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Comment by furyofantares | Hacker News Reader

edit: my bad, I misread the price and it's really hard to see the price after you bought it to double check.

$10 for something that (I think) doesn't work on most phones but isn't gated to ones it works on feels hostile.

Probably there's no way to gate, in that case I'd suggest not charging for it. Or I guess adding a daily usage limit that's lifted with an IAP.

I'll admit I was off-put by the price to begin with, which probably amplifies what a slap in the face it feels like to pay and get something that doesn't work at all.

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It's $1.99 and the description says:

The app requires a Pro iPhone with a minimum of 6GB of RAM. Only the following devices meet the requirement:

- iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 14 Pro, iPhone 13 Pro, iPhone 12 Pro.

- iPads: Please check. RAM varies based on model and year.

So if they know it wont work, and do not put that info into the store's compatibility matrix then it's still a bait/switch to me. Compare to the Resident Evil page which does set the store limits on what devices can dl it.

There is no way to specify iPhone models or memory capacity when submitting an app to App Store. Believe me - I spent several days trying.

You can set the minimum deployment to iOS 17 & then if someone has iPhone X*, 11 or SE then you can alert them to get a refund when they open the app either with a device check or total memory check. That'll set it so you remove most of the issues of older devices.

Source: https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/models-compatible-wit...

It's clearly spelled out, App Store refunds work more often than they don't...

...and it's a $1.99 risk ffs.

Tangential point: It's super easy to go off the rails and on a rant, while the real reason behind someone's "bait/switch" is external, trivial, and benign. We tend to judge others by their actions, but ourselves by our intentions. I used a German company's excellent sleep supplement (and later worked for that company, too) which was being bashed on Facebook as "non FDA approved snake oil". Meanwhile, the FDA refused (and still refuses) to even look at anything outside actual drugs, even if you wanted them to. Sometimes your hands are just tied.

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