
Wolfram Alpha iPhone app costs $50 [iTunes link] - tewks
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=334989259&mt=8
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hvs
That's a good way to guarantee that no one uses your app. Especially when it
is to access a service that no one uses anyway.

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caffeine
_That's a good way to guarantee that no one uses your app_

Exactly. It will therefore appeal to the market of geeks with disposable
income - people who enjoy paying for something cool and exclusive. People who
buy $500 mobile surveillance bots on ThinkGeek, mainly because nobody else has
one.

Maybe the solution to the "race to the bottom" in the App store is simply to
make really high quality apps (not claiming that W@ is) and sell them for a
really high price.

Though, personally, I wouldn't buy such apps unless I felt safe about being
able to back them up, transfer them to new phones, and most importantly that
they wouldn't get "removed" from the store at a moment's notice.

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ptomato
Other than the "removed from the store" thing, you can backup the app, use it
on a new phone, redownload it without repaying for it, etc.

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protomyth
ok, I'll ask the stupid question, what is my advantage in using this app as
opposed to just pulling up the site on mobile safari? I cannot see the
difference.

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henning
I'm wondering exactly the same thing myself. The app is only 0.5 MB in size so
they couldn't possibly be licensing a standalone copy of the evaluation engine
the way a chess playing game gives you a copy of the game evaluation engine.

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protomyth
Given what the screen looks like, it seems like it is just a custom webkit
view. There is no mention of local storage or processing (it says "connect to
Wolfram|Alpha's supercomputing cloud").

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jasonlbaptiste
Between this and their API pricing, I really wonder who makes these genius
decisions. Do they talk to customers or people AT ALL? You could have talked
to your community/potential buyers easily. Ask HN: How much would you pay for
a wolfram alpha iphone app? and Ask HN: How much would you pay for API access?
would have resulted in more than enough initial market research.

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fnid
Do you know how much money they are making off the API and App? How do you
know it isn't a genius decision?

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halo
Requires iTunes. Can you please put this in the title?

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iseff
A shameless plug of my own site, but hopefully helpful to those not wanting to
open iTunes:

<http://www.appstorehq.com/wolframalpha-iphone-77717/app>

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w1ntermute
_hopefully helpful to those not wanting to open iTunes_

Why do people assume that everyone has iTunes installed? I wouldn't let my
computer touch that resource-hogging piece of shit with a 10 foot pole.

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jamroom
Am I the only one that actually likes iTunes? Is it really a resource hog? To
be honest I've never really noticed (it seems to work well for me), but
recently have seen a lot of anger directed towards iTunes, so am wondering if
this is mainly a problem with iTunes on Windows?

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tptacek
iTunes is the best music player I've ever used, and that includes the one I
cared enough about to write for myself. It's "big", but so is my collection,
so I forgive it.

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buugs
For windows one of the better clients is foobar (I use itunes for the ipod and
foobar for listening), for linux well you are kinda sol if you want a good
music player (mpd with a gui client or ncmpcpp come somewhat close).

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elblanco
How does it compare to old stand-by players like Winamp?

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scythe
foobar2000 requires a little more finagling than winAMP to set up, but it can
be very nice when you do. It's also significantly lighter than winamp. They
both do things that iTunes won't (in particular play flac and ogg, which is a
very important feature for me).

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Dilpil
Great word of mouth advertising: the legendary $50 app.

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lispm
CIA analysts? Not sure if that is helping the app.

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gojomo
Bring back the $999.99 "I Am Rich" app!

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bcl
Maybe if you could talk to it to input the question like the google voice
search app. How can anyone in their right mind drop $50 for an app that you
could just as easily use the browser for? (and I just tried it, almost exactly
the same as their example page.

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rebelvc
I'm willing to bet that it will become a top grossing apps. The premium price
will make a some people feel like they it is an app they really need. Some
will buy it to show off.

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adrinavarro
The app looks nice, but nothing amazing, just a native viewer for the website
contents.

Hey, I can code this one in two hours. Definitely not worth the price.

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mynameishere
You make less than 25 dollars an hour?

ED: Five downmods? Okay. If so-and-so wants a product that costs 50 dollars,
and his time is worth 30/dollars an hour, then it doesn't make sense for him
to spend 2 hours remaking it. If his time is worth 20/hour, then it does make
sense. What part of this is offensive? The Math 101 or the Econ 101?

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DougBTX
Chances are he gets paid a salary, so working on this project would not reduce
his income. Considering his skill set, he is better off working on this, so he
can spend the $50 on something which would take him longer to build, for
example a toaster.

Do they cover specialization of labour in Econ 101 still?

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protomyth
On a side note, it will be telling how many reviews there are based on the
fact you need to buy the app to review it.

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nirmal
It has one 5-star review. iTunes doesn't seem to let you copy/paste review
text...

<http://twitpic.com/m1s8m>

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mr_luc
That's a fantastic review.

    
    
        "Don't know why I purchased this application but 
        it does what it claims to do."
    

/me runs for his check card.

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TJensen
Wow, I wish I could be in the "more money than brains" camp. Oh, wait, I guess
I probably am; I just don't have any money, either.

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fjabre
Yikes.. This feels awkward..

A $50 iPhone app with a name like WolframAlpha - how can these guys lose?

