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Comment by angerman | Hacker News Reader

While I do feel the sentiments against paying again for a successor, it makes me feel sick[1]. It's 5 bucks; generously about two coffees. After apple takes it's cut the developer receives about US$3.5, just how many copies does the developer need to sell to make it a worthwhile venture? Reeder has been in the AppStore since September '09, until it went free in June '13. That's, in todays terms, 3.75years of support and updates for an app that cost's US$5 today. If Reeder2 takes the same path, that would be about US$1 per year taxable income to the developer.

[1]: I think this will become even more apparent over the next few years. Buy once for 99c, get lifetime updates is no sustainable business model.

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http://www.joshlehman.com/thoughts/stop-using-the-cup-of-cof...

Thanks for posting that; I hadn't seen it before, and it does a pretty good job of covering the problem that analogy brings with it.

There aren't too many businesses where the customer is asked to take the business' health in mind when it comes to purchasing. Your lack of planning is not my problem and such.

The real issue is there is a mindset of unlimited free upgrades in iTunes that app developers are benefiting from at the first purchase. Reeder got a bunch of buyers who most likely assumed free updates for life and were not told otherwise. Charging for updates is fine, but some backlash is going to come due to the fact you benefited from the status quo while not participating in the status quo.

I agree with this sentiment completely. Too often people assume that buying a product is equivalent to making a charitable donation to the developer. I don't buy software to "support" the developer, I buy it because it will provide value to me. I don't care if the developer makes $10 or $10 million. The only things that pass my mind when buying software are the utility of the app to me and the cost relative to other apps. In the case of Reeder, the additional charge from paying for an upgrade is not worth it when the Feedly App is free.

Commerce is not charity. That does not change just because the developer is self-employed.

I don't know, I understand your point but personally I do feel different about a small indipendent shop and a bigger company and I have different expectations from them. Smaller operations are always sustaining bigger risks and don't have as much wiggle room (and we know how high the risks are for apps these days).

You may say that's because I'm a developer too (though not indipendent), but I feel the same way about other fields, I like to buy my clothes in small stores instead of malls or eat at a local restaurant instead of a chain.

Usually my experience is better with smaller operations but in this specific case I think the Reeder author hasn't communicated very well and should have been more transparent from the beginning. Still, for the reasons above, I'm less likely to be really pissed at him than I would be to some large company that did the same.

I think what's annoying to me is also that they were so opaque with their plans. They could have said "we'll be releasing a new version for money that will have the new feed sources in it."

But instead, they kind of half-supported feedbin et al in the iPhone app and then there was radio silence... And in the meantime, with zero information, I wasted money buying a bunch of other reader apps... Which I would not have done if I'd known they were coming up with this.

Feels like they were not transparent and, well, wholesome about their plans or vision.

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