Apple Prevents Omni Group From Offering Discounted Mac App Store Upgrades

[Serelus]

Or maybe, they are just trying to make a point, that the MAS is not the iOS App Store, no matter how much Apple might want it to be. Incidents like these is just teaching users, "you want to be able to upgrade? Buy direct." That is not good for Apple. I avoid the App Store for everything except the few occasions where iCloud features are used, or there is no choice (Tweetbot.) Otherwise, I stay away, which is too bad because it's extremely convenient.

I really don't understand what you're getting at, I explained in an earlier post why this way of doing business can easily screw over consumers. It's not wise to implement. This "playing the victim act" is an attempt to change something that's been working flawlessly for years. All just because Omni wants more money. They have their userbase, which apple has granted them, and now that they don't need apple anymore, they wanna take home the bacon and get all the users to come directly to them. Sadly this isn't how business works. Again it leaves alot of room open for customers to get screwed.

 

[iCole]

Cool, so as I bought Mountain Lion from the Mac App Store, Mavericks will be free for me?

Mavericks is a new version. A new "app". You are getting updates, fixes, ... for Mountain Lion for free, no? And for all the existing apple software you bought on the AppStore.

 

[JayLenochiniMac]

Allowing them to do that makes them more likely to charge for an upgrade rather than offering them for free. Although they had no problem screwing us over using the current system as Quickoffice did (they made quickfiles pro into quicksheets and forced everyone to purchase Quickoffice pro separately).

 

[Rocketpilot]

This is why I like the App Store. I don't want to buy the software again just because the developers want to charge for an upgrade.

Then we're moving to a world where mid-tier software developers slide down to low-tier. The main thing you'll notice is that well-written manuals (Omnigroup's are top-notch) and active, helpful support channels will go the way of the dodo.

 

[Serelus]

Mavericks is a new version. A new "app". You are getting updates, fixes, ... for Mountain Lion for free, no? And for all the existing apple software you bought on the AppStore.

Actually his analogy is right, seeing as they are offering an upgraded "new version" of the App. It's why they call it an upgrade and not an update.

He hasn't considered the consiquences of such a system though.

 

[HenryDJP]

They (the developers) don't mind selling upgrades via App Store. The problem is that Apple does not support the notion of paid upgrades.

No you don't have this completely right. What some developers are trying to do is get their product recognized on the MAS, then navigate their "customers" to a place outside of the MAS to get the upgrades. That's the same shenanigans that some developers were doing a few weeks back. Offer a free app on the MAS then provide a link within the app that navigates the user outside of the MAS. Then they sell the user an upgrade to that app and Apple gets nothing.
If developers are going to do that crap then they should also market their own product rather than using a popular platform to do it and then dodging ways to pay Apple their share.

 

[Karma*Police]

The whole upgrade pricing scheme seems passee in this day and age. Devs should follow Apple's lead and reduce the upfront cost and provide enough bells and whistles with their upgrades to justify the same price as the original.

 

[furi0usbee]

No you don't have this completely right. What some developers are trying to do is get their product recognized on the MAS, then navigate their "customers" to a place outside of the MAS to get the upgrades.

That's a separate issue. Apple needs to provide a way for any company to offer upgrade pricing to anyone who has purchased the app previously. The ONLY reason I can see for the no upgrade policy is Apple wants 30% of a larger full app price, vs a smaller 30% of an upgrade. That is ONLY reason. There is no technical reason otherwise. Apple kindly shows me all my apps I've purchased. They can do this with one IF statement... it's not that hard. If I purchased app X and there is an upgrade, then give me the upgrade pricing. Very simple.

However, it seems Apple wants the bigger 30% of the full price.

If anyone else can offer me a better explanation of why they don't allow upgrade pricing, I'll listen.

Same with a trial period. They do it with movie rentals... 24 hours from the time you start watching. You mean to tell me the geniuses in Cupertino can't let us try our software for 24 hours, and let us have a refund if we don't like? Again, it ONLY comes down to money, and not the satisfied customer.

Upgrade pricing and trial accounts should have been there from day one.

Bryan

 

[HenryDJP]

Aye, and this worries me, as Windows is something that's going to **** as well...

I sure hope that Apple are reaching their maximum of control freakishness....[/i]

Why do people continually say this but still use Apple's products? Ridiculous. If I've been supporting a company and their business model rides my nerves I will cheerfully vote with my wallet. Honestly it's annoying that people keep talking about Apple being control freaks yet you guys keep coming here and keep being Apple's customer.
I gave up on Microsoft years ago and no longer support them. Ya'll should do the same thing rather than complain so much.

 

[phinsup]

This is one app i buy directly from the developer and the reason was this, you also can't upgrade a current version to "pro" if you buy the app store version, you have to buy a whole new license to upgrade via the app store.

 

[furi0usbee]

The whole upgrade pricing scheme seems passee in this day and age. Devs should follow Apple's lead and reduce the upfront cost and provide enough bells and whistles with their upgrades to justify the same price as the original.

Ok, but what if a company wants to reward loyalty with a *lower* price for current customers? Your argument goes for a company charging more (same price). Under Apple's terms, a company cannot reward their current customers with a lower price. They have to lower it completely, for everyone, and that is not fair to the devs, nor the loyal customers.

Bryan

 

[TennisandMusic]

The whole upgrade pricing scheme seems passee in this day and age. Devs should follow Apple's lead and reduce the upfront cost and provide enough bells and whistles with their upgrades to justify the same price as the original.

It doesn't really matter if you think it's "passe", there is a long storied business history behind doing this, and reasons why it works. That's why developers want it in a big big way.

 

[bbeagle]

That's a separate issue. Apple needs to provide a way for any company to offer upgrade pricing to anyone who has purchased the app previously. The ONLY reason I can see for the no upgrade policy is Apple wants 30% of a larger full app price, vs a smaller 30% of an upgrade. That is ONLY reason. There is no technical reason otherwise. Apple kindly shows me all my apps I've purchased. They can do this with one IF statement... it's not that hard. If I purchased app X and there is an upgrade, then give me the upgrade pricing. Very simple.

However, it seems Apple wants the bigger 30% of the full price.

If anyone else can offer me a better explanation of why they don't allow upgrade pricing, I'll listen.

Same with a trial period. They do it with movie rentals... 24 hours from the time you start watching. You mean to tell me the geniuses in Cupertino can't let us try our software for 24 hours, and let us have a refund if we don't like? Again, it ONLY comes down to money, and not the satisfied customer.

Upgrade pricing and trial accounts should have been there from day one.

Bryan

This is different. The original OMNI purchases are OUTSIDE the app store, and the upgrade is inside the app store.

I agree that Apple should allow upgrade pricing.

 

[HenryDJP]

That's a separate issue. Apple needs to provide a way for any company to offer upgrade pricing to anyone who has purchased the app previously. The ONLY reason I can see for the no upgrade policy is Apple wants 30% of a larger full app price, vs a smaller 30% of an upgrade. That is ONLY reason. There is no technical reason otherwise. Apple kindly shows me all my apps I've purchased. They can do this with one IF statement... it's not that hard. If I purchased app X and there is an upgrade, then give me the upgrade pricing. Very simple.

However, it seems Apple wants the bigger 30% of the full price.

If anyone else can offer me a better explanation of why they don't allow upgrade pricing, I'll listen.

Same with a trial period. They do it with movie rentals... 24 hours from the time you start watching. You mean to tell me the geniuses in Cupertino can't let us try our software for 24 hours, and let us have a refund if we don't like? Again, it ONLY comes down to money, and not the satisfied customer.

Upgrade pricing and trial accounts should have been there from day one.

Bryan

Bryan, Apple does seem to be on the customer's side according to the article. The MAS rules do state that the upgrade has to either be offered for free to existing customers or a full version at regular price. Understandable that currently the upgrade system doesn't offer enough options to satisfy everyone but personally I'm all for a free upgrade and that's fair on many levels.
Right now I want to buy Pixelmator. I've used version 1 for a long time and now version 2 which came out on the MAS has been there for a long time with small updates. I'm afraid of buying version 2 because I'm thinking version 3 will come soon. I can't get any kind of answer from Pixelmator as to when and if there will be a version 3. Now if a free upgrade from version 2 to 3 would be offered that would be fair. I shouldn't have to buy a piece of software today and tomorrow I have to pay for an upgrade if one gets released. What would be make more sense for many at least is to give all customers a one-time free upgrade when buying from the MAS. After that then they pay full pricing.

 

[nagromme]

Fast forward six years, and Apple locking down OSX the way they have iOS and making the Mac App Store the ONLY place to obtain software for the Mac looks more like an inevitability than a fevered delusion of Apple detractors.

Apple has clearly done the reverse: GateKeeper. They put in the effort to make a very good system that lets users install ANYTHING from anywhere, AND supplies maximum security. A clear signal that the App Store is NOT meant to be the only way, merely the best.

 

[schmidm77]

Apple is too lazy to be bothered with app store evaluation versions and upgrade pricing. Their answer for lack of functionality is to just offer software at cut-rate prices or give it away.

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Bryan, Apple does seem to be on the customer's side according to the article. The MAS rules do state that the upgrade has to either be offered for free to existing customers or a full version at regular price. Understandable that currently the upgrade system doesn't offer enough options to satisfy everyone but personally I'm all for a free upgrade and that's fair on many levels.
Right now I want to buy Pixelmator. I've used version 1 for a long time and now version 2 which came out on the MAS has been there for a long time with small updates. I'm afraid of buying version 2 because I'm thinking version 3 will come soon. I can't get any kind of answer from Pixelmator as to when and if there will be a version 3. Now if a free upgrade from version 2 to 3 would be offered that would be fair. I shouldn't have to buy a piece of software today and tomorrow I have to pay for an upgrade if one gets released. What would be make more sense for many at least is to give all customers a one-time free upgrade when buying from the MAS. After that then they pay full pricing.

You realize that past sales do not fund future development?

 

[Glassed Silver]

Let me give you a clear example of how this can go very wrong very quick, you see developers can be very generous with their work, some give you everything for free, others will rob you of every dime they can get.

Let's take the money hungry developer for a second, if apple were to allow "Paid upgrades" What's stopping a greedy developer form disabling the old version of an App rendering it useless until you pay for the upgrade?

For example, you open the app and it says: "This is an old version of the App, please upgrade to the new version to continue using the app". In this case the consumer completely get's screwed over. Which is exactly what Apple wants to prevent. I've already seen several apps handle this business model, Plants vs Zombie 2 versions other than the latest do not work, you have to update them. EA would literally rob you blind in upgrades.

What's stopping them now?

It doesn't need a message, they can simply refuse to update "XYZ" when they have "XYZ 2" published to the Store.
After some time, APIs and other hurdles will do the work and the old version might stop working (you know Apple doesn't give one flying **** about backwards compatibility... If an app dies on a new OS that's perfectly cool with them)

Just slap a policy change on this issue and it's solved.
No messages and artificial lockouts would be possible that aren't possible already.

Why do people continually say this but still use Apple's products? Ridiculous. If I've been supporting a company and their business model rides my nerves I will cheerfully vote with my wallet. Honestly it's annoying that people keep talking about Apple being control freaks yet you guys keep coming here and keep being Apple's customer.
I gave up on Microsoft years ago and no longer support them. Ya'll should do the same thing rather than complain so much.

Oh we're so smart aren't we?
a) I talked about what COULD happen. THEN I'll have a big problem.
b) There is no viable alternative atm. Main OS stays OS X, in fact, right now overall I'm very satisfied with it. Windows is gone to *****, Linux is no main OS for me and anything else is too obscure to even mention, let's be real here.
c) I always vote with my wallet, you implying I buy stuff I don't want merely derived from my fears of what could happen in a nightmare is quite fantastical. Right now Apple's products are good. They slack in certain areas, for example it's absolutely ridiculous to not give me a decent filesystem with OS X, but Windows doesn't either and GNU/Linux or BSD based distributions are no main OS material as I mentioned before. Tough luck voting here.
d) Uhm, what? I certainly know very well what to do with my money, thank you very much. I use Windows AND OS X by the way, because I also happen to be a gamer and OS X just isn't cutting it in that department. Backwards compatibility being one of the issues here. I don't trust OS X enough to start gaming on it other than OS X exclusives. Why? Because Apple will drop support for code compiled today at the blink of an eye in 5-10 years if it helps them keep their codebase a tad bit cleaner.

Get real man, it's impossible to buy products you're PERFECTLY content with.
At least products as complex as computers, operating systems, smartphones etc...

Glassed Silver:mac

 

[Analog Kid]

All things considered i'm gonna take advice from a billion dollar company versus a million dollar one almost every time.

Why? History is littered with big companies making bad decisions.

Microsoft was worth $250B when it released a baby-sht brown Zune. Money does not make a company smarter...

More importantly the business model for a billion dollar company is different than it is for a million dollar company-- so forcing the smaller company into the bigger companies business model is going to do harm to the "ecosystem". Other than Apple, Microsoft and Adobe, there aren't many billion dollar software makers for Mac. Two of those three don't see the App Store as a significant vector to market.

Who is the MAS for if it's not for the little guys?

 

[mdriftmeyer]

That's the user's choice, not everyone needs to be babied. All this says to me is apple is becoming a control freak and is only going to make their platforms more and more closed.

It says to me my old friends at OMNI either have new management or wanted to do something they damn well know is not viable and has never been viable since the AppStore was first created.

The AppStore was created due to the overwhelming mismanagement of software within organizations doing large scale deployment updates.

This is an absolute waste of time on OMNI's part.

 

[musika]

This isn't really news. Omni, no matter how big, doesn't get special treatment. We knew this.

(I know that they're probably trying to raise press eyebrows to make a big enough kerfuffle so that Apple changes their policy/system.)

 

[FrozenDarkness]

This issue is two fold:

- should a company be allowed to offer pricing outside the app store while still listing in the app store therefore bypassing apples 30% cut

- should apple allow for upgrade procing in the app store. Like releasing two apps where one has a requirement

I think both makes sense

 

[Plutonius]

I see no reason they can't offer upgrades through the App Store. It sounds to me like they just want more traffic to their website.

They wanted paid upgrades.

 

[dumastudetto]

I probably won't buy Omnifocus 2 after this little stunt from the Omni Group. It is totally acceptable for them to setup a mechanism to bypass App Store rules and try to deny Apple revenue at the same time.

I know many Apple fans tonight are very angry about this and are considering a boycott of Omni Group products. I'm one of them.

The Omni Group should be thankful Apple didn't kick them out of the App Store entirely because a strong message needed to be sent about this kind of misbehaviour.

 

[joelypolly]

Problem isn't really with Omni since they release quality software but with countless other developers who will now release "upgrades" 4 times a year that cost money.

 

[dru`]

That's the user's choice, not everyone needs to be babied. All this says to me is apple is becoming a control freak and is only going to make their platforms more and more closed.

Then why don't they just go buy directly from Omni?