Comment by patio11 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by patio11 | Hacker News Reader

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a) Apple hand-picked and b) everyone else

Apple-as-kingmaker (a sort of frequent model in Mac development, incidentally) is not obviously advantageous to indie developers. It works fantastically for those who are turned into kings, but it also guarantees that 99%+ of the population will remain serfs.

I tend to think "gaming the App Store" is another way to say "giving Apple what they want". The problem is, well, Apple wants churn. (Or, if they don't want churn, they're incompetent, because they've designed a near-perfect system for encouraging it. I don't think Apple is incompetent.)

Pick your favorite useless app which costs $1 and only hold's someone's attention for a day, while they show it to friends to say "Hah, look what I can do with my iPhone." Maybe your favorite example is farting, or a flashlight, or jiggling various bits of the anatomy, whatever. Whatever it is, if it causes someone to talk to their friends and say "Hey guys, look what cool things I can do on my iPhone which you can't do with your lame phone" then that app is anything but useless to Apple.

Many people think that the App Store sells applications. To quote the best line of a bad fantasy TV show: That is its function, but not its purpose. Its purpose is to sell iPhones.

(Ditto for iTunes.)

I think you overestimate Apple's competence... or, more specifically, the breadth of the fields to which applies.

Apple is very competent at making things for consumers, and not particularly good at working with developers or corporate IT.

I tend to agree that the App Store is being used by Apple as a tool to market more iPhones and not as a way for the iPhone to become a successful software platform for developers. But I think that's more because Apple is flailing to figure out how exactly the App Store should work; remember that it wasn't originally planned to exist at all. Companies need practice at managing developer ecosystems in the same way that individuals need practice at any other skill.

I feel that Apple made the App Store without really predicting or understanding how it would work out. When it turned out to be a great marketing tool for the iPhone but not a very good platform, Apple used the "There's an app for that" slogan. Making the hardware attractive to consumers was the App Store's strongest feature... naturally enough, for a system built by a company that earns alls its money by making hardware attractive to consumers.

When all you have is a hammer, only the nail-shaped parts of your product ever really get done. The rest becomes secondary by fait accompli, not necessarily as part of a master plan.

I agree, I've spoken with someone from their developer relations and he quietly told me how much of a mess the AppStore department of Apple is. Everyone is running around like a chicken with their head cut off.

They made the AppStore by copy/pasting the music store, hence .99 pricing pressure and hit-driven nature that it's become. Sure, there was some planning and the iPhone truly is a brilliant device -- but the AppStore was not a deep thought.

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