App Store Subscriptions
developer.apple.com
developer.apple.com
Many customers forget where they even sourced their subscription to begin with, especially if you have a multi-/omni-channel presence.
1. On the Home screen, tap Settings.
2. Tap iTunes & App Store.
3. Tap your Apple ID at the top of the screen.
4. Tap View Apple ID.
apple isn't new to this kind of outsourcing
They're huge companies.
Turns out that the process to do this involves first configuring the city in an app within the iPhone, and then on the watch doing a series of UI actions: a force-touch, a swipe, a tap and turning the "digital crown" to find the right city within a UI element that is a list although it doesn't look like one. Several of these actions are entirely undiscoverable (the force-touch and digital crown in these contexts are just actions you have to stumble on by trying all the possible combinations, I guess).
I don't think there would have been any way to figure this out without googling it. And this is a feature that's prominently displayed in the default view of the Apple Watch screen, so it's perfectly reasonable to expect that users will want to change the city.
It's hard to believe that this device was designed by the company famous for the one-button mouse. I do find the physical design attractive though.
Simple is great, but not when you try to make simple do complex.
Windows 10: will upgrade your computer while you are sleeping without consent
OSX El Capitan: free upgrade requires you to create an account and type in your credit card number
Found out, unless you have the pro version, you can't even tell Windows not to do that. You can only set a period of time where Windows will do it (like 2 am) so it doesn't do it at more inconvenient times.
OS X upgrades are worse, in my opinion. For any given version, Apple just nags me to install it. But if I go from major version to major version, suddenly selling my MBP gets complicated, because I can only install the version that it came with after I wipe it. It's up to the person who buys it from me to log in to Apple and update the OS to a more recent version.
Then there's iOS which nags you constantly to install updates that have been known to brick some devices...
That isn't true. You can install a fresh copy of the most recent OS.
Apple also historically had a small fraction as many users as Microsoft and had Steve Jobs, who didn't seem to care if existing users were bothered and instead wanted the experience to always be perfect.
Once you reach a certain number of users, any menu or UI change becomes increasingly painful for your current users, at the expense of new users and, sometimes, what feels like common sense.
However, this may only serve to compound the problem.
I personally don't see what benefit putting the subscription management behind an unrelated UI widget that doesn't even appear to be clickable could possibly bring to an end-user. Or how such a design got through usability testing in the first place. Hence the likelihood for a dark pattern seems pretty high to me here.
Still, if Apple's barometer has become "just to be less sucky" then Google and MS, they're still doing awesome.
This has always seemed like a horrible user-hostile dark-pattern on Apple's part. When you subscribe, Apple says to go to Settings to unsubscribe or turn off auto-renew, but it's very opaque. It's also hidden behind a username/password prompt.
It would be much better if there were a Subscriptions option directly under 'iTunes & App Store' – even if there were still a password prompt behind this, at least people would know how to find it.
But Apple have long, long needed to modernise their entire iTunes Store experience, of which subscriptions are just one small problem. Does anyone know if it's still running on WebObjects? The whole experience has always felt slow and un-responsive, which felt normal when it first launched, but now feels very behind the times. It wouldn't surprise me if the subscriptions issue is a result of this too. Would be interested to hear if this is the case.
It's always felt like poor discoverability and lag were big reasons behind their social efforts (Ping/Connect) failing too. Not every social network needs a web presence, but presumably it'd help to be able to access/link to this content on the web at large, rather than it being buried deep inside existing apps.
Redacted example from my site: http://imgur.com/a/cL0t7
The Settings app built-in search doesn't work either. If you search for "Subscriptions" it doesn't appear, because it's behind hidden behind this password prompt (to be more generous, that entire screen is probably only generated once you've logged in, but it doesn't have to be that way).
Additionally, the "View Apple ID" button itself is also non-obvious: you have to click your email address first for it to come up as a pop-over. I recognise my email address in blue is a link to my account information, but a less experienced user might (reasonably) think otherwise. It would probably be better for your account name to have a right disclosure arrow next to it (taking you to a new view with your account options inside) to specifically indicate that touching it takes you to this new screen, because that's the way everything else in the Settings app works.
To solve all of this, you could just as easily put the "Subscriptions" button one level up in the "iTunes & App Store" screen, before the password prompt, and only prompt for a password after the user has clicked it. This would solve all of these problems.
If this sounds confusing, that's because it is. That's the real problem here.
This, of course, is part of why it's such an awful phrase. It's too nerd-cool to avoid being overapplied by cool nerds.
WebObjects has been discontinued, presumably for a reason, and while it was ahead of its time back in the day, it wouldn't be surprising to me if its age is starting to show when trying to deal with the huge amounts of traffic the iTunes Store must handle. But I really don't know. I only asked because I've seen it mentioned in this context before.
I've personally experienced a lot of flakiness with the Apple ID infrastructure though, especially with 2-factor auth enabled (their old 2-factor auth, not the new system which I haven't tried yet). Most recently when trying to purchase AppleCare after the fact, I just couldn't log in. I have no idea what's going on behind the scenes.
I'm a relatively-infrequent Apple user who signed up for HBO Now when it first came out and you had to sign up exclusively via an iPhone App. As it turned out, you could use the credentials obtained from that signup to sign in with any web browser and stream content. You didn't need to use the app itself.
Apple was literally just handling payments and subscriptions for HBO Now, exclusively, for 3 months.
Imagine my frustration at trying to find out when my subscription was set to renew. Why am I supposed to know that iTunes and App Store settings is where I should look for anything to do with a subscription for something that isn't visibly tied to either iTunes or the App Store?
Taps #3 and #4 are truly banana-pants insane though.
6. Tap Subscriptions > Manage
7. Tap on a subscription
That's a crazy convoluted flow. It's hard to believe it was made that way on accident. Hopefully this change in iOS 10.
1. Play Store
2. hamburger menu
3. Account
4. Subscriptions
Not a lot better, but at least makes more sense than "View Apple ID" I think.
However, it would not solve the issue of people that think that simply deleting the app will cancel the subscription, or dissuade people from insisting that we cancel the subscription for them.
Rather than needing to code your own subscription management UI, your app can open the following URL:
https://buy.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/man...
Opening this URL launches iTunes or iTunes Store, and then displays the Manage Subscription page.
See: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/Networ...
I do like that Apple promotes the classic "let's hook them with a free trial and hope they forget to unsubscribe in time" dark pattern as an official use case.
(Edit) Also:
Even if a user cancels and resubscribes within 60 days, they will still accumulate days of service from the point where they lapsed. [...] As part of your overall subscription marketing plan, consider ways to win back lapsed subscribers with targeted messaging, such as email or in-app messaging, to communicate the value of your subscriptions and encourage users to resubscribe.
So app developers are not just incentivized, Apple explicitly advises that they spam unsubscribers with notifications to win them back. Sounds great!
Another 6 years and maybe we'll get upgrade pricing - something that's been available in mainstream software since the 90s.
I have a handful of monthly subscriptions through the App Store, and currently, none of them notify me of the renewal before it occurs (I've checked my spam folder).
When I first subscribed to an app a couple of years ago, I received notifications before renewals (that sub was a 6 month or 1 year term, I don't recall exactly).
I also have an app that has offered subscriptions for almost 2 years. From end user reports recently (there weren't many issues about renewals until more recently), I'm getting the impression that Apple doesn't notify about upcoming subscription renewals unless the payment method Apple has on file is out of date, as we get quite a few emails asking about how to update payment information.
We would certainly be interested in finding out what others (both end-users and app developers) have found in their experience.
[0] https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/Langua...
What happens when a user dies? I mean, that does happen occasionally. Are the relatives on the hook to somehow email apple the death certificate to clear out their debts five years later? The issue of death on the internet is woefully overlooked. Perhaps there is an opportunity here for a startup to provide "closure services" where they settle all accounts.
Apple is already in the 'subscription' category with the Apple TV. I subscribe (via the Apple TV) to Hulu and HBO. I remember magazines being the same, as well.
Yes it's possible to have no credit card at all on file for your itunes account (though they go out of their way for you to not realize that), but sometimes you may want to actually pay for an app too.
Funnily I tried to give apple some money through the app store but made the mistake of signing up with my German credit card when living in LA and was lost in a "we cannot accept this German CC with a LA address"-limbo and never was offered a way out. So I now have a crapple account that one cannot put money into without some apparently lengthy verification process and I therefore can give my app store credentials to friends who just need some xcode update :D
I'm an audible, spotify, and netflix subscriber currently. I have to purchase (or use tokens) on their respective sites then I can stream the content in the app.
What is the value add for companies like these to "take advantage" of an app store subscription?
As I see it, none. But Apple would love getting netflix and spotify subscribers, since those services are ones that people stay on forever.
Actually some companies DO NOT like it, because they might lose some users due to the pricing being bumped up 30%
www.theverge.com/2015/7/8/8913105/spotify-apple-app-store-email
www.recode.net/2016/6/30/12067578/spotify-apple-app-store-rejection
But really, we're talking about a year here. I feel its a long enough timeframe that mostly encourages good practices (like continuously providing value for subscribing customers).
If this can establish a middle ground where more app categories can find a sustainable business model including long term support and updates that could be very interesting, especially now that many apps might want to include cloud-based features where committing to support forever in exchange for a one-time payment might be a risky proposition.
(Though admittedly it's only for subscription-based pricing, but, let's admit it, one-time software purchases seem to be going the way of the dodo.)
I don't think one-time software purchases are going anywhere. In fact, the more apps switch to ad-driven or subscription pricing, the easier it will be for (unique, interesting) apps with non-subscription pricing to market this to their advantage. I expect subscription-based revenue in the App Store will dry up for the vast majority of apps once users get over the novelty in a few years.
Plus, some software simply cannot be subscription based by definition. Most non-AAA games are finished works with only maintenance updates in their future. Who would want to subscribe to that?
Not sure it said that before.
[0] https://web.archive.org/web/20160419200531/https://developer...
Until yesterday, you could use the app to watch things on catch-up. Now the 'levy/subscription/tax/license' is mandatory.
Is there a loophole they're using that I'm missing? eg: That they don't want to call it a 'subscription', even though that's exactly what is. (Well, more of a 'tax', but they hate calling it that too.)
So, since no one 'buys' a subscription 'through the app' then Apple can't demand a cut? Is that right?
I thought there was an issue if an app provided content which was only consumable through a paid subscription. Which the iPlayer now is. (Though you don't need to log in to view it, but you'll be breaking the law if you do and you haven't paid.)
ta.
Note that this is purely down to Apple allowing it — there's nothing stopping Apple from disallowing apps that do this, but to do so wouldn't be in Apple's interests.
Also, the TV licence is officially a tax. Not that that really changes anything. Apple could still chuck BBC iPlayer off the App Store if they really wanted to, but they'd be crazy to do so.
Or is this only for app usage.