I'm not a Genius ... Fan
Ok, here we are again, talking about the App Store and how difficult is for small application development companies to make their applications visible. Of course, large companies do not have this problem, because they have marketing departments and huge marketing budgets.
In a previous post we where analyzing how the flood of new titles has created fierce competition among developers, and how most of the applications pass through the App Store unnoticed by users. In that post our recommendation to Apple was to borrow ideas from social networks like Facebook and MySpace (the have also a large number of applications, but small software developers have a real chance to get noticed).
In another post we explained our concerns (and gave to Apple a few recommendations) about the evaluation process, how to promote apps, and how to improve the app search engine.
An now we have iTunes 9, the new and improved version of iTunes. Has Apple listened to its developers? Well, it seems that the answer is yes, because the new iTunes has some important changes regarding to how apps are discovered. First, iTunes 9 changed the way apps are presented in its main page, with a larger scrolling section for new and noteworthy apps and more prominent promotional spots. Second they have expanded the top 100 list to 200, and they have added a "Top Grossing" list. Finally they have extended its Genius recommendation system to apps (buy the way, did I said I'm not a Genius fan?).
Nice changes. However independent developers are seriously worried about the impact of these changes. It seems that Apple is throwing more support behind big software development companies at the expense of the smaller ones. Several developers confirmed the worst, noting that their daily sales figures had declined following the release of iTunes 9.
OK, we can understand these movements of Apple, if they think that what the users want is less applications, but better quality. What we can not understand is why Apple makes so ease for newcomers to join the Apple Developers Program? What are they fostering, large studios, or small ones.
Coffee for all has never been a good business strategy.
In a previous post we where analyzing how the flood of new titles has created fierce competition among developers, and how most of the applications pass through the App Store unnoticed by users. In that post our recommendation to Apple was to borrow ideas from social networks like Facebook and MySpace (the have also a large number of applications, but small software developers have a real chance to get noticed).
In another post we explained our concerns (and gave to Apple a few recommendations) about the evaluation process, how to promote apps, and how to improve the app search engine.
An now we have iTunes 9, the new and improved version of iTunes. Has Apple listened to its developers? Well, it seems that the answer is yes, because the new iTunes has some important changes regarding to how apps are discovered. First, iTunes 9 changed the way apps are presented in its main page, with a larger scrolling section for new and noteworthy apps and more prominent promotional spots. Second they have expanded the top 100 list to 200, and they have added a "Top Grossing" list. Finally they have extended its Genius recommendation system to apps (buy the way, did I said I'm not a Genius fan?).
Nice changes. However independent developers are seriously worried about the impact of these changes. It seems that Apple is throwing more support behind big software development companies at the expense of the smaller ones. Several developers confirmed the worst, noting that their daily sales figures had declined following the release of iTunes 9.
OK, we can understand these movements of Apple, if they think that what the users want is less applications, but better quality. What we can not understand is why Apple makes so ease for newcomers to join the Apple Developers Program? What are they fostering, large studios, or small ones.
Coffee for all has never been a good business strategy.
Comment
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Comment by TrevGil on September 17, 2009 at 9:48am - i like the Genius feature... ive tried a few apps i didnt heard about before... so far i like them :)
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