
Is it worth selling software on Ubuntu Software Centre? - nvr82
Do you have experience selling your apps on Ubuntu Software Centre? Is it worth to develop software for Ubuntu/Linux(moneywise)?<p>I'm more interested to hear stories about non-game software, but game developers can also share their thoughts,
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whalesalad
I think that most of the people you talk to here are going to tell you to
avoid it. A lot of us have apt-get engrained in our minds as the defacto
interface for managing software on Debian based systems.

That being said: why not? For Apple, the App Store is great. It shows you what
is popular and what others find useful. It adds a layer of social proof to
your applications. I was using an HTTP REST client for the longest time that
was a pain in the ass to use. A lot of user interface inconveniences existed.
After Google failed me, I cracked open the App Store and was fortunately able
to find the app Rested. It's not perfect in my opinion, but it's been a breath
of fresh air when developing my API.

We can argue all we want on the walled garden approach of the App Store, but
it's a great platform. We also need to remember that it's still an infant, and
it's going to evolve and improve. The more we use it when building software,
and the more our customers and users use it to discover and rate our stuff,
the better it will become. Apple certainly doesn't let the community dictate
their moves, but they certainly allow us to influence their decisions if
enough people are on board.

For this reason, I think you should definitely start using the Ubuntu software
center. If it provides a simple and more pleasant experience for your users,
great! Hopefully there will be more and more people looking at desktop Linux
in the future who will need a place to find applications. If you can help
evangelize and shape their platform with the weight of a successful app, then
the whole ecosystem will grow and flourish from it.

~~~
donniezazen
As a Linux user, I pay developers whenever I can and if there are no official
channels like Ubuntu Software Center then I just donate directly.

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jstanley
Judging by the ratio of upvotes to answers, this seems like a topic that a lot
of people are interested in but nobody knows about.

Personally, as a user of Ubuntu, I never use the Ubuntu Software Centre - not
even for free software - I much prefer apt-get, and I'm not aware of anything
(aside from paid software, which I didn't even know about until you mentioned
this) that Ubuntu Software Centre does that apt-get doesn't.

~~~
wting
As a side note, aptitude is a superior package management tool to apt-get. The
syntax is the same, but aptitude has 3 main advantages:

1) Keeps track of system state. Tracks packages installed as dependencies, and
remove them when necessary meaning no orphaned packages.

2) Handles recommends well. apt-get fails to handle recommends, which many
packages depend on to pull in dependencies.

3) Searching. More intuitive and better formatted than apt-cache search. There
is also the text UI when running aptitude directly. For example, how do I find
all installed python packages?

    
    
        $ apt-cache search python
        Returns all packages with python in title or description.
    

vs

    
    
        $ aptitude search '~ipython'
    

or

    
    
        $ aptitude search python | grep ^i # installed packages are flagged with i on the first line

~~~
brandonfish
"apt-cache search" does AND search over everything by default which is neat to
find software for _something_. with aptitude you have to use some cryptic
flags for that.

to look for packages that you have installed use "dpkg -l"

aptitude is otherwise great and I prefer it over apt-get

~~~
wting
With aptitude you would use the description flag (~d) like so:

    
    
        $ aptitude search '~dautojump'
        p   autojump                                 - shell extension to jump to frequently used directories                          
        p   jumpapplet                               - autojump notification icon, to jump to frequently used directories

------
jarek-foksa
Short answer: no, it's not worth it.

I'm selling the same app on both Ubuntu Software Center [1] and Mac App Store
[2]. Between June and December I have sold 29 licenses on Ubuntu store and
~2000 licenses on Mac App Store.

Chrome Web Store [3] seems to be a much more promising distribution channel
for Linux apps. With the new APIs it will be possible to access native window
manager, USB ports, filesystem or webcam. Besides, you don't have to deal with
incompatibilities between distros.

[1] <https://apps.ubuntu.com/cat/applications/type-fu/>

[2] [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/type-
fu/id509818877?ls=1&...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/type-
fu/id509818877?ls=1&mt=12)

[3] <http://developer.chrome.com/apps/about_apps.html>

~~~
nvr82
Thank you for you comment. This kind of comments I was looking for.

What I've been looking into this today...It seems that it's not really worth
it, as you said. I would kind of want it to worth it, maybe some day it will
be.

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jiggy2011
Ubuntu software centre has always felt a bit lacklustre to me as a paid
software place. Most of the stuff on the front page is either listed as free,
have bad icons and screenshots (sometimes Unity,sometimes Gnome 2 or something
else) or all 3.

Not to mention that the UI is kinda slow and clunky.

Basically gives the feeling of being in a neon lit discount store rather than
a premier software showroom.

I think it might do better to get rid of it as an application altogether and
just build an attractive webpage that gives a lot of space over to
highlighting the best, most polished commercial apps with a handful of the
higher quality open source desktop software. Use a browser plugin to trigger
installation.

Installing open source libraries, dependencies and dev tools could be handled
by a more utilitarian ncurses front end to apt or something.

~~~
jdjb
Since Debian 4 I usually use synaptic as my package manager. It's really just
a GUI frontend for aptitude but I've never had any issues using it.

------
knicklabs
There seems to be only a few commercial packages in the Ubuntu Software
Centre. As a commercial developer that probably means one of two things: (1)
The market is yours for the taking or (2) There is no market.

I'd be curious to know if it is worth it as well. Have you spoke with any
commercial developers directly?

~~~
pekk
If I want to sell Linux apps, what is the alternative?

~~~
csense
Put it on your website and take payments in the form of Paypal/credit
card/bitcoins/whatever in exchange for a download link.

If you want to sell for Android (which is, of course, a type of Linux), try
the Google or Amazon app stores.

Dominions 3 [1], a commercial game with a native Linux build, recently changed
publishers and is now sold on Desura [2].

If you enjoy making your users put up with horrible DRM, I've seen multiple HN
articles about how Linux support for Steam is in the works.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominions_3:_The_Awakening>

[2] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desura>

~~~
jdjb
"If you enjoy making your users put up with horrible DRM, I've seen multiple
HN articles about how Linux support for Steam is in the works"

It's an open beta right now with about 40 games listed under Linux.

------
meunier
Super Meat Boy, which has over 1M sales across all platforms, has a whopping
77 sales from the Ubuntu Software Centre.

~~~
rbirnie
Which those 77 sales are really pirate copies as Ubuntu Software Centre sold
SMB without permission and hasn't paid the SMB any either. I'd stay away from
them if they're willing to pull this type of shenanigans.

[http://www.kotaku.com.au/2012/12/ed-mcmillen-ubuntu-store-
so...](http://www.kotaku.com.au/2012/12/ed-mcmillen-ubuntu-store-sold-super-
meat-boy-for-a-year-without-permission-has-yet-to-pay-team-meat/)

~~~
h00k
From Jono Bacon at Canonical:

[https://plus.google.com/114419073019603780828/posts/KA5vKChg...](https://plus.google.com/114419073019603780828/posts/KA5vKChgwDQ)

\--->

Regarding the Super Meat Boy issue, here is a response from David Pitkin who
runs the Ubuntu Software Center at Canonical and works with developers:

"I just looked into it and the check to Tommy and Edmund from Canonical is in
process for the 77 copies of Super Meat Boy. We have been working together
since November to get it resolved, no piracy here just some miscommunication".

------
modeless
According to the earlier story about Super Meat Boy, it was on the store for a
year and only sold 77 copies.

~~~
shardling
That's meaningless by itself -- SMB was sold through a lot of other channels,
both on other platforms and on Linux, before it was put in the store. It's
placement in the store was also accidental, and so probably didn't get
promoted much!

------
LarryMade
Software center... never use it, in fact the way it had mixed the non-
installed stuff with installed software really ticked me off (this is probably
my biggest gripe with unity, wheres the menu of all the installed apps??? I
don't want to shop ALL THE TIME!). I had installed gnome classic (for getting
to whats installed) and Synaptic/Web sites to get to what's not.

So went to find software center - not in the classic menu, but entering
software-cetner got it from the terminal.

Seems it suffers like all the others, only one level of hierarchy, looking for
Desktop publishing, select office and start reading through the hundred plus
entries, most of which have a clever name and icon which does nothing to
relate it to desktop publishing at all.

You want o make big bucks at your app, help develop better app stores, so
people can find your app.

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PaulHoule
I would be pessimistic. Most people in the Linux community aren't in the habit
of paying for software.

Also, I avoid the Ubuntu Software Centre as much as I can. I find the Ubuntu
desktop to be atrocious and I log in via ssh as much as I possibly can to
Ubuntu machines.

If there's any market here it would be for a $500+ product that customers want
bad enough to deal with the USC than it would be for $5 games; even in that
case most of your marketing work is going to be outside the USC.

Why hasn't anybody come out with a Linux distribution that contains an Android
personality so that you can run Android apps side to side with normal Linux
apps kinda like Windows 8? It seems Linux could use this to close the
usability gap with other OSes.

~~~
dysoco
That's not really true: If you develop a nice and polished desktop application
which can be better than an opesource alternative we are disposed to pay.

For example check the Humble Bundle: Linux users always pay more than average.
Although I'd not sell in the Ubuntu Software Center: As you would miss a lot
of users from other distros (or people who don't use the Software Center).

~~~
cabirum
Not quite true. Linux users are the 'true average'. The problem is, Windows
Humble Bundles are bought for $0.01 en masse with the intention of reselling,
sinking its average price.

~~~
sounds
Can you cite some data that indicate Windows HB license are bought with the
intention to resell them?

~~~
cabirum
I know a few places reselling the bundles. steampay.com/bundle is an example.

------
ecspike
The Humble Bundle Linux version usually sells well.

~~~
hdra
I doubt that Humble Bundle's Linux sale would perform that well if the games
aren't playable on Windows/Mac, considering the games that claim to be
playable on Linux ends up buggy on it.

------
lsiebert
If I could get it working on Mint, I'd use it, and I am happy to pay. I am
disinclined to switch my distribution for it though.

------
newishuser
I use the software center whenever I can. I like the reviews, screen-shots,
description, and link to official website.

It's a pretty ugly piece of software with unrefined edges all over the place
but it gets the job done for now. That being said I've never bought anything
through the software center, just installed free software.

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mangecoeur
Not speaking from direct personal experience, however the Humble Bundles have
found that linux users tended to pay more than average, which goes against the
common assumption that linux users want everything for free.

~~~
seyed
Kind of users on Linux and Windows and Mac is different, so same app would
have different sales. Most of Linux users has good computer knowledge
therefore some apps like Type-Fu should have bad sales. Also most of gamers
living on windows not Linux... Can anybody share his sales statistics on
Ubuntu Software Center?

------
pkamb
I'm guessing that people using the "free" side of the Ubuntu Software Center
are not required to have a credit card on file. This is probably one of the
most significant barriers compared to the Apple app stores.

------
mtgx
I hate how most stores look on Linux, and they are slow. The only one that
seems decent is Deepin:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY_OAWYCEv8>

There are still a lot of things that don't seem ready for prime time for the
consumer market in Linux distros, and I wish it wasn't like that.

