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Steve Jobs Email Suggests In-App Subscriptions Don't Apply to 'Software As a Service'

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Somian said:
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The Rules are clear. If u can subscribe to something in the app, it must be possible to use apples system. It's not only about apple making money with that. It's about being much easier to use one account for everything instead of having to register for every little app, enter captchas, set up your payment, answer a confirmation mail etc. This is stone age and has to end and thus, I highly welcome the new rules and of developers don't like the new, better system because they prefer a more complicated and annoying way for their users, they are free ro go to the android market only.

On iOS, I want transparency and ease of use.
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Developers prefer more revenue, not a more complicated way.
 
dcranston said:
Look, I'm not trying to do a scientific study here. It just seems that it behooves us to prove authenticity before blindly assuming every claimed email is valid. There have been plenty of faked SJ emails in the past, and this article provides no particular offer of what makes us sure this is real.

There's plenty of SJ emails (faked and not) here : http://www.emailsfromstevejobs.com but of course there's no way to identify Steve's habits with certainty. I'm just wary of these emails because of how many have been faked. It seems like one always seems to surface at every minor internet controversy flare-up, and not always because of Steve... is it uncalled for to question this?
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No, not uncalled for. I just tend to lean on the side of believing, especially because in this instance, the dev used his real name and reputation on the line to get some clarification. If it was found that he faked the exchange it would look really bad on him. Granted, that's not a really strong argument for authenticity, just a slight push in the direction of "not being faked" to the tune of 51-49.

Sorry if I came off like I was personally criticizing you.
 
`What a load of bull crap. So on one hand Stev Jobs 'apparently' states it does NOT affect SAAS apps, yet a SAAS app was REJECTED from the App store based on the in app subscription ruling!!

Apple seriously needs to sit down in a board meeting and decide EXACTLY what the rules are and ensure EVERYONE knows them. Because this is just getting worst and worst for Apple and it not putting the company in a good light.
 
History likes to repeat itself :/ Apple once had a decent market share, they have it again. And they will loose it, and it's only their fault...
 
sadly, this is greed. I love apple but I hate them for this.

And makes me not want to support their ipad/iphones.
 
subscribtion

I think that since content providers give a discount on their price if you subscribe then Apple could do the same and lower their percentage from 30 to something more acceptable.
 
A lot of developers seem to be forgetting these rules:

"This is a living document, and new apps presenting new questions may result in new rules at any time. Perhaps your app will trigger this."

"If it sounds like we're control freaks, well, maybe it's because we're so committed to our users and making sure they have a quality experience with our products."

That said, Apple is free to set the rules inside the confines of its own store.

To me, the biggest issue, and where they really overreach is the trying to dictate that publishers cannot undercut the app store's pricing in channels outside Apple's. Not even Walmart tells their vendors how to set their prices for the same goods at Target.
 
1st rule of AppStore - thou shalt not compete with any Apple app or service
(that includes current apps/services and proposed ones ).
 
goobot said:
lol sounds like some app devs are just trying to get away from apples 30% unrightfully so apple stopped it. I doubt those really small companies that complain that they can't steal that 30% back will really effect apple at all. Those companies need apple, not the other way around.
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no one needs Apple. There are other platforms. It's a shame developers don't think they can live without $teve Job$ Just like people starting moving away from the Microsoft environment, the same can happen for Apple. Developers just need to be willing to do it, regardless of the love of their iStuff.

These stories are no different than the grip of death. A lot of fluff and fake posts. Apple will come out with a condescending email within a week telling developers what they REALLY meant in their new terms, pretending not to understand why people are upset. It it comes from Steve, more of that tone will be prevalent.
 
Apple has certainly paved the way with the new digital media and established a format which could work. They are at least a year ahead of the competition. They should take a quick think about the future as new platforms emerge and who they want to do business with.

If the top media companies and publishers decide to boycott Apple altogether how would that effect Ipad and Apple hardware sales in the future?
 
I think Gruber nailed it. You're paying for content from Readability. The only people who think that they aren't a publisher are those who don't like how their app got rejected. That includes Marco, who made the Readability app out of Instapaper, and the developer of TinyGrab is only saying that because he can get some press for an application that few use.
 
Warbrain said:
I think Gruber nailed it. You're paying for content from Readability. The only people who think that they aren't a publisher are those who don't like how their app got rejected.
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I disagree. The "content" you get from Readability are webpages that are available for free on the web. What Readability offers is a service that strips ads and reformats the content so they are easier to read. If Readability is a "publisher" then so is every web browser.
 
What about Bloomberg? USD 20,000 a year in subscription for access to among other things, news, research, financial data. Plenty of publishing in it. They have a Bloomberg Anywhere app (not the regular app). Of course it will never offer in-app subscription, and Apple would probably not be stupid enough to kick them out, but according to the rules they could say bye-bye bankers.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bloomberg-anywhere/id407761767?mt=8
 
Night Spring said:
I disagree. The "content" you get from Readability are webpages that are available for free on the web. What Readability offers is a service that strips ads and reformats the content so they are easier to read. If Readability is a "publisher" then so is every web browser.
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Bad analogy. They are scraping the content and republishing it for people who pay for their service.

Your web browser is a means of access, not re-rendering what someone already published because you paid for a service (outside of ISP).
 
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Night Spring said:
I disagree. The "content" you get from Readability are webpages that are available for free on the web. What Readability offers is a service that strips ads and reformats the content so they are easier to read. If Readability is a "publisher" then so is every web browser.
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If it's "free" on the web, then why do they claim they pay 70% of their revenue to writers and publishers? This is where I get confused.

Someone else said it, Apple needs to clarify this policy very clearly. There are too many apps and private or industry publications I can think of that don't apply or should not apply to these rules.
 
Cybbe said:
What about Bloomberg? USD 20,000 a year in subscription for access to among other things, news, research, financial data. Plenty of publishing in it. They have a Bloomberg Anywhere app (not the regular app). Of course it will never offer in-app subscription, and Apple would probably not be stupid enough to kick them out, but according to the rules they could say bye-bye bankers.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bloomberg-anywhere/id407761767?mt=8
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Good point. According to the current rules, the Bloomberg Anywhere app will be kicked out on 30 June 2011 unless Bloomberg allow an in-app purchase/subscription (as well as their standard method of subscribing) which pays $6000 of each subscription fee to Apple.

Ever going to happen ? No. But it demonstrates what an ill-thought out policy this is.
 
Warbrain said:
Bad analogy. They are scraping the content and republishing it for people who pay for their service.

Your web browser is a means of access, not re-rendering what someone already published because you paid for a service (outside of ISP).
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They aren't "scraping" anything. When a user comes upon a webpage that they find hard to read because of bad formatting, too many ads, etc, they click a button, and the page is reformatted. Your web browser also renders webpages, and most modern browsers have some kind of "strip format" option. This is just a more sophisticated version of that type of functionality.


Popeye206 said:
If it's "free" on the web, then why do they claim they pay 70% of their revenue to writers and publishers? This is where I get confused.
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As far as I can tell, they are trying to offer an alternate model for publishers to get paid for online content. Instead of getting paid by including ads in their pages, the publisher gets paid according to how many users use Readability to read their webpages. I believe they are trying to avoid being seen as depriving ad-supported sites of revenue. However, I'm not quite sure I agree with this payment scheme. For instance, many of the sites where I use Readability are not ad-supported to begin with, and wouldn't have any mechanisms in place to accept payments from Readability. I'm also not planning to subscribe to Readability's paid service myself, since I find their free service sufficient, and as far as I can tell, their paid service only duplicates Instapaper. So it's not like I have a full understanding of Readability's business model, nor do I support it fully, but calling them a publisher seems to me a distortion of the meaning of the word "publishing." A publisher has control over the content they publish, while Readability has no say whatever over what sites its users choose to use it on.
 
shotts56 said:
Good point. According to the current rules, the Bloomberg Anywhere app will be kicked out on 30 June 2011 unless Bloomberg allow an in-app purchase/subscription (as well as their standard method of subscribing) which pays $6000 of each subscription fee to Apple.

Ever going to happen ? No. But it demonstrates what an ill-thought out policy this is.
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Could Bloomberg devide it into a service called iOS subscription and charge $10 a month for that and give 30% of that sum to Apple?
 
Evernote

Everyone needs to stop saying such mean things about my beloved Evernote. It has provided in-app purchases for subscriptions since at least last summer.
 
It seems to me like their could be a middle ground here too. This isn't addressing the 70/30 at all, but just what a service like TinyGrab can do when Apple can't even tell them that user A paid for the in-app upgrade. TinyGrab can't authenticate purchases made through Apple. Why not provide some sort of OAUTH interface Apple? Then they can either go to TinyGrab and create an account, login with their iTunes creds in your interface, or link their existing TinyGrab account to your :apple: ID and viola, problem solved.
 
Popeye206 said:
If it's "free" on the web, then why do they claim they pay 70% of their revenue to writers and publishers? This is where I get confused.

Someone else said it, Apple needs to clarify this policy very clearly. There are too many apps and private or industry publications I can think of that don't apply or should not apply to these rules.
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It's free and clear on the web (no login required to view content), however the content is ad supported. This strips the ad content and in return pays back to the web site parent companies from the subscriptions they collect.
 
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Full of Win said:
Gruber is a tool among a space replete with tools.
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I could not agree more. Nothing more than annoying Apple mouthpiece.

Let's face it, this is all a back pedal by Apple. They obviously didn't consider SaaS when creating the policy and now will be forced to clarify it. That is all.
 
Apple's 30%

How much did it use to cost publishers to print and distribute printed text magazines? And how is that business model working now? Jobs is ahead of the curve once again.....
 
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