Posts tagged apps
Posts tagged apps
… RIM has repeatedly told carriers that, unlike Apple, it believes that they deserve a portion of revenues from its apps store and as well as future services. Although given the relative paucity of BlackBerry apps, the offer has relatively little financial value as of now.
That’s the same as me telling the carriers they deserve revenue from my app store.
A central issue with the Internet, no matter what device and presentation layer you use to access it, is that there is an unlimited amount of content available … What is valuable is filtering and curation. Restricting access to content doesn’t work. Someone else’s content will get filtered and curated instead of yours. Scarcity is not a viable business model on the Internet.
This is why I’m pessimistic about iPad magazines and other trapped-content applications. — Mac
… the Android Market, as a whole, bears a lot more resemblance to the Cydia app store than it does to Apple’s official App Store. This is both in terms of content (system hacks, geek utilities, lower-quality UI design) and audience (the sort of users who put “task killers” and home screen replacements at the top of their favorite app lists). Browse the Android Market apps listed at sites like DoubleTwist and AppBrain, particularly the most popular lists. Then browse the listings in the Cydia app store, and tell me there isn’t a strong similarity.
(via oreillyradar)
We’re making iPhone software primarily for three reasons:
Dogfooding: We use iPhones ourselves. Installed base: A ton of other people already have iPhones. Profitability: There’s potentially a lot of money in iPhone apps.
Folio reports on Wired’s iPad app sales:
Wired’s iPad expectations have come back to earth. In July, the magazine posted 31,000 single copy sales for the digital replica, compared to 67,000 for the magazine, according to ABC’s Rapid Report. By August, the latest month tracked, Wired generated 28,000 single copy sales for the digital replica, versus 91,000 single copy sales for the magazine.
This is a good thing. Publishers need to understand the baseline so they can adapt and iterate based on reality. And while the iPad may not be the utopia so many hoped for (because utopia doesn’t exist … ahem), the iPad and its ilk are certainly viable distribution mechanisms. Now we need to get down to business. We need to learn how audiences consume content through these devices, what works and what doesn’t. I’m more excited by the prospects now then when the iPad was still a unicorn-and-rainbows dream.
I’m interested in how digital analytics will combine with mobile applications to improve the brick-and-mortar experience, from both the business and consumer sides. ShopKick, an app mentioned in this New York Times article, is in the ballpark.
Of note: ShopKick rewards consumers for simply visiting a store. Shoppers don’t have to buy anything to get credit. Amazon uses this same type of info, albeit in the digital realm, to present recommended products based on your browsing habits.
I can imagine some sort of super mobile app that duplicates Amazon’s experience in the physical world by combining Foursquare-esque checkins, affinity programs and QR codes / augmented reality. What won’t work are apps that only focus on one function or another. That’s why Shopkick only feels like one piece of the puzzle.
Update 8/17/10 The New York Times published a full profile on ShopKick. The article explains how the app knows you’re inside a partner store:
The app knows someone is in a store by listening for an audio transmitter placed in each participating store; the phone’s microphone picks up the signal, which people cannot hear.
I can personally vouch for the awesomeness of the At Bat 2009 iPhone/iPod Touch app. It was great last year, but the addition of audio feeds makes this an insanely beautiful app.
