
Life and death in the App Store - gpresot
http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/2/11140928/app-store-economy-apple-android-pixite-bankruptcy
======
aschearer
To compete in a global marketplace with no barrier to entry it's not enough to
simply ship software. Apps are commodities. You've got to create something
with unique value. Probably that means doing something technically difficult
or new.

~~~
increment_i
I was going to say exactly the same thing. Once the initial novelty of app
stores wore off, only the shitty economics behind them were left to bare:

\- The barrier to entry is so low as to be non-existent. We haven't seen a
mass distribution channel with entry barriers this low since the lemonade
stand.

\- Since the above point forces most participants in the market to now compete
mostly on price, the race to the bottom of the last decade or so has raised a
generation of consumers who now expect software to be free.

\- The subtle friction of finding and installing apps has led the average
person to basically not bother at all, as we now know most people install zero
apps per month. The lions share is now exclusively the domain of those with
ridiculous marketing budgets and iffy business practices.

I'm just not sure exactly where we are on the technology curve of App Stores.
Are we in the trough of sorrow, where a new horizon of viability and
sustainability coupled with lowered expectations is just around the corner? Or
will we look back at the App Stores as the AOL of the 2010's? I'd love to hear
opinions on the subject.

~~~
marincounty
I remember buying my iPad. I remember saying to myself, "I paid a lot of money
for this device, Apple will not get another penny--in any way." And they
didn't. They didn't even get my cc number. I figured I bought this pricey
hardware--that's it.

I know there's a lot of great apps, produced by hard working Programmers. I've
just spent so little time in iTunes, I don't even know what you guys are
offering.

In all honesty, I don't like iTunes. I liked it in the beginning. The more
complicated/flashy it got, the more I used it in emergencies.

I couldn't imagine having a lot of time/money invested in an iTunes app today.
I imagine the tides will turn though?

~~~
hellbanner
So you got an iPad just for email + music?

~~~
stcredzero
Also could be: Web browsing. Facetime. Looking at photos. Notes. Reminders.
Calendar/agenda. Being able to look at the local weather. Seeing what a few
stocks are doing. Add only a dozen or so well chosen apps, and you're probably
at the limit of what the majority of people really find utility in -- in
common. Everything else is going to be for specific niches, or the result of
marketing to people stuff they don't need.

------
arielm
I agree with other comments that competing in a global economy requires a
great app, but what it also requires is running the business that created that
app like a real company. That means more than just building a great app.

Developers that understand this are able to make a living on the app store
while those that wait for the store to magically make their app successful
don't.

As the VC markets cool down we'll those companies that didn't build a company
around their apps fail more.

I wrote about this here: [https://arielmichaeli.com/making-apps-for-love-and-
profit-3b...](https://arielmichaeli.com/making-apps-for-love-and-
profit-3b2a18743d7#.3abd0euo1)

I personally think what's happening now is the market maturing. In the long
term this will lead to more stability for those who know how to compete.

------
hellbanner
Can we talk about how we educate users on what a "webapp" is? In the last few
years I've shown potential clients, friends and strangers webapps and they've
asked "Oh neat.. but is there an app? Where can I download it?" or something
similar.

This is very frustrating because it encourages walled-garden..

~~~
stcredzero
Did you find out why? Were any of them burned by bad webapp interfaces? Were
any of them burned by their webapp getting an "unwelcome update?" Were any of
them burned by crappy behavior under limited connectivity? (That one has
happened to me _a lot_ with web apps on an iPhone.)

I suspect that the problems of small app developers are much the same as guys
on dating sites. All of the discoverability is implemented and controlled by
one entity who doesn't depend on your success specifically to make money. They
only need just enough success to keep the whole thing running.

I wish now that Jobs had gotten his way in the beginning, and all of the apps
would be web apps, and discoverability would be through web links and search
engines.

~~~
aikah
> I wish now that Jobs had gotten his way in the beginning, and all of the
> apps would be web apps

The IPhone ecosystem would be nowhere near what it is today if not for native
apps. It would have been a serious mistake. People want native apps because
the mobile web sucks for anything a bit more complex than displaying text or
simple forms. And web APIs on mobile in general still suck. Caching sucks, The
DOM is still slow and cannot deeply interact with phone features or hardware.

The mobile web has failed since native apps are still required. Every web tech
base mobile OS have failed. Firefox OS for mobile has failed.

~~~
neotek
I imagine that if all apps were web apps, then we'd have solved all of the
issues you mention. Necessity is the mother of invention, etc.

~~~
aikah
We wouldn't have solved anything due to limitations of the web stack. There is
no way to make it run fast on a $100 handset. The native stack on the other
hand can run pretty fast on low hand devices.

------
nsxwolf
Once it got to the point that searching for my apps by name returned the apps
of larger competitors, I knew it was time to bail on my silly hobby.

~~~
antiviral
And this is the root of the problem- lack of discoverability for apps.

Once you have several thousand apps (not to mention 1MM+), it becomes
exceedingly difficult to find apps that are relevant to you. Someone might
create a better app than the one you have on your phone, or one that you don't
even realize you need, but how will you know about it?

If you can only rely on the App Store rankings and search engine, you are
going to have to spend alot of time looking through irrelevant results- most
people don't have that kind of time.

The result is (as brought up in the article) that app developers need more
sophisticated 'growth-hacking' techniques outside of the ecosystem, which tend
to be hit or miss depending on some degree of luck.

There have been several app discovery platforms like AppGratis and Chomp, but
Apple has shut them all down. Apple may have wanted to preserve the Appstore
as the single authority on their apps, but now they have created a more
dangerous, and possibly existential crisis for themselves- irrelevance of the
app ecosystem.

Why should I create apps (or invest in app developers) if my chance of success
is less than 0.1%? As a consumer, I may still buy Apple devices, but it will
be less because of the great apps, which will become increasingly scarce.

------
aaronbrethorst

        But the App Store’s middle class is small
        and shrinking.
    

Apple may not realize it now, but this is an existential threat to iOS's near-
dominance of the mobile device market.

~~~
draw_down
Only if someone else manages to make a better app store and ecosystem. I would
love for that to happen but I don't see it any time soon. As many problems as
Apple's app stores have, they're the best ones. Which is depressing in its own
right.

~~~
cageface
This hurts Apple more than it hurts Android because the greater quality and
diversity of iOS apps has long been a selling point for their devices. Apple
needs this differentiating factor more than ever now that Android and Apple
phones are now so close in terms of hardware quality and OS polish.

Apple has done a lot to make lives better for iOS developers in the last few
years. Why they can't invest some of that energy into making the app store a
less hostile place for smaller players is a mystery.

~~~
curt15
>Apple needs this differentiating factor more than ever now that Android and
Apple phones are now so close in terms of hardware quality and OS polish.

Apple still wields a massive security trump card, especially when pitching to
enterprises, because with the possible exception of the Nexus, no Android
device comes with any commitment by the OEM to providing timely security
patches.

~~~
cageface
I'm not convinced that the average user cares much about this, at least not
yet. But it's true that at least for the moment Apple has a distinct advantage
here.

------
bko
Is there any reason there can't be a browser experience that relies on data as
well as some cached data? Browsers are getting better at detecting native
gestures common in most apps and I know a lot of internet content can be
cached. Won't this eventually replace the app store as it's easier, no one
would take a cut and there'd be less barriers to trying new services?

I think there is some reluctance in people downloading apps. I personally
avoid downloading apps on Android as I don't want them to be cluttered in "My
Apps" section of Google Play, and seeing the updates is annoying. It seems
silly but I get embarrassed by the low quality spammy apps I have downloaded
in the past. Also, having a browser based model would allow for developers to
push new releases without an antiquated versioning system. It's inexcusable
that Apple has developers wait around a week on average to get a new version
to the app store. I appreciate that they have actual people review each app,
but 90% of the time is spent in "Waiting for Review" and the actual review
process doesn't take long. I don't know if the queue is by design, but it
seems excessive.

------
Agustus
If anyone from Pixite is reading this, do what the good ones do with their
logos, through the company logo on the app logo.

For your ease, please compare these graphics before and after:
[http://i.imgur.com/lMwL3kh.png?1](http://i.imgur.com/lMwL3kh.png?1)

Before shows no brand awareness, the after develops brand awareness.

~~~
epmatsw
It sounds (and is) shallow, but I wouldn't download an app with the after
icons. It looks cheap and distracts from the icon that matters. Also backing
that up, I have only 3 apps not hidden in folders which do the double icon
thing: ESPN, Marvel, and another app which is mid-rebrand.

------
dj_doh
I agree with most comments here. App market maturing, user behavior maturing.
It was always going to happen. Fart apps could only sustain so long:)

Here's my 2 cents - Apple could introduce an Indie category/sub-categories.
Community could come up with a distinctive micro-icon that represents
something as an indie app. Sort of like the tiny Zynga dog icon you see in
their apps. Once again, Apple could introduce apps to be flagged as indie by
its users. Refine search results by this flag.

I think Apple does their job of promoting really cool indie apps and games.
But it has to be outstanding or novel enough for them to pitch it forward.

------
dba7dba
Few lessons I can draw from here.

This is another case of if something is too-good-to-be-true (make millions
with little or no capital investment up front), it is indeed too-good. If
there's a low barrier to entry, you can bet the competition will grow fierce
very quickly.

We have a huge player at top that is collecting most of the benefits while the
much smaller players (more and more) below are competing for ever smaller
slice of the pie. And the slice was quite small to begin with, because there
were thousands and thousands of fellow coders who were doing the same thing
you were doing.

Lock-in is bad. As a consumer. And also as a vendor.

