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Comment by MichaelGG | Hacker News Reader

The apps on the Windows store are not even remotely plausibly useful for anything else. Not only that but they are intentionally misleading. Netflix had to deal with Microsoft at least three times in order to get Microsoft remove fake Netflix apps. Many of these apps don't even have a valid website link or contact info. Some are just a video player wrapped around an HTTP server that has 10 or 20 video files.

Microsoft has zero quality controls and their store is full of shit, which is one of the reasons their platform failed so hard. They were literally paying people per app published regardless of the content of it. It turns out just advertising that you have a billion apps doesn't help if they're all just junk.

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I feel the same about the Kindle and Google Play stores, as well. iOS App Store seems to be the only one that has more "useful" apps to noise. That said, the iOS App Store is filled with crap as well, they just do a good job of curating a front page, and the category list pages.

Google Play Store is a lot better than it was in the past, but the problem I find now is due to the sheer number of android devices, you just don't get the consistency while running apps that you get on iOS App Store. I assume this is the same for Kindle since it is android-based and Windows Store since there is so much hardware out there.

> That said, the iOS App Store is filled with crap as well, they just do a good job of curating a front page, and the category list pages.

Very true. Once you delve into some of the category pages, or the search, you find many many pages of utter garbage. But the 'front page' experience is carefully curated to look like the cream of the crop.

Yep -- search for something like "fart button" and marvel at hundreds / thousands of apps for this, even for iOS. There are definitely some very high-quality iOS apps, but they have a ton of crap as well. Android is worse, and MS / Amazon are so bad that even finding the legitimate thing you want and know the name of is a hassle. Microsoft also compounds this by making installation a hassle and almost impossible to troubleshoot, so then you must try to find legit "fix windows store" programs and hope they're not just a timer with a progress bar asking you to pay $60 for the pro version.

I feel iOS is too curated and too Draconian in what they will accept.

I would much rather have to sift through garbage to find the app I want, then to have a company like apple tell me what I am allowed and not allowed to install on the device I paid them 100's or over a $1,000 to "own"

Would you be happy if you could sideload apps and leave the app store curated?

You can do this using an MDM solution on apps that have enterprise distribution licenses.

The Kindle app store is as bad as Microsoft's one is being painted here. It's crammed full of dubious apps, many of which are clearly only there to deceive people into thinking their the official app from a provider.

Do you think Apple's store for MacOS failed for the same reasons?

Mac App Store fails mostly because the restrictions on apps in it are too severe. Many applications can not exist on it due to sandboxing.

This and the fact that the application itself is quite terrible.

Edit: Also, for desktop apps the pricing model without paid upgrades is not viable. Compared to mobile, there are too few customers.

Did the MacOS App Store fail? I don't think so. Sure, it's not as popular as the iOS store but this is probably because most Mac apps are an order of magnitude more expensive than their iOS counterparts. Personally I don't mind paying a few bucks for an iOS app, but I think twice before hitting that buy button on a 50$ app.

It's certainly failed to reach its potential. A lot of very high quality, high profile apps have quit the App Store and actually found their sales and revenue increase, aside from not having to comply with onerous sandboxing restrictions any more.

The macOS app store didn't gain much traction but you're underestimating just how much of a cease pool the Windows app store is. Microsoft must have the resources to moderate that better. But based on my last test search of "Firefox" coming up with dozens of fake Firefox apps or "apps" that are "Firefox Guides" basically PDFs wrapped as an "app" etc... My only guess is Microsoft knows there's a truly abysmal number of legit apps so they just choose not to moderate it

I don't think they realize how much effort it takes to curate. Even Google's half-assed, slap-dash approach is better than nothing.

The Mac App Store has some junk but I actually find it quite useful and do buy stuff on there because I know I'll be able to install it if/when I switch computers in the future. Same thing with Steam. I also expense most of my Mac App Store purchases, so that probably makes a difference.

Apple's store is not a complete failure, there's some very good apps in there, but it's cluttered and disorganized.

The biggest hurdle in the macOS App Store is the stiff sandboxing rules that make the more exotic and often useful utilities incompatible.

Do you think Adobe doesn't put the real Photoshop in Apple's Mac app store because of sandboxing?

Nope. The really big hurdle is the 30% cut that Apple wants to take.

It certainly contributes. Rewriting an app as complex as photoshop for the App Store would be a daunting task.

It's not in Adobe's best interest to hand over that portion when they have proven demand for their product and a distribution system (Adobe Cloud) of their own.

For smaller devs the store should provide a better marketing and sales platform, and so be worth the 30% cut. Steam, as an example, seems to work out alright for most companies but not everyone.

Do you think Apple's store has the same lack of quality control?

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