No, really?

A good friend sent me a link to this unintentionally hilarious article about pricing on the iPhone App Store.

I burst out laughing at the writer's tone of utter outrage. App developers are charging the price the market will bear, and it is lower than his moral intuition tells him it should be?

The list of "complaints" in this article is hilarious:
  1. People used to sell apps for $50/year on Windows. When they moved to the iPhone, the optimal strategy was to sell it for $10/year. Therefore they sell it for $10/year. NO, REALLY?
  2. "Not all of the people investing time and money in their products are reaping the returns they expected." NO, REALLY?
  3. Someone had to price his app not on the basis of how much work he put in, but on the basis of what people would pay for it. NO, REALLY?
  4. The top ten apps list (which is based on the number of items sold, like every other top ten list in the world) is dominated by cheap applications and not by expensive ones. NO, REALLY?
  5. As there are more developers and more apps doing the same thing, prices are falling. NO, REALLY?
  6. Someone submitted an app, and Apple recommended they cut the price in order to get more sales. They did cut it, and they got more sales. NO, REALLY?
  7. If someone writes an app for the 50 million Apple users and is considering a port to Palm's 500,000 users, they'll think twice about it. NO, REALLY?
Extensive guffawing ensued at the entitlement mentality of this guy. What is the conspiracy here? What is Apple supposed to have done differently? What sort of world does he want us to live in?

Comments

PunditusMaximus said…
Most of that article is ridiculous, but the part about the silliness of people complaining about spending three bucks for software was valid. People do have weird attachments to "free."
6 November 2009 at 04:49
Leigh Caldwell said…
sure...but there's no point in the guy whining about it. People do have an attachment to free, and you won't sell a lot of twitter clients when there are free ones available.

Of course it's equally silly for people to complain about the app not being free - they should just not buy it. The entitlement mentality goes both ways, it seems.
6 November 2009 at 08:25
PunditusMaximus said…
Enh, I feel a bit of his pain. The App Store is a bit of a Wild West for developers right now.

That said, yes, he's being silly. But, again, how is someone supposed to make money in an environment where one gets hate mail for charging three bucks for a software program?
9 November 2009 at 05:07
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