Hanchor LLC

Happy to announce that Vegas Mate 3.1 is on the App Store.

This Two Way post has all the info.

That’s a smaller number than I would have guessed… Also, hi Spanish people!

I’ve got a simple, fairly niche app on the Mac App Store called ‘BetaBuilder for iOS Apps‘ (it was called ‘iOS BetaBuilder’ but Apple freaked out about the iOS in the front instead of at the end and asked me to change it). It’s a developer focused tool that’s designed to make it easier to do over-the-air beta distributions for iPhone and iPad apps. Yes, kinda like TestflightApp.com (great service, BTW). The main difference is that BetaBuilder is designed to be self-hosted, in the event that’s important for your biz. BetaBuilder actually slightly pre-dates TestFlight but they’re built on the same iOS 4.0 improvements.

I recently did some advertising on a popular podcast that is listened to by many in the Mac and iOS developer communities. I was thinking it would be a good way to boost BetaBuilder out of the gate and while I’ve never really thought of BB as being a real product, I was assuming that I could at least cover the cost of the advertising and raise the profile a bit (more on the difficulty of making back the investment of an advertising buy with a $2 app in another post).

The host of the show did a great job and things seemed to be going well that first day – I watched the app climb in it’s category, ‘Developer Tools’ all afternoon. It passed apps like BBEdit and Coda on the ‘Top Paid’ chart (supposedly based on number of sales, not revenue, though we don’t know for sure what the algorithm is). Holy crap! BareBones and Panic are pretty much the top of the Cocoa pyramid – their success is inspirational for all of us trying to make useful products for users. The only thing that would have been more thrilling would have been to pass Apple’s Xcode (not likely and didn’t happen).

At the end of that Monday, I couldn’t wait to see the AppFigures.com report in the morning. I was excited enough that it was a little hard to sleep that night. When the report came in the next day, I was surprised: 11 copies had sold. Eleven. I had made enough money to buy a pizza… as long as it was a small one… without toppings (the screenshot says #7 but it actually peaked at #6 during that afternoon).

This was the first app I’d put into the Mac App Store. As a developer on Apple platforms, all of my experience was on iOS where I’ve been fortunate enough to see some success. I had done custom WebObjects work back around 2005-ish but when but when it came to commercial apps, my only real experience was the massive volume we see on iPhone and iPad side. A similar sales position in many of the iOS store categories would be at least a few hundred bucks per day and for the more competitive categories, in the thousands if not more. There’s massive volume on the iOS App Store. Massive.

I’m sure there are lots of reasons why my advertising investment wasn’t a net positive: niche product with a limited developer audience, another competing product that’s quite well done… or maybe the lack of a developer track record on the Mac platform. I’m not really upset about shelling out for advertising that didn’t have a big impact – that’s just the way it goes sometimes and this post isn’t about that.

What I think is interesting is the low volume, at least in this category on the Mac App Store. Apps like Coda and BBEdit are selling fewer than 11 copies per day through this channel? Even at their far higher prices ($99.99/each or ~$69.99 after Apple’s cut), that means they’re raking in less than $300k per year? Certainly nothing to sneeze at but if correct, these are high-profile products from shops with multiple employees – they’re not single developer outfits.

As far as I know, Apple hasn’t released any stats on the Mac App Store since the day after it opened. Maybe that’s because they’re not that all that great. As a user, I love the convenience of the Mac App Store – I setup a new machine recently and for the apps purchased through that channel, it was super easy to get going. I hope all my software is delivered this way in the future.

That said, if this is the future of Mac apps, based on my experience it seems like it has a ways to go.

On 5by5′s Daily Edition last week, there was a section of the show where Dan, Jen and special guest Dave Findlay were talking about apps on iOS, specifically what makes an app ‘native’. There was a little bit of debate on the show with Jen suggesting that some folks would argue that any app  that’s in the App Store can be called native.

For me, this is simple: a native app is code that calls directly to the vendor-supplied OS frameworks. On iOS, this means apps that directly reference UIKit, et al. This does not include Web apps – JavaScript calls inside a UIWebView for something like geo-location have to go and then talk to CoreLocation under the hood. Adding this level of abstraction means shedding the native moniker.

This direct communication means faster, better performing apps that can use system supplied (and heavily optimized) UI widgets. Apps that ‘cheat’ and use HTML5 based interfaces seem to always feel ‘weird’. Look at the recently released HBO Go app on iPad – the UI is clearly at least partially built using HTML (they were able to deploy on Android as well, almost certainly a benefit of this approach). The downside in the case of the HBO app is that for anyone that cares at all about UI, it just feels totally off. If the app wasn’t primarily used for watching video (where this kind of UI suckage matters less), I’d delete it off my iPad.

Native apps: the only way to go.

It only took three months but I’m happy to share that BetaBuilder is now on the Mac App Store! You can purchase it here:

BetaBuilder for iOS Apps on the Mac App Store

Yes, I did decide to charge $1.99 for the app. That decision won’t impact the source code availability – it’s still on GitHub and will remain there. The $2 bucks is a way to support the project and say thanks if you feel so inclined.

Anyway, this was a long time coming and I’m happy to see it up there now!

I got my ticket and hotel situation for WWDC 2011 all set – can’t wait.

If you’re going to be in San Francisco that week, love to meetcha for a beer.

A friend of mine, Eric, started talking today about potentially switching from iPhone to Android.

I don’t know if this is a good change for him or not – there are some people that fall into Android’s sweet spot (though I think far fewer than the sales numbers would indicate – many customers pick carrier first and until recently, that often meant Android).

What I am confident in is that for me, Android isn’t the best choice. This is a good opportunity to explain why.

First off, I should inform you: I own an HTC Nexus One that I bought the first day it went on sale. I was Android-curious and it was a way to see what all the fuss was about. I don’t regret that purchase but it never made it into daily rotation either. These opinions are based on it and Android 2.2.2.

My online life isn’t dominated by Google. I do use Google Search and other services like Maps but unlike others for whom Gmail and their Google ID are really important, I don’t rely on them for all that much. If you’re an avid Gmailer, Android has a great client for you. If you’re not… well, there’s a second email client (WTF is up with two apps for email, BTW?) you could use. Unfortunately, it pretty much sucks compared to the Gmail app. Far fewer features and occasionally flakey IMAP connections. I have 8 email accounts and only one is hosted at Gmail. I’m not interested in maintaining two email apps on my phone and having most of my email running through a second rate client is not attractive.

In some respects, the UI design feels like the Soviet-made cousin of iOS. Where the iPhone has an elastic band effect when you reach the end of a scrollable view, Android just ends. After using iOS for awhile, it feels very stark. This kind of thing is found all over the place. I’m sure some people don’t care or even notice this stuff but for me, it’s something that adds up. As I said today on Twitter – the Android UI is death by a million paper cuts.

Moving off of iPhone would mean no more AppleTV remote, no more iTunes protected content and no more App Store. These things matter to me. I have a large investment in iTunes content and I’d like to be able to continue to play it on my mobile devices. Since the release of iOS 4.2, I’ve also gotten pretty into AirPlay (a technology allowing you to stream media content from an iOS device to an AppleTV). I’m not willing to give these up.

When it comes to apps, there are quite a few iOS exclusives that are part of my daily routine. Some, like Instagram and Reeder, are just for fun but others, such as OmniFocus, Instapaper and Simplenote are a critical part of my workflow. They don’t exist on Android and switching to other, similar apps would mean giving up the integration I enjoy with my tablet and desktop machines. It’s just not worth it… And let’s not even mention Netflix. Sure, it’s supposed to be coming to Android eventually but only on certain devices. Who knows if my Nexus One will be on the preferred list.

Since I’m also using an iOS based tablet, many of my apps are what Apple calls ‘Universal’ – they run on both platforms with optimized UIs on each. This is another significant advantage to sticking with iPhone.

I have been begging people to show me examples of fantastic Android-only apps for a long time but I’ve yet to see one. If you know of one, please, let me know. I tried to launch Android Market tonight to see what was new and popular. The app ended up in an endless crash cycle that even a reboot couldn’t resolve. Hmmm.

This post isn’t about developer tools or APIs (don’t get me started – only RIM has worse tools than what Google is giving developers) but I have to say that the fragmentation of Android OS versions does bother me. My Nexus One is telling me that the 2.2.2 version it is running is the latest. That’s obviously not the case (as of this writing, 2.3.3 is current). After watching what has gone on with Windows Phone 7 and it’s updates, it seems that Apple is the only vendor that can make this process work properly. That’s too bad – it’s nice to know you’ve got the latest features and bug fixes across all of your devices.

It doesn’t help Android’s case that in some of the areas that it is strong, I simply don’t care about it’s capabilities. Sure, you can replace the Android dialer with something custom, put tons of distracting information on your home screen or choose from any number of multiple app stores based on your preference. These are not compelling features for me.

I’m over thirty and what little spare time I have, I don’t want to spend it fucking with some setting on my phone. In my book, the endless customization and configuration options are a negative, not a positive. I want something that just works – I grew out of tinkering a long time ago.

Design is about curation and making choices – it’s about being opinionated. Android often likes to punt on those hard decisions and leave it up to the user. ‘Hey, let’s put it in preferences’ is not the same thing as having an opinion. Don’t get me started on the mis-use of Android’s ‘menu’ button – in many apps, it’s like the kitchen drawer filled with crap that you never get around to cleaning out. The stuff that doesn’t fit anywhere else. Ouch.

Of course, the above list doesn’t mean iOS is perfect – far from it. I have a long list of things I’d change if I had the power to do so. One of those items that is on pretty much every user’s list is the notification system. Get multiple alerts on an iPhone and not only do they take over the entire screen but dismiss one and you’ve lost them all. This is a pretty sorry way to solve this problem.

Android gives you a notification center of sorts, punctuated by a seemingly endless stream of meaningless icons in the top status bar. For the record, while I think the iOS way of handling this stinks, the Android version isn’t the ‘right’ way to do this either. In some ways, it’s almost as lazy as the iOS solution. I have a feeling Apple is going to improve their setup but I also think that Goggle has closed the book on this issue in Android.

Those are just a few of the reasons that Android doesn’t feel like a good fit for me. This post isn’t supposed to be about what is better for you or for someone else. I honestly don’t really care if you’re happy with your smartphone… I just care that I am with mine.

Cheers!

Did the whole wait-in-line thing and picked up my iPad 2. So far, I dig it – amazing how fast it seems.

As for my apps, Vegas Mate runs so well on the new device, even some of the gnarly table views that pull data from multiple Core Data entities scroll like they were pre-made bitmaps. Pretty awesome.

If you need to decode JSON and you’re not using JSONKit, you’re making a huge mistake. It’s by far the fastest parser I’ve found, almost as fast as binary PLIST (so close, there’s no reason to switch away from JSON).

Dig it.

https://github.com/johnezang/JSONKit

Yesterday, Apple dropped the equivalent of an atomic bomb on App Store developers whose apps feature content subscriptions. The App Store now supports subscriptions via the In-App Purchase mechanism. For everyone from Netflix to Bob’s Valentine Cards, this is officially a ‘big fucking deal’.

As expected, this news provoked the typical anti-Apple reactions as rabid Internetizens commented on the company’s perceived motivations: greed, control and, well, greed. As a developer that’s lived with the App Store’s 70/30 split for a few years, perhaps I’m a little more conditioned to accept this sort of arrangement. The whole ‘Apple is evil’ trope is incredibly boring and not worthy of anyone really doing any thinking about these issues. My first reaction was not to foam at the mouth but for whatever reason, I couldn’t get the details out of my head.

Being on the App Store has been great for my app, Vegas Mate. Without it, I doubt I could have reached the many tens of thousands of users that I’ve sold copies to. Search for ‘vegas’ in the App Store and Vegas Mate is the first result. That’s extremely valuable when there are millions of potential customers with credit card numbers already on file. 70% of a big stream of sales is a lot better deal than 100% of zero.

In a perfect world, this new subscription model will provide the ‘missing link’ that has so far eluded magazines and other periodicals on the App Store. Despite some strong starts, many of the banner publications have reported declining sales since launch. It’s hard for a subscriber to the print edition of ‘The Economist’ to justify paying again for the digital version but up until now, that’s what was required. In App Subscriptions will solve all that.

So, publishers must be excited, right? Well, not exactly. I’m sure some may be but there have been some pretty vocal dissenters as well… and it’s not just the 30% thing. The other issue is access to subscriber data such as email address, zip code and demographic info. For decades, these publishers have used this data to sell their advertising and who knows what else. Apple is willing to make this available but only if a user has explicitly allowed it. Without some kind of discount incentive, I bet that opt-in rate ends up being close to 10% if not lower.

Apple’s new system, while potentially offering an upswing in subscribers, is incredibly disruptive for traditional publishers and their classic model.

Will jilted publishers run into the arms of competing tablet makers? Maybe they’ll try. 2011 should bring competing offerings from Motorola, HPalm and others. Will this work out well for them? I think that’s far less certain. Show me the big content success stories on platforms like Android. Even the uber-popular Angry Birds is advertising based when running on Google’s smartphone platform. Apple seems to still have the monopoly on users that actually are willing to pay for stuff.

For existing content sellers that have apps in the store that are going to be impacted by this, I’m sympathetic. Some of the business models around that content simply won’t support 30% going to Apple. That’s a real problem – if apps like Amazon’s Kindle and Netflix leave the App Store, customers will notice and that could translate into cascading trouble for the platform if left unchecked.

For new businesses that want to sell content, it’s no big deal – they’ll just factor these costs into their overall profit modeling and move on, putting their wares in front of millions of users that can purchase through a trusted, easy to use platform.

I’ve reviewed the new App Store guidelines and while I haven’t yet shipped anything with In App Purchase, from the perspective of a developer, I really like the system Apple’s built. It’s super convenient for users and fairly simple to implement. I think that MG Siegler is right when he says that it could be the best subscription management system ever conceived.

Despite the fact I think the new In-App Purchase subscriptions could end up being a hit with customers, I’ve been stewing on this news since it was announced and I just can’t get past the fact that 30% feels excessive for this type of content especially on a recurring basis. Is it too much? We’ll see – the market may force a correction, be it through device sales, the number of apps being published or overall developer interest in the platform.

What would a correction look like? The simplest thing would be to lower the percentage for this type of content. Moving down to 10% or even lower would go a long way to calm the hordes.

What about dropping the ‘price match’ rule that requires subscriptions to be priced the same both inside and outside of the app? This would then rely on users picking the In-App Purchase version just because it’s easier. Depending on the cost difference, this would probably be enough for many people and it would certainly make content providers chill out a bit.

Removing the ‘no linking to external stores’ rule would probably be welcomed by publishers but it alone wouldn’t be enough in the cases where there simply isn’t 30% margin to give to Apple.

Yesterday’s press release makes me wonder if Apple is overplaying their hand. We’ll see.

The other issue here is NFC (near field communication). If the rumors about NFC coming to iOS this year are true, there’s no way that Apple could get away with a 30% transaction fee for facilitating transactions in a world that’s dominated by credit card fees of 2.5%.

One unfortunate side-effect of the above is uncertainty in the marketplace. No one is quite sure how these changes will impact existing and future apps and as anyone can tell you, uncertainty is bad for business.

A bug fix release of Vegas Mate, 3.0.1, is now in the App Store.

This update deals with a few problems that were discovered after 3.0 shipped. It also reduces memory consumption in a few places and includes re-worked input controllers for several of the trip related screens. It was nice to be able to clean those up – they look nicer and are easier to use.

Next up will be a feature update, likely 3.1. I’ve been working to do less frequent releases as they’re very disruptive to App Store rating scores, etc…

In other news, Apple today announced the details of the subscription extensions to In App Purchase. I think this is going to be very interesting – I’ve already got a few projects that might benefit from this sort of system. More to come!