love that this was built from the Apollo developer. Obviously incredibly talented.
Also, Christian can’t help himself but attach his apps to large companies that can cut him off overnight. Haha.
They do. But it's difficult to call anything they make "smooth." Google does some decent backend stuff but their frontend experience is not.
The YouTube Music app blocks you from navigating to a different song at the same time as playing a track if it decides that the track is primarily aimed at under 18s (such as the theme from a retro cartoon).
It's UI might charitably be described as a total catastrophe.
https://www.androidpolice.com/2020/01/30/why-youtube-videos-...
Also, I never encountered the problem you complain about.
To be fair the clock app is a lot better since they introduced the sleep schedule, but I used to have a separate alarm app, and still use Sleepytime to calculate wake up times.
Subjective, but I use both Android and iOS daily. Interesting byproduct of Android being the favorite of those obsessed with customization is that the stock apps are almost universally bad because everyone just replaces them with different niche alternatives.
It’s possible they might use this leverage to negotiate better terms on iOS. For example, Netflix would like to offer in app subscriptions and to keep more the revenue without sharing with Apple.
If Apple sells millions of visionOS devices then that gives Apple more leverage and these 3 might come crawling back.
Long answer - The Apple Vision Pro’s Missing Apps by Stratechery (https://stratechery.com/2024/the-apple-vision-pros-missing-a...)
Netflix already has that option[0] at a 15% commission rate, but they snubbed their nose. Allegedly because they didn’t want to play nice with the TV app, like other streamers do.
Personally I think it’s that (and the potential loss of data) + them just wanting to pay $0.
> Building a new app from scratch makes zero sense for the size of the install base. Only reason to ever do that would be to get some love back from Apple in the form of features and attention (which, for YouTube / Netflix / Spotify are hardly necessary) > Allowing YOUR iPad app to function on visionOS means that your customers will hold YOU responsible for its functioning. At the size of customer base of these companies, that's a bunch of risk for no reward > When your users use a browser that promises 'regular access to all websites' (built by Apple) to access your service, the responsibility for that experience lies with the browser builder, not you
There's 100% no negotiation over fees happening with individual developers, regardless of how big they are, regardless of what type of support for a platform they promise Apple, as that's exactly what has gotten Apple and Google in hot water with regulators worldwide.
Ben worded it well in the article:
"It’s certainly possible that I’m reading too much into these absences" < Yes
Operating system fatigue, supporting three native apps as well as apples own browser engine is a lot of engineering time.
End of the day Vision Pro needs YouTube more than YouTube needs it.
The app is almost entirely made up of tableviews/collection views/recycler views, save for the video player… really not rocket science. If YouTube’s public API were more capable I’m positive that third party devs would have no issue maintaining their YouTube apps across N platforms simply because they wouldn’t be overcomplicating them like Google is theirs.
I don't think the Youtube product managers really care enough about Vision Pro to prioritise making an app for it. That doesn't mean they strategically disgree with the product and actively wish to hamper it.
Indepedently of Vision Pro, I think they just might not be that enthusastic about third party youtube apps.
I'd say the lesson here is NOT to rely on official APIs.
However, upon reading this blog post, it does seem he's using the official API so I guess he thinks he'll be fine as long as he doesn't block ads. Time will tell.
The idea of strapping something to my face that's going to project ads into my eyeballs that I cannot look away from--well, let's say it's pretty clear technology took a wrong term some time ago.
Apple should do the right thing and enforce a strong "no ads" policy for this product. Keep it premium for people who shell out thousands of dollars for it.
So yeah I learned my lesson I should not resort to piracy, but start with it
Designing a great UX to interact with the system is the other key ingredient, that requires step 1 and also a great deal of creativity.
Anyone can copy same the features after someone as good as Christian Selig has made an app, Few can do similar or better starting on their own, especially indie developers, so he can always be ahead if he wants to.
Christian also chooses apps to work which are third party platform controlled for a reason I think. He can operate in markets like this as a extremely talented indie developer that very few competent teams with capital funding would attempt with platform risk. Beeper is the most recent example on Apple, Christian himself got burned in Reddit[1][2].
Finally he prices at a point so low that people are just paying for the brand - for a well designed reliable software which won't crash on them.
He likely will not lose all that much sales if a lower priced/free product comes out Safari browser based Youtube.com is already there .
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[1] He can afford to in the sense his monthly cash burn is very low compared to any normal company and he doesn't have 100's of employees to worry about if he gets kicked out.
[2] Even then he has carefully choose an API that Google will have a hard time just blocking him ( and not every other use of embedded playback), and he also is careful not to use APIs to render the UI he has just skinned the main website with light CSS.
The YouTube embed API supports ads, and works perfectly with Premium so Google are not losing any potential revenue with this app existing.
Sounds like Christian learned his lesson with his experience with Reddit: "don't get in the way of the company's ad revenue".
Your statement still stands though, you are ultimately correct.
> https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/171780?hl=en
The YouTube API Terms of Service and Developer Policies apply to all access and use of the YouTube embedded player.
> https://developers.google.com/youtube/terms/developer-polici...
You and your API Clients must not, and must not encourage, enable, or require others to:
use YouTube API Services to create, offer, or act as a substitute for, or substantially similar service to, any YouTube Applications. API Clients must not mimic or replicate YouTube's core user experiences by recreating features or process flows unless they add significant independent value or functionality that improves users' interactions with YouTube. For example, an API Client must not recreate the browse experience from any YouTube Application without adding significant independent value to that flow.
Specifically this appears to offer a better experience than what YouTube choose to offer.
It's called "Juno for YouTube" so they could definitely send a cease and desist for the YouTube trademark.
They’ll probably still send a C&D but it will be defensible.
"oh, he's entirely reliant on the platforms!"
Meanwhile, his cap table is himself, he does quite well, and doesn't owe anything to anybody.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/largest-spca-fund...