FFS you need to chill out, it's just the internet. This forum has really gone to the dogs now it's full of PC switchers
Matt
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App Store Almost Reaches 10,000 Apps
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FFS you need to chill out, it's just the internet. This forum has really gone to the dogs now it's full of PC switchers
Matt
Trying to beat Apple at their own game has become the new alchemy (iPod, iTunes, iPhone, App Store... you'd think they would have learned by now)This is gonna be funny!
My View point.
Its funny, for me as physician, how the health care and fitness category has so much crap! and it comes in waves:
in the beginning there was nothing... and the app store was a quiet and calm place... then the calorie counters appeared!
Tons of applications with virtually the same database promising to cut your belly fat by counting how many thousand calories your Supper Sized burger has, all neatly translated to points....
For us chubby crowd, there were the weight calculators, BMI calculators, Hip to waist ratio calculators, probably pant size calculators, you name it... .For us heavy eaters!, Hundreds of them! in all flavors (no pun intended)
Then the Fitness applications boom came: First with the Heart rate monitors: "Hold your iPhone on one hand, and your other hand check your pulse, at the same time tap the screen every time you feel a beat (probably using your toes) and count to 60 and presto! your heart rate will be calculated!"
Then the Sports applications were a natural evolution from this precarious predecessor; being an amateur swimmer I was interested in... guess what? iSwim (Obviously!), but getting into the water with my phone did not seem to be a good Idea.
But there was a sudden change in the evolution.... Female only applications... The first one that I remember, was probably LadyBiz, with a hot chick cartoon as icon... wait a second... "this application will let you record your mood, menstruation, and dates of intercourse" (probably a tab on quality of intercourse would be a reasonable expected update)... and maybe if the SDK would permit it, this application could integrate with the contacts application so you can automatically add a special contact group for your "mates"
I have to give it to them, very creative... but then a exponential growth on this applications came about... Which is Ok, I guess; but the names... Silly names, iMensies (guess it could be iMenses, maybe?), Petals (?), iSpot, i-have-nothing-to-put-on-my-intercourse-tab etc...
For those reckless women that did not care to buy one of the menstrual calendar apps, there was the next level: Pregnancy applications!
iFeelNauseated, I'm Pregnant! iKicks etc....
We have come a great way! there is a current trend now that have the iPump (iPump Office stretch) applications head to head with the "relaxing Applications": "This application will help you Sleep with this soothing recordings of the beach during hurricane Katrina" and that stuff.... There are some that are pretty sophisticated: Brainhack anyone? sounds dangerous!, Custom Hypnosis:
Dozens of binaural sound applications with allegedly therapeutic applications, most of which lack completely of scientific foundation etc...
Now Seriously...Well anyway... for me, in the Health care department, there are probably 3 maybe 4 that are worth: epocrates eponyms and Mediequations and those are still in my phone.
Its funny, for me as physician, how the health care and fitness category has so much crap! and it comes in waves:
in the beginning there was nothing... and the app store was a quiet and calm place... then the calorie counters appeared!
Tons of applications with virtually the same database promising to cut your belly fat by counting how many thousand calories your Supper Sized burger has, all neatly translated to points....
For us chubby crowd, there were the weight calculators, BMI calculators, Hip to waist ratio calculators, probably pant size calculators, you name it... .For us heavy eaters!, Hundreds of them! in all flavors (no pun intended)
Then the Fitness applications boom came: First with the Heart rate monitors: "Hold your iPhone on one hand, and your other hand check your pulse, at the same time tap the screen every time you feel a beat (probably using your toes) and count to 60 and presto! your heart rate will be calculated!"
Then the Sports applications were a natural evolution from this precarious predecessor; being an amateur swimmer I was interested in... guess what? iSwim (Obviously!), but getting into the water with my phone did not seem to be a good Idea.
But there was a sudden change in the evolution.... Female only applications... The first one that I remember, was probably LadyBiz, with a hot chick cartoon as icon... wait a second... "this application will let you record your mood, menstruation, and dates of intercourse" (probably a tab on quality of intercourse would be a reasonable expected update)... and maybe if the SDK would permit it, this application could integrate with the contacts application so you can automatically add a special contact group for your "mates"
I have to give it to them, very creative... but then a exponential growth on this applications came about... Which is Ok, I guess; but the names... Silly names, iMensies (guess it could be iMenses, maybe?), Petals (?), iSpot, i-have-nothing-to-put-on-my-intercourse-tab etc...
For those reckless women that did not care to buy one of the menstrual calendar apps, there was the next level: Pregnancy applications!
iFeelNauseated, I'm Pregnant! iKicks etc....
We have come a great way! there is a current trend now that have the iPump (iPump Office stretch) applications head to head with the "relaxing Applications": "This application will help you Sleep with this soothing recordings of the beach during hurricane Katrina" and that stuff.... There are some that are pretty sophisticated: Brainhack anyone? sounds dangerous!, Custom Hypnosis:
wow Im sold!
Dozens of binaural sound applications with allegedly therapeutic applications, most of which lack completely of scientific foundation etc...
Now Seriously...Well anyway... for me, in the Health care department, there are probably 3 maybe 4 that are worth: epocrates eponyms and Mediequations and those are still in my phone.
Don't forget Lexi and Skyscape - not cheap, but serious apps for the health care professional and pretty much bring the iPhone up to par with what was available for PDA's.
Yes there were 100 slightly different wheels offering some slightly different approach. There were and are probably millions of different wheels.
Why should applications be treated differently than songs or books? What is the difference between a do-it-yourself book (which is supposed to have some utility) and an application. Or between a low-brow novel and a game?
How many applications exist for the Mac that are crap?
The only difference between applications for the Mac and the iPhone is that Apple shuts out a handful of categories. For me the AppStore is just part of the internet, whether I buy an app an the internet (or via VersionTracker) or on the AppStore makes no difference to me.
Apple prevents you from running certain apps on the iPhone. It does this by not allowing iTunes to sync them. Otherwise you could put apps for jailbroken phones into iTunes and it would sync them. It is not the AppStore, it is the syncing that really stops certain apps (plus that their developers would have to break a contract they signed when downloading the SDK from Apple).
I don't buy apps because they are available in the AppStore, I buy them because they were recommended by somebody (going into the AppStore and searching is more cumbersome than search the Web with Google). The AppStore is irrelevant, except that it standardizes the updating, signing, and payment of apps. But applications like AppFresh and the Dashboard widget Application update plus Paypal do exactly the same of Mac applications.
Belgian and holland store also, seems to be in all EU country's. Probably a service timeout as it is middle of the night in europe.
Yeah, I wonder why there hasn't been one yet... I'd even pay for one!
Maybe there's something in the SDK against it? I don't think so, but I sure hope not!
Even if a couple dozen apps are flashlights, if every type of app had nearly that many duplicates, there would still be 500 completely different types of apps available.
.
Discontinued Apps
Arn...I checked here http://appshopper.com/ and found nothing in regards to discontinued apps. Do you have a list or does someone else have a list of all of the apps that were in the store and discontinued???
A list of permanent and temporary removed apps would be nice to review my purchases against. It would let users know that some of these have been pulled by the devs because they just didn't sell or the excitement wore off and they couldn't keep up with it. This would help me and others remove dead apps from iTunes, other then those that still work but were pulled by Apple, like the tethering app.
A link or list would be greatly appreciated!
Arn...I checked here http://appshopper.com/ and found nothing in regards to discontinued apps. Do you have a list or does someone else have a list of all of the apps that were in the store and discontinued???
A list of permanent and temporary removed apps would be nice to review my purchases against. It would let users know that some of these have been pulled by the devs because they just didn't sell or the excitement wore off and they couldn't keep up with it. This would help me and others remove dead apps from iTunes, other then those that still work but were pulled by Apple, like the tethering app.
A link or list would be greatly appreciated!
There is an app that lets you do all of that and more. It's called "I am Rich". Definitely worth buying.
I think this is an excellent idea and I don't know why Apple hasn't done this yet. Is Apple allowed to sell their own apps in their own store? If so, why don't they develop and sell iWork for the iPhone. I think the iPhone would be able to handle this well.
As for the number of apps, yeah, it's misleading; 30 flashlight apps, 500 notes apps (when one already comes with the phone), 60 find-crap-around-you apps, 70 binaural beats apps, 70 count-down-till Christmas apps, 50 dictionary apps, 30 translators, 800 social networking apps that all do the same thing, 40 fake caller apps (yeah, we really need those), 20 clock apps (I really don't know what these do, when the time is right on the home screen), a whole "weather" category (when an app already comes natively), 45 calculators, 20 "drink safely" apps (is it ever totally "safe" to drink? - "weDrink" how did this ever make it onto the app store??), 20 unit converters, and the rest, games.
This calls for an update: here come all the Obama inauguration countdown apps!
So, I want to know, how much are you willing to pay for those good quality apps?
What? Free? 99 cents?
No wonder most of those apps are crap.
Sarcasm, that's the reality of the App Store at this moment and well discussed in iPhone development forums. Customers don't want to spend money on apps, so it doesn't make sense for a developer to develop spend 3 months on something really cool. Common practice is 1-to-3-day app, 1 week max.
So, think what kind of stuff a developer (even a good one) can do in 3 days.
Until we see more of the top 100 paid apps are $5 or even $10 (right now, most are 99 cents), we won't see serious apps there. There are still some very cool simple and good apps, but most of the time, the developers would sell a single feature (for example, those "Call BF", "Call GF", "Call Mom"...) instead of a complete solution.
Whoever hold the money decide the market. When you don't want to pay, don't blame the lack of good products.
What? Free? 99 cents?
No wonder most of those apps are crap.
Sarcasm, that's the reality of the App Store at this moment and well discussed in iPhone development forums. Customers don't want to spend money on apps, so it doesn't make sense for a developer to develop spend 3 months on something really cool. Common practice is 1-to-3-day app, 1 week max.
So, think what kind of stuff a developer (even a good one) can do in 3 days.
Until we see more of the top 100 paid apps are $5 or even $10 (right now, most are 99 cents), we won't see serious apps there. There are still some very cool simple and good apps, but most of the time, the developers would sell a single feature (for example, those "Call BF", "Call GF", "Call Mom"...) instead of a complete solution.
Whoever hold the money decide the market. When you don't want to pay, don't blame the lack of good products.
the sad part is more than half those "Social networking" apps are the same and / or useless!
THANKS FOR PROVING MY POINT!
IT'S REALLY YOUR OPINION...you said it yourself.
there are many remakes of the same song but different people will download different versions.
buy what you want to buy and take whatever is free. It's your choice so why do you care if there are many options. Freedom...welcome to America!
Hahaha. I understand. Lol.
No worries.
THANKS FOR PROVING MY POINT!
IT'S REALLY YOUR OPINION...you said it yourself.
there are many remakes of the same song but different people will download different versions.
buy what you want to buy and take whatever is free. It's your choice so why do you care if there are many options. Freedom...welcome to America!
I also said there are a lot of doubles.
And it's FACT that some apps are useless.
And FACT that there are many apps that do the same thig as others
It is opinion that certain songs and movies suck.
The reason the top apps are 99 cents or free is because there are really few expensive fantastic, knock-your-socks-off, apps available. Has a developer ever tried to put out an app like this, only to see it fail? I think the developers are actually afraid to give their time and effort to a killer app like this, not because they fear people won't buy it, but because Apple will reject it.
The reason there is so much fluff in the app store is because this is all Apple will allow. Put an MMS app out right now and I would pay up to $50 for it. Where are all the uber-expensive GPS turn-by-turn apps? In no-man's land or purgatory, I guess.
I really wonder if the app store has hit a creative ceiling. I haven't seen anything truly innovative in months (except for Google Mobile App - which isn't even innovative!). Is this what we are going to come to expect over the next few months, different combinations of the same-old, same-old?:
http://appshopper.com/weather/worldnow
Right, no matter what the economies of scale, I don't think we'll ever see greatness for free-99 cents.
I've only been developing with the SDK for a few months, but I'm a senior software guy. I can say that it takes time to write a good iPhone app. Longer than a desktop app in many cases. Take an app that collects a few dozen data attributes, some that repeat, some that don't, some that are optional, etc. This could be one form in a desktop app. On the iPhone it is a large number of view controllers that need to be organized in a very meaningful way. You don't just crap something like that out in one day. And that is a relatively simple, data entry example.
Just because the screen is small doesn't make it easier to develop apps. If anything, it makes it harder. Plus, coding for situations like network connections that drop in and out and so forth are unique to mobile devices.
It is ultimately true- you get what you pay for.
That seems to be the logical next step, not only the store itself is tempting but also the centrally controlled DRM that is Mac/PC/iPhone/iPod compatible. Imagine Apple taking a 30% cut on the desktop apps, i definitely need to find some extra money to buy Apple stock.
Don't need to exclude the DVD titles, the DVD's itself can be free or low cost with the actual sale going via the app-store.
good grief.
PC/Macs already have an app store, its called shareware, or just downloading an app and paying for it via paypay or credit card. PC/MAC don't have a middle man owning the platform so anyone can *already* release anything for it.
All apple are doing is letting people into their closed platform. The fact they are rejecting apps shows they still want to have control while maintaining an illusion of openness.
And I'm sick of all this 'apple create, others will copy'. Most PDA/smartphone companies have ways of downloading thousands of shareware apps. And most of them are crap just like on iphone.