David Barnard on being successful in apps business

Great mini-series with David Barnard on the Release Notes podcast:

• Part 1
• Part 2

David shares very interesting case for how important search traffic is for building financially successful apps.

Not on the Mac App Store

A list of great Mac applications, which are not on the Mac App Store. It's a pity that Mac App Store failed to deliver on promise to connect users and developers in a new delightful way:

The Mac App Store has been around for 6 years, but is still lacking some of the best software the Mac has to offer. You might be wondering why this is. Sandboxing certainly has a lot to answer for, but it's not the only reason. There's also paid upgrades, sustainability, quality of life, and the Mac App Store just generally being half-assed.

Future of the Apps

I presented at the ITEM 2015 and shared my view on the evolution of the business of applications and offered some advice to startups looking to build their company around application(s).

Here is the gist of my talk:

• Applications play increasingly important role in our digital lives. On the last WWDC keynote Apple mentioned that the average person has 119 apps (check out other numbers from the keynote).
• The industry is huge. Last year developers received $10bln on iOS App Store alone (cumulative paymnets of $30bln this year against $20bln announced last year).
• Apps have gone a long way from multi-hundren dollars packages full of floppies and manuals to nearly free downloads available instantly. We continue to withness "race to the bottom": $1.26 is not that much for an average price of app.
• With widespread subsidization of mass consumption applications (e-mail, calendars, notes, contacts, etc.) acqui-hiring has become fairly common way to monetize apps in this category. It may be tempting to follow the example of Sparrow, Mailbox, Accompli, Wunderlist and others, but it is difficult and very uncertain.
• Working in a niche on a specilized application gives far greater chance to build a business around app development.
• New niches often form around new devices, which inspire users to find new ways to use technology products.
• What is even better for our multi-device always-connected environment – services.

Take a look at the slides below. I'll the video, when it becomes available.

Future of the Apps: what startups need to know from Dima Malenko

Google, Microsoft, Facebook & Adobe’s iOS Apps

MacStories published an interesting piece with stats on how major non-game app developers maintain their apps in the iOS App Store. The article compares Google, Microsoft, Adobe and Facebook. The choice of companies for research is very interesting because

• Google maintains its own successful mobile platform
• Microsoft also maintains its own (although, not as successful) mobile platform and until recently was very reluctant with bringing their major apps to iOS
• Adobe has always had its traditional market and audience on desktops
• Facebook represents new-age service originated from the Web and cannot move forward without mobile.

Definitely worth checking out.

Threes vs. 2048 on Google Play

Threes, precursor and inspiration to popular game 2048, has been removed from Google Play because it used "2048" as a keyword. Jessica Conditt reporting for Engadget:

Google – probably a human there, not a robot – reinstated Threes after just a few hours offline and following a stream of articles and Twitter activity around its removal. Of course, 2048 remained live on Google Play the entire time, alongside a bunch of other Threes clones. This string of events highlights one of the biggest differences between Google and Apple, and how they approach their app stores.

TechArcade also has a nice rundown of the situation with an angle on apps and games clones in app stores:

Pretty much any search for any popular game will turn up something that probably has a trademark or copyright that's being used without permission. Again, things are not as bad as they once were, and the App Store's got its own game title tomfoolery going on. But this Threes situation is ignoring thousands of active violations of store rules, intellectual property, and just common decency, to nail a big-name tile without warning for a questionable violation.

Take down without warning or any upfront notice was the biggest problem here. Good that Threes is back.