used to have legendary patch notes, but it's been a long time since that was true. And since app stores don't actually let you downgrade to a previous version, your comment is simply untrue.

Re: Pocket Casts, you altered the deal, so I will alter your app

#90

Post by Zagorath »

theshrike79 wrote: post #81
Zagorath wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are (or were, at the time they had that slogan) an Australian company. I am an Australian citizen. Under Australian Consumer Law, an advertisement is absolutely legally binding. https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/advertising-and-promotions...

So if an Australian ad tells something is "the best" or something similar and you can prove it isn't, you can get your money back?

The link I shared makes it quite clear that "puffery" that nobody is reasonably expected to take literally does not count.

Being told that the app you paid for would be a one-time payment, and then having the service deliberately degraded to try and force you into a subscription model, is clearly not puffery.

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