Problems on the Galaxy Store
forum.developer.samsung.com
forum.developer.samsung.com
I know that some people are instinctively repulsed by such a model, but there are good reasons why users prefer it. There is real value in being able to install an app, see that it actually runs on your device, explore the interface and perhaps try some of the features before actually paying anything. Most app stores do have refund policies that amount to a free trial, but there's a big psychological difference between trying an app for free and paying for an app that you can get a full refund on (subject to terms and conditions).
I vaguely remember the Google Play Store (before it had that name) having something like this, never understood why they got rid of it. They must have concluded it made the store less profitable, but I wonder what data they were looking at, or if they interpreted it correctly.
Apple on the other hand unfortunately has nothing like that. If you want refund, You have to go through the hassle of creating a ticket and they may refuse to refund for whatever reason.
But still I think it's a mistake because 15 mins is not enough time to know if the app is going to work. Sometimes it takes that long just to get the damn thing installed! Especially if on a mobile connection or the app is big. I once got screwed because I bought an app that didn't work on my device, but I couldn't find out within 15 minutes because my storage was too full and the Play store refused to install it until I cleared out more room. It took a while to go through all my stuff and back them up to the cloud, so by the time I actually got the app installed and found out it didn't work, it had been 20 minutes or so. Now I'm very hesitant.
A 1 day return period should be enough. Once you return the product you cannot trial it again without purchase.
If there’s gonna be a short timer it should start the moment the app is first opened instead of the purchase time.
As an example, I recently tried a sleep tracking app. It is a subscription service but has a 1 week free trial. I tried it for a few nights, hated the mechanics of making it work, so I canceled the free trial and uninstalled the app. $0 spent on a paid app, completely supported by Apple.
It should be something available by default, but the workarounds seem pretty widespread. The advantage of this approach is that many developers offer "pay per month" or "pay a lot once" for their paid apps. The user can choose which one they like better.
The place to do it is https://reportaproblem.apple.com/
Yes, most video games are designed to be significantly longer, but as long as the expected runtime is communicated to the consumer, there's nothing inherently wrong with designing shorter experiences.
Applications and games are very different, however. An application should be useful to you across a long-ish time window.
I've played 2 hour games, and if it was a good time I'm not going to return it. I don't think most people want to cheat indie devs, they're a very sympathetic group
I don't think it's inevitable. If it hasn't happened by now, it likely won't happen. An entire industry has sprung up around Prime returns. E.g., HOTBINS.
It's better to have a paid app that does not have the code/permissions required to even engage in advertising and tracking in this way. Preferably the paid app doesn't even have IAP at all.
Looking through the Google Play store, nearly every "Top Free" app clearly states that data is collected and data is shared with third parties. Nearly every "Top Paid" app clearly states that no data is collected and no data is shared with third parties.
As far as I know the major ones don't offer this, Apple for sure doesn't. I think the store runners would much rather see developers use subscription pricing that gives them a recurring cut as well.
I think it is vastly disingenuous to suggest that the ads and spyware in most free apps are somehow “good for the user”.
These are simply economic realities that are forced on app developers, because the market place for paid sustainable apps has been mostly destroyed by free alternatives.
These days good apps are almost without exception either a) subsidised by a major corporate (eg. Insta) or b) paid (eg. Procreate). Free apps are mostly exploitative spam, hunting for whales to sustain the developers.
The intention seems to be to get me hooked before I can invoke any judgment calls. I've had similar experiences with car salesman.
The bottom line is that I'm not willing to begin the experience/transaction without a clear idea of what the final outcome might be.
It used to be that customers had enough leverage to provide incentives to corporations to make better decisions. But in their wisdom, corporations have decided that they are better off without customer feedback.
We have gotten to this point by allowing corporations to dominate our political process, changing us from an above average democracy into a corpocracy. It is not good for us, and in the long run not good for them.
For all their faults, don’t put Apple in the same bucket as Google or Facebook
Otherwise, I completely agree. Samsung should just use Google Play or the System update process to manage system app updates, etc.
I can see their concern with relying completely on gPlay, as there may be instances where the permissions needed for a system app go beyond the allowances of gPlay, but there are other ways to avoid those issues, and the Galaxy Store is trash.
If you had to pick the top thing that is hostile to the user, what do you think it is?
On anything else, it's there.
> On anything else, it's there.
Alternative app stores for Android have existed for a long time. Samsung Galaxy Store, Amazon, Huawei AppGallery, F-Droid, Aptoide, etc. They are also available for older versions of Android.
Might as well complain that Walmart has a “monopoly” on selling things in Walmart stores.
Of course you need explicit permission from the user to install apps (that just makes common sense) but I've been using F-Droid Basic which works like a treat.
Only Amazon has tried to launch an alternative app store so far, and I'm it sure if they use the new API that makes automatic updates possible. However, there's nothing standing in anyone's way to bring competition to this market.
If you can come up with a better store, you can take one of the many open source app stores out there and add a sales feature to turn it into a business venture and take on Google and Samsung. I'm not sure how this will go down on iOS when they will eventually allow installing external apps, but I imagine the situation may be quite similar.
The EU has made anti-gatekeeper laws, targeting Apple, Google, and other gatekeepers.
Back in the day some cheaper Samsung models came with the Amazon App Store installed.
I think this is just the developer is trying to resolve his frustration by "yelling for the manager" to make a PR incident.
But honestly just flag and move on
> Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it. Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead. If you flag, please don't also comment that you did.
EDIT: however, you should be allowed to set the pricing of your app however you like.
What about being allowed to curate apps in your app store however you like?
But yeah, if Samsung doesn't like it, I say screw 'em and just put it on the Play Store instead.
The crux was, however, that the developer was totally upfront about what you got for the price and apparently there still were douchebags around forking over the cash to buy "status".
Apple yanked the app due to the publicity. Which I thought was wrong. It didn't violate any App store rules and it was honest and up front in the description of the app.
Own a .org, .net and .com of the same URL and your a winner.
Yearly renewal is around €2k and I only use eight :/