Financial Times Ending Support for iOS App

[hchung]

Wow, you got it completely wrong.

Pushing HTML5 was not some sort of conspiracy to lock people into iOS.
In fact, it was first pushed before native apps were even available. Remember all the backlash about not having a native SDK?

And if you think there was going to be some backtracking involved now that Apple's dominant, you're wrong. I have friends who've submitted apps to the App Store in the last few months get back a letter telling them their new app has been rejected because their app is better off as a web app because they have no value-add as a native app.

It's really ironic, but this is what Apple gets for championing HTML5: For many applications, the App Store becomes completely irrelevant and Apple's business model will no longer work for them.

Okay, Steve Jobs praised HTML5 so high not because he actually liked the technology, but at the time it a) did not really exist "in the wild" and b) it sounded nice as an argument to kill Flash, that evil platform that allowed for easy development of multi-platform software. In other words, he tried to use HTML5 as a clever trap to lock people into iOS.

In the meantime, some companies that were unwilling to pay Apple a 30% tax did the unthinkable: Led by Amazon (who were the first to do this), they actually began using HTM5 to write platform independent software instead of using Adobe's ecosystem for the same purpose or using Apple's own tools to write native iOS apps.

I wonder when Apple begins ranting against HTML5, now that this technology works against their tight App Store business model. And not only that, every new HTML5 app also makes their competition stronger; all other platforms also have HTML5-compatible browsers and thus do not need a vast amount of native apps.

It's the browser that matters, not the operating system and the native software for it. That already was Bill Gates' nightmare back in the day when Netscape became huge and it caused Microsoft to go on a crusade against Netscape. Now Apple faces a similar situation with HTML5 web apps.

 

[Menel]

Their HTML5 webapp is brilliant on iPad. Quite possibly the best I've ever used. WOW.

Too bad I'm not big on their content, nor subscription.

 

[kevinpdoyle]

My problem is more with the pricing policy. They wanted me to subscribe to the hardcopy daily edition and then pay another $325 per year for the electronic version. So, $700/year? The FT is good but not that good. Their rival, The Economist, took the opposite approach. Full online and app access is free with a paid print subscription and the iPhone and iPad apps totally rock. Guess which one I read and which one I dropped.

Seeing as how they are owned by the same company I wouldn't exactly call them rivals.....

 

[charlituna]

I can't disagree with the logic of FT's decision,

I can, somewhat. I'm okay with the whole HTML5 bit but it sounds like they are actively killing the iOS app. to me that is wrong. stop updating it sure, let it die a nature death but to actually issue an update that kills it, that to me is wrong

 

[wtn]

FT has great content and analysis, world news, comments and analysis sections as well as quality columnists in-house and their ability to draw in interesting players like George Soros (their A-List blog) are all reasons I subscribe to their electronic edition.

I've tried the web-based app but I'm frustrated with it as it doesn't seem to update as effectively and fully across sections. The user interface is neat, smooth and easy to read but the contents of the web version of the FT site are often not reflected in the web app. That's poor service.

With a website as clean as the FT's, why don't they just make the site fully iOS friendly and skip the app, replacing it with a simple home screen link button on iOS devices? Get the people behind to web app to show the FT's editorial board what a home button and iOS friendly site looks like.

Let the chips fall on their (excellent) content and not on some silly malfunctioning app or choice between Newsstand or freestanding web-based app. That'd be my advice to the FT's decisionmakers.

I agree with you 100%.

You can tell from their mobile offerings that they really don't care about everything being presented correctly to the reader, otherwise they would make a content platform that actually works for all its clients.

Lots of times content from the website is missing inline in articles, with no explanation.

Their HTML5 app is ok. Slightly better than the iOS app, which had basically no text formatting.

 

[goosnarrggh]

I can, somewhat. I'm okay with the whole HTML5 bit but it sounds like they are actively killing the iOS app. to me that is wrong. stop updating it sure, let it die a nature death but to actually issue an update that kills it, that to me is wrong

As time goes on, they may begin developing new data models to represent their content, and new ways to offer data-enriching features. If these new representations were not anticipated when the native iOS app was developed, then content relying on these new features would stop working on the iOS app. At this point, they would inevitably need to start actively remastering their online content twice - once to make it Web App compatible, and once to make it native-iOS-App compatible.

This would be the point where it would make perfect sense to shut down the iOS App. And it's entirely possible that they're already nearing that point. If this is the case, then I entirely applaud their decision to move to an exclusively HTML5-based solution.

 

[pcunite]

Apple hardware is so nice, why the extreme arrogance to developers and end-users who want freedom? That is what the PC was all about anyway ... you can do anything with it on your own time and if you want to share anything with others you can. Apple makes things unnecessarily difficult. Apple always screws up their lead ... let's see if they do again.