You can see by the amount of people who clicked on the article's "positive" link, that apple employs many propagandists to try and sway our wallets their way.
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Apple's $0.99 FaceTime Charge Due to Accounting Requirements
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Quit your crying, sheesh! It's 99 cents. You would drop that in a second if this was a third party App on your phone. There are people in these forums falling all over each other to drop two grand on a new laptop but not a 99 cent App. Grow up.
They aren't charging for software updates. The previous version was a Beta (meaning software that was released so users could test it), this is the Gold release so they are charging for it.
I'm sure it will go free shortly anyway if enough people complain.
You're assuming you know how Microsoft was accounting for the revenue from XP when it was initially sold. If they anticipated adding fuctionality in the future, they may have deferred some of the orignal revenue to cover it, therefore not having to charge anything.
So basically Apple had a choice between restating earnings and charging $.99 and it chose to charge $.99. And then they decided to deflect the anger by issuing an artfully worded statement making it look like the government somehow forced them to charge it. Does that about sum it up?
Somebody in a post way back mentioned that iTunes and Safari are a part of OS X/ the Mac, which have already been paid for and is why they can be free.
However, this does not apply to the Windows versions. How can they be free with these rules? Can one of the accountant experts on here clear this up for me? (And my apologies if it already has been addressed.)
I ask because not only does it seem inconsistent to me, but also because I think Apple will eventually want to release a Windows FaceTime client in order to popularize the protocol.
However, this does not apply to the Windows versions. How can they be free with these rules? Can one of the accountant experts on here clear this up for me? (And my apologies if it already has been addressed.)
I ask because not only does it seem inconsistent to me, but also because I think Apple will eventually want to release a Windows FaceTime client in order to popularize the protocol.
No, that's the excuse, not the reason. Why doesn't GAAP enforce Apple charge to the Remote app on the iOS App store?
Apple, and any other company, is allowed to give away free software.
Correct.
I wouldn't characterize it that way. I doubt they were trying to deflect anything. They were probably just asked a question and answered it truthfully. From reading the two threads about Facetime, people are more upset about the accounting explanation than the actual $0.99 charge.
Yet, no one can explain why it is valid on this thread. I know of no GAAP accounting rule that says a company can not give away free software.
It's likely performance reasons. The video has to be compressed before sending over the network. Older Macs may not have the graphics/CPU power to due it in real time.
I've also been told that I can't increase my corporate email quota without signoff from the CEO because of SOX-- so to a certain extent I think it's become the general purpose bogey man.
I'm not an accountant, so I can't really judge for myself. I've looked at the law, and I find it very lacking in specifics of any sort which I think is part of the problem. I've talked to accountants and business people who agree with Apple on this, and do attribute it to SOX-- not that the SOX law specifically requires it, but that it establishes an enforcement regime within which this sort of accounting is deemed most safe. Unfortunately I can't remember the exact business practice this was meant to make transparent.
As Arn pointed out earlier: Apple makes most of their money providing a great software experience, not selling little upgrades like this. But from my understanding, that's part of the problem-- this piece is seen as part of that seamless software experience and thus an accountant would apportion a part of the OS X revenue to the availability of FaceTime.
I would think an answer whose sole purpose was to be truthful would have said, "We forgot to delay earning related to developing this piece of software so we either had to charge for it or restate earnings and we decided to charge for it." Apple's actual statement sure left a lot of people with the impression that the government somehow made them do it. Which it didn't. That's why I would call it an artfully misleading statement.
What makes you think they forgot something? And how do you know what Apple's actual statement was? No quotes that I can find. For all we know, Moren asked "Is this accounting related?" and Apple said "Yes."
I was really going back to the statement related to the original iPod Touch issue. This is kinda a rehash of that. But implying the reason was "regulatory" is the same type of deflection. It's only regulatory in that the government makes you provide accurate statements of your earnings.
EDIT: I mean the 802.11n issue. Hard to remember where this nonsense all started.
You are correct - SOX has become the be-all end-all of ridiculous IT controls. Ignore the fact that most corporate frauds that led to SOX occurred at the CEO/CFO level - what SOX has generated is a significant number of non-value added processes at a detail level.
Don't get me started...
You are correct - you can give anything away for free if you account for it correctly.
Why would you expect it to be free though?
Are you telling me that everyone who has bought this app for .99 today and who has posted in this thread has never used Facetime on a Mac before they bought it today (because, after all, before today EVERY version of Facetime on a Mac was Beta)?
i haven't seen your answer
and, yes, i'm aware i didn't answer the question. but i'm also willing to admit that i don't know the answer
You haven't seen my answer because I am one of the people ASKING the question.
I have the Beta now- still works fine - and I'm wondering, as many in my situation are, is there any point in buying the .99 version?
Someone who had had Facetime Beta HAD to have downloaded today's version out of the hundreds of posts here. Why hasn't any article I've read point out any differences between the two, seeing as most people already have the Beta? I would think that would be the first question on people's minds, but obviously not and everyone is stuck on the whole "is a dollar worth it for Facetime" bs.
It's a good question - unfortunately none of us can really answer it because we don't know how Apple accounts for each discrete piece of software. As I indicated above - it's ok to give away something for free. The problem is then what you do with the expenses. If you aren't earning revenue, then you generally can't expense the development costs (which is actually good).
iTunes is a completely different story now that I think about it. iTunes generates significant amounts of revenue through music sales. Even if they did charge for an initial version, they could probably upgrade it all they wanted to without charge because the expense of developing the new version can be matched against the revenue from music sales.
Safari - they've chosen not to charge for it. That's fine. They are choosing to charge for FaceTime (just like they charge for Aperture - where's the outrage there?).
720p is about all I have read.
Oh wait my iphone does not do that level of detail so who exactly do I use this with?Let's ignore the whole accounting discussion - because the more I think about this the more I realize that the accounting really isn't what is coming into play here (regardless of what the original post claims).
I'm sorry - but I don't understand your question. How many software companies release free versions of their software while in alpha/beta and then charge for the 1.0 release? Lots of them do. That doesn't mean that no one used the beta version - it just means that, for a period of time, the users of that software essentially "paid" for the software through beta testing (yes - arguable point - I know).
The way I see this - is that people who are objecting to paying for FaceTime are basically saying that whenever Apple develops new software that they (the posters) think should be free then it should be.
Now - if we go back to the whole ipod touch / airport base station discussions from the past then my statement doesn't hold true as those people have already paid for a product that, for whatever reason (good or bad) they feel they have a right to future upgrades. No judgement there - just a different situation.
Are you trying to make the
fanboys think, don't be so cruel this could cause their heads to bleed out. Accounting rule
, I could be wrong but never had a class in accounting that had this in it , dam must have fallen a sleep