(Android) Developer Income Report #6
kreci.net
kreci.net
Is it safe to assume that those earnings are for December 2010? If yes, I would have assumed that earnings for Android software would have increased quite a lot more as this month is typically the strongest for many developers - See http://taptaptap.com/blog/million-million/ for a good example.
As for iPhone programming, feel free to check out http://itunes.apple.com/us/itunes-u/developing-apps-for-ios-... if you haven't already - There is plenty of material available from Stanford for free that will allow you to create your first iOS applications easily.
The majority of iOS devs make little to nothing, documented countless times. Of course when you hear the rare success story it is presented as a norm, which paradoxically leads to a gold rush that really ensures that no one gets rich (and quick!).
And the same is entirely true for Android. While the user base has grown dramatically, the number of applications have exploded as well so there's significantly more competition.
The overwhelming majority of iOS devs make little to
nothing, documented countless times
Yes, there is lots of money to be made in, essentially, consulting. That is true pretty much universally.
That's not really what he said though. Even if 0.1% of the iPhone developers and 0.1% of the Android developers are making money, the iPhone devs could still be making more.
Apple said 1 billion in payouts to developers
Apple said 300,000 apps in app store
Average $ per app = $3,333.33
Now if this were a bell curve half the developers would be getting less than that. But this is not a bell curve (it's one of them thar hockey stick things) so the large majority of apps will be earning less than that.
For the purposes of handwaving, lets say 90% of apps make less than the average.
Now lets say that the average app is pulling its income in mainly over the last twelve months... that equates to ~$250 per month.
So... if 90% of the apps on the app store are making less than $250 per month ... this means kreci is actually doing pretty good on Android compared to iPhone.
I think from looking at kreci's article that he is more than comfortable with 'showing a little leg' in order to get some ad impressions (4 of 5 sources of revenue are ads or referrals). Now my impression (from a great distance) of the Android market compared to the iPhone market is that the Android one is much more dominated by ads. Also, this aligns better with Google's corporate goals (to plaster advertising over everything in sight).
So, in conclusion, I would say that kreci is doing pretty good, and that he has a good match of business models to the environment he is in.
@kreci - thanks for sharing your data
You can't know if the guy is a talent or not, if you are not more talented than him. That being said, and with ridiculously low rate, I highly doubt if he is talented.
Thank you again for posting these numbers every month.
No one can say without knowing about the specific app, the advert implementation, and the amount of users you loose because of the implementation. I'd guess something around that much though.
$1 per acticle? I know the articles on the site (http://www.minimotherboard.com/, via a comment) are short and not really original content, but assuming he's spending even 10 minutes per post, he could be earning more working the drive-thru at McDonald's. I suppose he's agreed to it, and it's not your fault he's undervaluing his work, but that strikes me as insultingly low. I really feel for the guy if he's been forced into writing for what is essentially table scraps.
If she can bust out one article in 5 minutes, even with breaks of a few minutes in between to stretch or just clear her head, the writer can do 15 of them in an hour. And that's assuming kreci is her only client. I can see her making over US$100/day quite easily, and depending on where the writer is situated (and it seems that she is not a native English speaker/writer based just from her word usage alone), making between 25-30k year could possibly be no small potatoes.
FYI, I just wrote the preceding in 5 minutes and it's 118 words.
And yes, you (and other commenters) do bring up a good point in that $1 has a lot more value in many parts of the world. And while it still strikes me as a bit exploitative, I fully understand how untenable my complaining about this is considering basically every piece of electronic equipment on my desk was probably made by someone earning the around the same, if not less. The same is probably true of the clothes I'm wearing.
Step 1: Read 4 paragraph press release or product description page
Step 2: Regurgitate with your rote spin ("The technology continues to get smaller and more powerful with the new xxx yyy from zzz. Featuring foobar processor and bazbot spiffo support, the yyy can meet the small form factor needs of today's HTPC and silent PC enthusiast.")
Step 3: Submit to kreci
Step 4: $1.00
Step 5: goto 1.
https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp/associates/agreement...
The purchasing party receives something (money,extension of subscription,...) in return for finalizing the transaction through your affiliate link.
As far as I know, this kind of deals is not possible through the Amazon Affiliate Program.
I ask because I have trouble believing that people click on the ads out of intention. I think I clicked on one by mistake before (although, honestly can't remember for sure).
I just find it hard to believe that Angry Birds makes $1M in ad revenue per month. I don't get why you'd click an ad when you're about to play a game.
If you want to develop yourself, you don't need the latest hardware. A used Mac Mini is enough and should cost around 300€.