I actually did this policy to get one of my apps in the store. As more people eventually use it (and presumably good reviews roll in), I anticipate that I will be able to remove the features which I didn't think were needed.
On the other hand, I really don't like the idea of apple having editorial review over apps for being too simple. The only app which I feel might be too simple is an additional fart or flashlight app. And I'm still inclined to let those be distributed in some way (if not directly through the app store process).
>I anticipate that I will be able to remove the features which I didn't think were needed.
This is a really bad idea. While you might think that its impossible, some of your users are going to absolutely love the useless functionality that you added to appease Apple. When you remove it, you are going to receive an influx of 1-star reviews.
I think you can make moderately safe choice if you have the usage data. I.e. if you see 0.5% of active users use some functionality, you can remove it. It can help rest of the users (make the app more simple) and you as well (smaller code base). Also adds possibility to add another feature without cluttering the app.
> The implication behind this statement is that if most users don't use something, the one's that do don't find it useful.
Not at all. The implication is that if few people use a feature, few people will be affected if you remove it. They may be really, really upset, but there won't be many of them.
Would you refund those people automatically after removing the feature they use? Since this is not anymore the same value proposition as before. One small feature can make the whole app not anymore worthy those original 1.99$ user paid for.
Can we get rid of the absurd disgust over the huge price of 99 cents people pay for apps? If he thinks the app is better being simpler, let him make his app better. It doesn't matter if he "offers" a refund or not. They can ask Apple for one, and Apple will give it to them. Don't act like the guy is a jerk for removing a feature he deems unnecessary because someone might be upset over the 12 cents of value lost when it very well could improve the experience of the other 99.5% of his users.
I'm sorry, but for 99 cents you don't get complete control over my time and decision making process. Feel free to make suggestions, but for the love of God don't "tell me" that "I need" to make feature X for you. I particularly enjoy 1-3 star reviews that say it's great but it needs X to improve review. As if they would actually come back and change it when it gets X. I promise they don't.
Noone is complaining about 99¢, but the principle stays. One small feature that noone except me uses if removed makes the product/service unusable for me. I could have paid 99€, I could have paid 99$ or 999%, it doesn't matter for the topic.
If you remove that one feature under my feet, the app is to me worth nothing. I would be ok using the old version of application that still has that feature, but in case of a service or phone app where I simply can't use the old version or easily rollback to the one, I would ask for refund, regardless of the original price.
You could set the release data of the app like 2 weeks in the future and have some sort of webservice that you use to enable or disable app features. You could disable the bogus features after the app has passed Apple's review, but before the app is visible to end-users.
Legally so, but not rightly so. Apple has arbitrary and unreasonable rules. They are not in a morally justified position when they exert those rules, even though they are legally able to.
Now, in this case, it is obvious what the right move is for the developer. They have to ship their app on android or windows phone instead of iphone. If apple refuses entry into their walled garden, the developers should take their app and go somewhere else. If enough apps do this and become popular, apple will change their rules.
I think it's still rightly so on Apple's part: Apple can set the rules however they like because the App Store is their playground. If you want to play there you have to abide by their rules - even if those rules are contradictory or arbitrary.
I do agree that developers should take their apps to other platforms (most notably Android). I don't expect Apple will change their rules, but customers may switch to other devices. I've personally switched from iPhone to Nexus 5 because some of the apps & features I wanted were blocked by Apple.
Apple's rules aren't arbitrary, they are built around a fairly clear set of aims about which Apple have been fairly public. You may disagree with those aims but that doesn't mean the rules are unreasonable or arbitrary.
I'd also say that as an iOS user and an Apple customer, one of the things I like about the AppStore is that there is a degree of curation, that they do have rules. I don't agree with all of those rules but over time the rules have improved and, on balance, I personally like the end result more than the alternative.
What is more arguable as unreasonable is that the AppStore is the only means of loading Apps to your phone without a developer license but I don't think changing the AppStore is the right solution.
Personally I'd argue that sideloading should be possible (though would need to be enabled somewhere down in the guts of the settings with warnings and all), but I wouldn't change the AppStore which is a service with a specific aim which it meets pretty well.
Because it fits. Do you think that Wal-Mart doesn't have rules for vendors?
Perhaps Apple is more mercurial and arbitrary. But the institutional arrogance is the same.
As a manufacturer, Wal-Mart is your best friend and worst enemy. They pay you promptly and order lots of stuff. But they demand steep discounts and punish you harshly if you fail to meet commitments, and you must be able to rapidly ramp up your supply chain when their demand grows.
Your analogy only address's the issue form the consumers point of view.
What about if you make a product, should you be able to force a distributor to carry your product?
It functions as such. Developers make a product, they convince Apple to stock that product, and Apple takes a cut when they sell it. You can argue that it shouldn't be like that, but you can't really argue that it ISN'T like that.
The only thing you can really argue is that they should allow other app stores to exist that aren't under their control. And frankly, they do exist on jailbroken phones and if you want that you can jailbreak your phone, or get an Android.
I once had someone pitch me an idea for an app, which coincidentally I had actually built and was selling on the app store. He wasn't willing to pay 99cents for it (but had previously been willing to quit his job to make it hypothetically with me).
I hear app ideas all the time. I think at least a third of the time I can pull out my phone and find an app that does that already. If they haven't even looked at competitors, they're not serious. I've learned that one quick way to filter people is to ask to see what apps are on their phone. If it's just Facebook and Angry Birds, they're useless.
Out of all the app pitches I've heard, I'd say 33% are already done reasonably well by other apps. Maybe 25% or more are not possible to do on the iPhone (but sometimes on Android). At least 90% have a marketing plan of "just put it in the store and wait for the sales to explode."
Rdl is correct. Smart people often get hired by small firms which do contract work for government organizations. It allows the smart people to live outside of the hierarchy imposed by a large institution.
The motivations are very similar to startups working outside of larger companies. You get more freedom in work choices and pay scale.
I mean I am overstating the case for effect here, and I am sure there are small cliques of competent people hidden within big organizations everywhere, but if this were a government official project, it wouldn't have been done by those people. I knew brilliant people in the military in Iraq, but they weren't brilliant due to their jobs. If we did awesome stuff on the side it wouldn't have been a product of the US government.
Government also discourages small side projects, especially in the classified world, and particularly discourages them from becoming production. They would far prefer to run a program of record, or pay for (well defined) innovation by third parties.
Oh, I've been using EC2 + S3 for five years (2007). I was looking in to the newer stuff (beanstalk, dynamodb).
Please add your feedback to the details pads so other people can use it in the future. That is why I posted it on hackpad and not my blog.
EDIT: thanks for the feedback.
Sorry if I wasn't clear of the purpose. I don't love the Amazon documentation and wish people would use Hackpad instead because it would be more up to date.
This is my effort to bootstrap that step by providing and overview and details rather than googling old blog entries ever time I want to setup EC2 with ubuntu.
Do you have any specific criticisms of our documentation that I can pass along to our team? Do you want more, less, or something different? Feel free to post or contact me via the email address in my profile.
> were 33% more likely to achieve them than those that merely formulated goals.
I've heard this before and I've also heard the exact opposite. That telling other people your goals reduces the chances of finishing them. The theory I remember (I google but was unable to find a good link) was that telling someone a goal feels 60% as good as actually doing the goal itself. So it is easier to just tell everyone your goals and then invent new goals.
I'm not trying to contradict Alex Maccaw. I've just noticed this dichotomy before and been curious how people reconcile the two theories.
Has anyone else noticed these two recommendations or know what I'm referring to?
I can't speak to the accuracy of the studies he's quoting here, but Derek Sivers talks about this in a post on his blog (https://sivers.org/zipit). Central quotes:
"Once you've told people of your intentions, it gives you a “premature sense of completeness.”"
"You have “identity symbols” in your brain that make your self-image. Since both actions and talk create symbols in your brain, talking satisfies the brain enough that it “neglects the pursuit of further symbols.”"
But, as others have pointed out, what Alex is talking about is (I believe) more of a list for your own benefit, rather than a publicly-shared list.
When I was five I asked this question and got a simple answer. I'm not an economist so it is probably incompletely or completely wrong.
If you notice that your money is worth more tomorrow, you are going to save your money and spend it tomorrow. This is true in situations of "deflation".
This sounds good to you, because all you have to do is wait and you'll be better off tomorrow. You don't even have to work to get more stuff.
However, you aren't the only person with this idea. Everyone saves their money in the bank. The people who sell goods and services, sell fewer goods, and maybe go out of business.
The economy slows down.
On the other side, if you design an economy so that inflation exists. People want to spend because in the future their money will be worth (a little bit) less.
Money flows around a lot. People who sells things make money and stay in business. People have jobs and the money is still worth something.
Remember money isn't worth something, trading good fluidly and efficiently is worth something. Money lets us do that. So a currency that lets us do that is good.
If anyone knows more about the situation, please add it. I don't know any economists so this story is probably pretty incomplete.
I'm not asking a deep economic question. I'm saying, why would any real business accept payments in a currency that overtly and deliberately penalizes them for holding that currency when alternatives that don't do that are even more available? It just makes no sense to me.
Because the customer wants to pay in freicoins, and tools exist (or will exist - I'm talking from the future) to make acceptance hassle-free, and the value will be stable long enough to convert into the currency of your choice.
(Of course the macroeconomic recession-proof nature of demurrage currency makes it desirable for merchants as well, and the zero-interest loans are a boon for entrepreneurship. I'm just saying even if you're skeptical, that shouldn't be a barrier to acceptance.)
Why would anyone want to make an interest free loan with an arms length party? I understand that from time to time these things happen, like KIVA, but seriously why would I lend out my money for the opportunity of not getting it back?
Then add appropriate interest representative of the risk you are taking on.
When we say zero-interest, we're talking about basic interest/liquidity premium: the interest which is attached to loans simply because of the opportunity cost of lending, not the risk taken on.
I don't get it either, interest isn't inherent to a currency, when I hold dollar bills I don't accrue interest, but if I put them in a bank, or other security they do.
That's taking the argument to an unrealistic extreme. Rather, non-zero interest rates and resulting inflation/deflation incentivize market inefficiencies. Not a big enough inefficiency to drive an industry out of business (unless we're talking hyperinflation), but enough to be measurable consequences.
But if this were true, wouldn't we be in deep trouble as soon as just one deflating currency or commodity existed? All wealth would be hoarded in the form of that one thing. And gold exists.
Even if you are correct and the existence of gold is detrimental to the economy, I don't see how you can prevent the effects of an existing devaluating currency/commodity by creating a new inflating one.
Well there is also this theory that people saving their money are actually giving a gift to the economy. They gave something they received money for in return, if they don't spend that money they basically sold their goods for free.
On the other hand, I really don't like the idea of apple having editorial review over apps for being too simple. The only app which I feel might be too simple is an additional fart or flashlight app. And I'm still inclined to let those be distributed in some way (if not directly through the app store process).