Am I mistaken or is the premise: I don't like that users have an opinion about my app?
He explains why the request for ratings exists in the post. I'll never review a well known brand if they pester me, but go out of my way to make time for indies (including real world shops) when they do.
Let's all be a little less entitled.
I'm sure it's frustrating to put the work into building an app with several features only to receive a one-star review because a user feels slighted by one specific behavior, but this is how users have been trained to behave because it's the only lever of power the users have. Writing a thoughtful and detailed feature request or bug report is often a fool's errand. Users just give the app 1 star and move on.
There are already commenters proudly declaring they abuse the system because there is just no incentives not to.
Just because you don't like the value system of your users doesn't mean you get to call them false or fake. Good product managers LISTEN to their users. You clearly are not willing to do that, despite the now overwhelming validation of your users complaints you are receiving.
How do you know it's accurate, when you haven't used my app? That's actually not accurate. I don't have a nag screen.
But your paid for app does request a rating when using it? That’s what people call a nag screen
Yes.
> That’s what people call a nag screen
No. Where do you get "screen from?
Ironically, there are some comments here that suggest I do the something that I'm in fact doing already:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49099655
> So put a "hey, a rating really helps" somewhere in the app that doesn't interrupt?
> The bottom of the dashboard. Top of settings. A banner that shows up after a while. Let me permanently say no; none of the passive-aggressive "maybe later" shit.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49102435
> Well, not covering content helps.
People read the single word "nag" and assumed something much worse than the reality. If you define "nag" as any request for a review, regardless of the form in which it appears, then you could say that it nags, but as soon as you start talking about a nag screen, covering content, a modal dialog, etc., that's a totally inaccurate depiction of what my app does.
If you write a blog post over a negative review accusing you of nagging, I would expect you to say “actually I’m not really nagging, I just have a line saying to please leave a rating in my app” if that’s the case. If you instead double down and make excuses and advocate to just ban the reviews because you don’t like user reviews anyways, it sounds like you’re actually wrong and the rating is correct.
And I’m not surprised that readers don’t proactively go out and look for your app to check themselves before criticizing you.
This is itself a misunderstanding of the blog post.
There's a whole setup where I talk about my other blog post from the previous day, Apple App Store curation, and the origin of the App Store from the iTunes Music Store. Why do you think I wrote all of that?
And then after I mention my review, I immediately move on to mention another developer's review, which was not about nagging.
If you think my blog post was about me responding to that one review, then you've missed most of the paragraphs in the blog post.
I'm critiquing the system, but people want to turn it into a simple personal complaint. That's missing the point. I've been consistently criticizing the App Store for years: https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2026/1/9.html Of course I have personal experience with the system, and bring that into my blog posts, but I'm speaking about common problems.
In this case I agree with the system. I wouldn't want Apple start removing reviews based on arbitrary fuzzy feelings or logic.
> I wouldn't want Apple start removing reviews based on arbitrary fuzzy feelings or logic.
That's not what I'm talking about. And actually, Apple already selectively censors App Store reviews. Did you know that Apple actually reviews and approves user reviews before they're published?
I would abolish crowdsourced ratings and reviews entirely, not selectively.
The #140th most popular free app, StudentVUE, has an abysmal 2.1 star rating.
The app for my soundbar has a 1.8 star rating.
The app that my favorite karaoke bar uses to sign up has a 2.3 star rating.
Whether you live or die by App Store ratings depends on your chosen business model.
That is the risk you take when you spam the user with popups begging for a review after a specific action. If the user isn't satisfied with the result or the popup disrupt their flow, they will (rightfully) be in a bad mood when they review your app.
> Indie developers can’t win in the App Store. Since we’re mostly unknown to the public, we need positive App Store ratings and reviews for our apps to encourage purchases. If we don’t request ratings from all users, then the self-initiated ratings tend to be disproportionately people with a complaint rather than satisfied users
But I'd also say basic ratings of all kinds ... sort of stink for the same reason(s).