Yeah.. screw Apple. Trying to give customers a good customer experience. What a joke, right?
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Antitrust Committee Chairman Calls App Store Fees 'Highway Robbery'
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Yeah, Apple says otherwise because, unfortunately, most of us are sheep, unable to question why we shouldn't be able to install whichever apps we want on our own hardware. This is analogous to what's happening with the complete erosion of civil liberties in the world, which people are actually cheering. I intend to do my part by switching to Android.
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Not the poster, but I am a developer, and yes, downloading an app from a browser is 100% as technically feasible as downloading an app from an app store. Apple had to go out of their way to set up all the restrictions to prevent you from doing that.
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I guess nobody sells any software outside of the Mac app store on Macs, or the Windows store on PCs, or outside of Google Play on Android.
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Not the original poster, but here, let me make it easy for you.
If you bought an app for $10, the dev actually only makes $7, right?
If the developer was allowed to sell the app outside the app store, and charged only the $7 they actually get on a direct sale, then how many % of $7 is that $3 extra you're paying on the app store?
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Yes it's easy and cheap. If anyone is technically capable of writing a decent app, they'll do that easily.
Besides, in many cases, you'll need a web service anyway for whatever service your app provides. Adding a download link will take you a couple of minutes. Don't bring up costs because AWS is dirt cheap. About $0.02/GB stored, and at most $0.15/GB transferred (half of that if you transfer a lot of data each month). Unless you have a game with huge assets, storage and bandwidth costs are negligible.
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So you bought some apple device, decided after the fact that most of us are sheep because we want Apple to make their systems work the way we want? The very best way to do this is to vote with your dollars, which I'm glad to see you put your money where your mouth is. As far as your analogy, if you believe owning a high performance sports car entitles you to flout the speed laws, you might have a surprise.
HTML5 apps are absolute crap. They have low performance, even lower if you're not on a fast network. They drain your mobile data transfer quota, are unable to be used offline, and are unable to access many capabilities of the phone. Hell, on iOS, as pointed out, they can't even notify you of something: how would Hey work without that feature? I could probably make up a dozen other reasons why web apps are bad, but really, even Steve Jobs knew this argument was so much crap, they had to release the app store in a hurry after the first iPhone launch (sure it already was on their plans, but people were quite happy to make it clear at the time the iPhone would be no more than a toy without apps).
What it means is the pejorative way the poster believes apple products are overpriced. My advice to poster, is to not buy products whereby they believe they are overpriced. I get my monies worth out of my apple products.
Would you use an email app that can't notify you when a new email arrived?
I just wish what Steve said about free apps was still true. I hate the freemium model
Actually you can already "sideload" apps on Android. You don't even need to pay 10% to Google Play -- you can pay 0%. That's all I'm asking Apple to do. Like they already do on the Mac -- and like somebody in the thread already said, that's why the Mac app store is ghost town. When given the choice between letting Apple take 30% of their revenue or not, most developers choose the latter. Apple knows this, which is why they force you to go through the app store on iOS. They're not giving up this huge cash cow. You know how Apple says developers made hundreds of billions of dollars on the app store? Yeah, they're taking 30% of that.
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BTW, to everyone claiming the 30% app store cut is a great deal for developers: nobody wants to take away your precious app store. We want the choice to either use the app store (and naturally pay more for it) or download apps directly from the developer's website. You know, like we already do on the Mac and virtually all computing platforms (save for game consoles). And by the way, game consoles are meant for entertainment -- if an app is expensive there, there are other choices of entertainment. On iOS, I'm paying 43% extra on everything (again, 30% Apple cut = 43% more more expensive), even on apps I need to make money.
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The flip side of this, is it's not really great for consumers and apple. You bought into the ecosystem and now you want to change the rules? You want developers to have access to the hundreds of millions of ios customers and bypass the safety and security of the app store? If I were apple, I would disallow that also.
Your 43% is a disingenuous number. What is 43% of a free app? Who says the developer is charging more? 30% is a steal for marketing and management services.
I never truly really understood what the problem was until reading through many of the posts. So as I understand it, if an app developer wants to charge a subscription fee for users to use whatever the developer has made, Apple automatically takes 30% of that subscription fee, correct? and if that subscription fee is monthly, is the 30% again taken off? or is the 30% just a one off payment? and if the app developer does not add the subscription option to the app, Apple says they cannot be on the platform???
That is no different to what Supermarkets have done for years, which is to say to food producers, reduce your prices or we will not stock your products. it's very anti-competitive and they've been penalised for doing so.
So why shouldn't Apple be penalised?
That is no different to what Supermarkets have done for years, which is to say to food producers, reduce your prices or we will not stock your products. it's very anti-competitive and they've been penalised for doing so.
So why shouldn't Apple be penalised?
The flip side of this is, it's not really great for EU citizens (and elsewhere). You sell your stuff on EU market and now you want to break the law? You want Apple to have access to the hundreds of millions of EU citizens' wallets and bypass the safety and security of free market? If I were EU lawmaker, I would disallow that also.
By the way, the marketing part is a joke. It is well known that app discovery on iOS is non-existent. Ask Apple what % of developers earns 90% of all the profits.
Iphone is already going portless according to rumors. Probably has to do with the EU ruling. The next thing is iphones will be sold in the EU will be without an app store, and no way to load apps. The EU is shooting themselves in the foot.
Right, because that is what is going to happen.. You stick to that! I'm sure Apple will just give up over 500 million potential users, because that is what would happen.. No, they'll let you sideload apps in EU. Same as Microsoft was made to obey the laws in late 90s and early 00s.
Last I heard I can bypass the safety and security of the app store on my Mac. Please explain how iOS is any different.
My 43% is a mathematically exact number (well actually 3/7 is). If you think 30% is a steal, you can have it. Those that don't think so -- do they have any alternative?
And I'm sure apple will give up the advantages of it's ecosystem and the revenue as well, without a fight.
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I don't have to explain. Apple has to explain. And if you believe Apple is ripping you off, or not providing the right value/function ratio for you have alternatives.
You really think Apple would spend money releasing a product no one would ever buy?
You're joking, right?
If you're not prepared to explain (and no one is, because there is no such explanation) maybe you shouldn't have used it as an argument.
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Care to provide a link?
It already works that way on a Mac. And yeah, they will fight - pouring money over politicians. As much as I like their products, I hope they lose.
No, I am referring to the fact that when the app/service developer wants to sell you some software for iOS for, say, $70, you will have to pay 70+30 = 100 bucks. That's a 43% tax.
I misinterpreted the portless part.
My comment is to the allegation that Apple would sell an iPhone that doesn't allow loading apps in any way, shape or form. That will never, ever, ever happen. Apple is not stupid, it costs money to set up a distribution channel, and exactly 0 users would buy an iPhone that doesn't allow loading apps. Setting up a distribution channel for a product that would get 0 sales is pouring money down the drain. Even if they wanted to do it out of spite, the inevitable shareholder lawsuits, and the highest-level heads that would roll due to that (read: Tim Cook at a minimum), would prevent them from doing that.
Why don't you add in the sales tax also? And the shipping fees? And the ISP costs? Plus the $99 yearly renewal fee? The above accounting fails even Accounting 101.
I was talking about the tax imposed by Apple which is a topic of this conversation. You are trying to deflect by switching to a subject of general accounting. There are forums for that but MR is not one of those.
First, I remember the days when in order to be a Developer, you had to purchase license from Microsoft for Visual Studio for hundreds of dollars. You had to design, develop, package, and market your software on your own which was expensive then you had to hope that your software would sell in order to recoup your money and hopefully make a profit.
Then the App Store came along. I got the tools from Apple to develop software for free, I did have to pay $99 per year if I wanted my apps on the app store but if I just wanted to develop an application for fun, that was free. I still have to design and develop my own software . I could place that software on the app store once approved (that is a tedious I am not gonna lie) and sell my app. For hosting my application, Apple takes 30 percent and only in the first year, 15 percent every year after. If I offer up my application for free, it costs me nothing. If my app doesn't do well the only thing I lose is my time.
I was excited, for the first time I could write the software I wanted to without either getting a job at a company who writes similar software or making a massive investment to do so. I still don't understand the issue with App store fees. As far as being a monopoly, a monopoly is defined as a company that controls the entire marketshare of a product or service. In order for that to be true, the iPhone/ iPad would have to be defined as completely unique from anything else available on the market. Both would have to be significantly different from anything made with Android or Windows and that is just not the case.
Then the App Store came along. I got the tools from Apple to develop software for free, I did have to pay $99 per year if I wanted my apps on the app store but if I just wanted to develop an application for fun, that was free. I still have to design and develop my own software . I could place that software on the app store once approved (that is a tedious I am not gonna lie) and sell my app. For hosting my application, Apple takes 30 percent and only in the first year, 15 percent every year after. If I offer up my application for free, it costs me nothing. If my app doesn't do well the only thing I lose is my time.
I was excited, for the first time I could write the software I wanted to without either getting a job at a company who writes similar software or making a massive investment to do so. I still don't understand the issue with App store fees. As far as being a monopoly, a monopoly is defined as a company that controls the entire marketshare of a product or service. In order for that to be true, the iPhone/ iPad would have to be defined as completely unique from anything else available on the market. Both would have to be significantly different from anything made with Android or Windows and that is just not the case.