Porn and pirates hide Android's money maker

Slag off Apple all you like...

...but guaranteed there was a meeting where the app store operating model was discussed, and this exact scenario was highlighted in the CON's column when discussing whether to remove the garden walls.

Left-field Jobo app rejections aside, Apple app store still gives Devs more cash in their pocket, and consumers confidence in the relative safety of their purchased apps. For now. I'm sure Google will pull something out their hat(arse?) to get the best of both worlds soon though.

I predict the following from the Apple store review:

- apps too expensive for consumers

- Apple's cut too large for devs

- Apple still too restrictive on app types (eg there's no flash players)

- Apple takes too long to review apps, and randomly rejects apps

- crowded marketplace

- still too many fart apps

You know what they say about consultants?

Consultants don't know how to run a business. They know how to get other people to pay them to tell them how to run their business.

They're like marketing companies. Marketing companies sell their ability to do marketing. It's what they do. That in return they have to produce ads that may be seen by customers is an advantage they have over consultants, but it's the only one.

hmm

I wonder how much impact a better search / rating interface would have, for example there's many app's on the android market that I've thought about buying but then with a little digging if found a 100% app that does the same thing (the gmail unread notification widget for example).

I have bought some app's of course one that I really liked, the snes megadrive psx emulators for example. But trawling through the market is a pain id love the ability to hide apps I dont want to know about, or even category's of apps (for example when browsing games id love to hide all those useless soundboards and apps that just to a slide so of pictures).

Build it and they will come...

I think a lot of developers on the Android Market (and other markets) expect to just be able to write a piece of software and put it on the market then sit back as everyone uses their software and the money rolls in.

However, life doesn't work that way. If your app is fantastic, magical and revolutionary(!) then that might happen. All the app review sites and the major Android sites will pick up on it, people will talk about it, it will make the "10 must have Android Apps for your new phone" lists and you will sit pretty.

For all those other apps that are good, useful but not 'amazing' you need to market it (not spam it!). You can't expect Google to do it for you. There are many ways you can promote it for free or very cheaply. You also have to realise that just because you hate "calorie counters" and can't see why they are getting more coverage than your "battery monitor" app doesn't mean everyone thinks your app is better.

The best apps are shown with prominence in the market. These are the ones with the highest ratings and most downloads. Appbrain (which most people are or should be using) shows apps that are the hottest of the day or week - ones that have a buzz about them.

Every product in the world needs to be either brilliant (and therefore benefit from editorials or word of mouth) or be well marketed to sell. Apps are no different, on iTunes or the Android Marketplace.

App Stores

Are app stores ever going to be good enough to find new applications? I tend to find sites like AppBrain far more useful in finding and filtering apps.

The Android market is good enough once you've actually downloaded something as it delivers updates in a fairly painless fashion.

A new Users view of Market Place

Searching is great - but to search I already know what I want (e.g. London Underground Planner). But to just browse for something, as you might want to with games or on train, there is not enough structure/categories or any filtering (ability to limit to things like English language, exclude things that are USA only etc.) - look under reference and anything from dictionaries to religious quotes comes up

Finally some effort to lot spam bots on reviews would be nice

I predicted ONE BILLION DOLLARS!

Could this not just be bad forecasting (it is a recession after all) or piss poor products?

I'll admit, the market place could use some sprucing up, tags would help for a start, otherwise you have to scroll through umpteen billion pages. (But, it does dynamically load them into one page, so its contiguous)

After using Windows Marketplace.. well, Android is a fucking fairyland. The same 5 apps are still in the WinMo top ten, and it's all shit.

Only 49% "earning less than they'd expected"?

Seems like a pretty good number to me. I'd expect most apps (as with most new products in general) are written by people who wildly overestimate how breathlessly the world is waiting for their product. If half are making as much or more than they'd expected, that likely shows the public will buy just about anything.

Build a good app and people will buy it.

I've already bought a couple for my Nexus One, and they have proven incredibly useful, fun, and a joy to use. One is a time-tracker for professional time billing has paid for itself many times over. Another, a WiFi analyser has also come in handy numerous times. Oh, did Imention I've only owned the phone for a few days?

So yes, good apps will be purchased and those authors will make money.

To digress from the app development side of things for a moment there seems to be quite a few mud-slinging articles (on which there are no comments allowed) contains the following paragraph;

"My confidence in Apple rests on its comparative advantage in the user experience (UX) - it's still streets ahead of the rivals in ease of use. If you don't believe me, try a test with someone who has a new, rival touchscreen phone; invite them to change the wallpaper or the ringtone."

OK, I'll take that test. Out with my new Nexus One, touch the top button to turn it on, slide the unlock, touch and hold a blank spot on the existing wallpaper, up comes a menu, select "Wallpapers", select "Live Wallpapers", and then select the one I like. Boy, was that ever difficult... NOT.

OK, perhaps changing the rtingtone is difficult. Select Applications, select Settings, select Sound, select Ringtone, then select the sound you want to use. Nope, that too was a simple process too.

tad unfair

im no Android lover, ive used it on my HD2 for a while now and its ok, not better then WM, not worse, i think the android market is pretty good, its not quite as easy to navigate as microsofts but there is now choice and here lies the issue. There is a mass of crap apps on there and they are dirt cheap, publishers / software houses should concentrate on making good software, word of mouth is by far the best kind of advertising, so their argument of not making as much money is down to them, yes google could get involved and do what Apple does but then we'd all be complaining about censorship or favortism.

People, get over it, stop making so much crap then people wont be blinded by so much fud.

Who cares

What Apple apps cost, the world's in recession, I'm glad to see that these people have realised it now, they should be glad they're being paid anything at all.

Some key words here

Expectations.

OK so it was only one key word.

Just because someone is not making as much as they expected to, that doesn't necessarily mean that teh problem is with the Android (or Ovi) market - it may well be that the developers were overoptimistic in their expectations of returns. Would be good to see some proper research in that area, as this ('how realistic are my forecasts/expectations) could be of much more use to developers than the 'how happy are you' survey that seems to have been done.

How can Google be so bad?

1) The desktop version of the app store doesn't have search!

http://www.android.com/market/#app=net.sunflat.android.sfcave

you used to be able to page through all the apps, but I guess they removed that as it was embarrasing. Perhaps Bing can do an search feature for them?

2) Weak store availability

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Market#Availability_for_users

3) They expect the developer to get involved in the transactions as a merchant

-seriously, why do you send me an email that some user's credit card has failed

-why do 10-15% of purchases fail?

4) No way to make an app link which both links to the app in the store on a device AND does something useful if you click on it from a desktop browser

(I built a workaround system for this: http://and-download.hobbyistsoftware.com/ )

on the plus side, they do let you publish apps without having to wait a week for approval (or rejection)

it's a frustrating experience

the search is annoying because you have no way of ordering by starts, number of downloads etc to at least filter some of the crap out... scrolling through 2 pages of 1-2 star rated apps to find the 5 star one you're looking for is insanely bad.

then you have the annoyance of no real way to try-before-you-buy for some of the paid apps... so far my experience has been that the ad supported efforts tend to be better simply because uninstalling them means the dev stops getting paid!

I'd also love an option to filter by "official" apps... eg find the real Google apps, or the real Netflix one or the real Skype (oh no, they've sold their soul to a carrier so that's dead)

Android phone customers are paying less than iPhone customers purchasing from Apple's App Store"

ah. But it's free software. Free as in open , copy it and cheap or -gratis- no ? Only the sun comes up for free.

Biggest problem is it is only accessible from android phones

I've recently been trying to get some apps installed on our work Android phones, the problem I have is they are with Orange for data, and the data network in our part of the City has gone to the dogs lately. Worst thing is you can't even search the android marketplace without using your phone to do it.

I mean, I have the usb tether cable. I have a broadband connection. Why can't I just purchase and download an app then install it manually if I choose?

We don't have wifi in the office for security reasons, so as it turned out our only option ended up being sending the PFY down to the local coffee shop for a half hour to use the wifi there with a sheet of instructions on what to get.

Where's the Mac/Win/Linux AppStore

I find it interesting to observe that for smartphones (eg. iPhones and Android) we expect there to be an app store, whereas for desktops and games we're happy to do the research and buy from any store.

I guess we really will see which is best now...

...the Cathedral or the Bazaar