OK, we’re all thinking this, right? What the hell is going on with the App Store? It soft opened yesterday a full day before anyone expected it, and at 3 in the bloody morning. I suppose that’s when July 11th first hit New Zealand and my mates at Polar Bear Farm got their 3G iPhones. Lucky bastards.
Then we go poking around in there and realize that the App Store is open and its shelves are stocked with garbage. Yes, we all get a kick out of the crazy guy who put 42 unrelated controls into a XIB and shipped it as an app. The real question is this: why did Apple approve this app?
When people started talking about 500 apps on the store for launch, I counted all the developers I knew. Then I wondered where the other 450 apps were going to come from. This lower 90% seemed like it might be unpleasant, and oh my sweet chocolate lord did that turn out to be so.
Like, if you asked me to make a program for your iPhone that would enable you to leave your Kindle at home, I’d build a simple reader with links to Project Gutenberg, which provides copyright-free transcriptions of classic novels. I’d do a big ad campaign and bring attention to this interesting project and hell, maybe even get people reading again.
What I would not do is create one app for each of Project Gutenberg’s 25,000 titles and submit them all to the App Store. That would make people wonder why Apple let this cheap, stupid, spammy marketing ploy tarnish the chrome on their brand new App Store.
Let’s assume positive intent here. Say the folks behind these books apps, for example, are really just book lovers and they just didn’t think to do it as one app. Or maybe they didn’t have the expertise or the time to do it that way. Apple should have made that suggestion, pointed to help, or just rejected this galaxy of apps as being fundamentally flawed.
Again, assuming positive intent, Apple doesn’t want to be the arbiter of taste except in certain extreme circumstances. Being stupid isn’t illegal, and being crap isn’t a disqualifier for being included on the App Store. Maybe it needs to be, because no matter how swank your store is, nobody likes to step in poo.
Then, developers who suck will go away. Developers who care, but need help, will have the support of the best community of engineers on the planet. At Tapulous we’re also taking direct steps, like our Summer of iPhone program.
I’ve also been toying with the idea of giving interface and UI design consultations as a charity fundraiser. Donate $300 to the lemurs, get an hour of expert UI advice — that sort of thing. We have a quality crisis out there, people. Let’s clean it up.
Aside from the crap ratio, there’s the little question of price. Everyone just sort of guessed and a lot of people guessed wrong. I hope people made some adjustments when they got a feeling for where their app belonged. This is another place where Apple could have helped. They could have said, Ken, OmniFocus is an ADA-winning app. Charge $40.
Prices would then make sense in terms of each other. A five dollar app would do this much. A ten dollar app would do more. Then they could have killed things like one dollar flashlights. Quickly, before they evolve into a technique to scatter cheap apps all over the store in an attempt to suck a buck or two out of the casual passerby.
Finally I just wanted to thank the unknown developers, volunteers, interns, or board members who are going through all these submissions and testing and approving them. The task must be daunting. Do know that we — all of us — appreciate what you’ve done here.
OK it’s 3 a.m. and I haven’t slept in days and damn hell our apps better be up when I wake up.
Addenda 
Ash Ponders
I’m right there with you brother. I’m seeing maybe 10 must have apps, and another 40 or soe very cool apps. The rest? Cruft.
I hope Apple has a plan to get rid of the cruft.
I’m right there with you brother. I’m seeing maybe 10 must have apps, and another 40 or soe very cool apps. The rest? Cruft.
I hope Apple has a plan to get rid of the cruft.
boxofjack.com
As soon as I saw it, I realized the App Store could easily because as useless as MacUpdate or Version Tracker. Great if you know what you’re searching for but hard to track down the “cream of the crop”.
I would personally love to see some tough love when it comes to what apps make it into the store. It would be a very Apple thing to do. It’s elitist, it’s counter to the Windows philosophy and who cares because it means a high quality product that lets customers do what they want and move on with life.
And actually, Microsoft already exercise a lot of judgement with their Xbox Live Marketplace. It makes sense. If Apple want to run their own store and be the middleman, it’s got to serve the customers first and the merchants second.
As soon as I saw it, I realized the App Store could easily because as useless as MacUpdate or Version Tracker. Great if you know what you’re searching for but hard to track down the “cream of the crop”.
I would personally love to see some tough love when it comes to what apps make it into the store. It would be a very Apple thing to do. It’s elitist, it’s counter to the Windows philosophy and who cares because it means a high quality product that lets customers do what they want and move on with life.
And actually, Microsoft already exercise a lot of judgement with their Xbox Live Marketplace. It makes sense. If Apple want to run their own store and be the middleman, it’s got to serve the customers first and the merchants second.
Random Lemur
And to boot, I just tried to snag “Tap Tap Revenge” (after being excited to see it finally show up) and instantly got a dialog stating “The item your tried to buy is no longer available.”
And to boot, I just tried to snag “Tap Tap Revenge” (after being excited to see it finally show up) and instantly got a dialog stating “The item your tried to buy is no longer available.”
teknostik.com
Not counting the games (which are, admittedly, pretty tasty-looking), the free apps trump the for-pay ones by a mile. Think Twitterriffic, Evernote, Remote, Currency, reQall, , MixMeister Scratch, heck even MySpace Mobile (if you’re into that sort of thing) and Facebook with its sad, slow interface - adheres to the Apple ethos of developing applications better than these 99c flashlights, redundant Jirbo trash games (the for-pay ones are pretty slick, however)
From the screenshots, I really appreciate the work you have done on Twinkle and Tap Tap Revenge (I get an error when I try to download TTR in the App Store at this time though). Not to sound like a total loser here who should have better things to do than worry about UI quirks, I am just as puzzled at the selection of apps that made it in there.
Not counting the games (which are, admittedly, pretty tasty-looking), the free apps trump the for-pay ones by a mile. Think Twitterriffic, Evernote, Remote, Currency, reQall, , MixMeister Scratch, heck even MySpace Mobile (if you’re into that sort of thing) and Facebook with its sad, slow interface - adheres to the Apple ethos of developing applications better than these 99c flashlights, redundant Jirbo trash games (the for-pay ones are pretty slick, however)
From the screenshots, I really appreciate the work you have done on Twinkle and Tap Tap Revenge (I get an error when I try to download TTR in the App Store at this time though). Not to sound like a total loser here who should have better things to do than worry about UI quirks, I am just as puzzled at the selection of apps that made it in there.
Jon Bell
All Apple has to do is highlight the truly great apps better. I don’t mind 950 crappy titles as long as the 50 good ones are easy to find and aren’t obscured by crap.
And of course the quality of the apps are going to go up over time. The best apps on the store today are going to look like crap compared to the versions we’ll see in 6 months or a year.
All Apple has to do is highlight the truly great apps better. I don’t mind 950 crappy titles as long as the 50 good ones are easy to find and aren’t obscured by crap.
And of course the quality of the apps are going to go up over time. The best apps on the store today are going to look like crap compared to the versions we’ll see in 6 months or a year.
We have a quality crisis out there, people. Let’s clean it up.
Friday, July 11, 2008
App Store? More like Crap Store!
