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Amazon App Store 'Rotten To the Core,' Says Dev
suraj.sun sends an excerpt from this post made by a developer who decided to try out Amazon's App Store, only to be disappointed with the experience:
"Amazon's biggest feature by far, has been their Free App Of The Day promotion. Publicly their terms say that they pay developers 20% of the asking price of an app, even when they give it away free. To both consumers and naive developers alike, this seems like a big chance to make something rare in the Android world: real money. But here's the dirty secret Amazon don't want you to know, they don't pay developers a single cent. ... Amazon is being predatory here, and asking developers (who are often desperate for exposure) to give away their app, in order to promote Amazon. In the end we agreed that we had entered the world of Android development as an experiment, and it would seem silly not to add more data to the experiment we were conducting. The day of our promotion came: ... Amazon gave away 101,491 copies of our app! At this point, we had a few seconds of excitement as well; had we mis-read the email and really earned $54,800 in one day? We would have done if our public agreement was in place, but we can now confirm that thanks to Amazon's secret back-door deals, we made $0 on that day. That's right, over 100,000 apps given away, $0 made."
Someone misread something, but it wasn't them. Read the article again.
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
The old version of Amazon's agreement stated that developers would receive 20% of the original price when an app was given away for free. Then they changed it, and they didn't make it clear to developers. For many of them it was a nasty surprise. Unfortunately I can't find the original, but the new version is here https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/G/01/mobile-apps/devportal/pdf/Appstore_Distribution_Agreement.pdf with the added sentence "No Royalty is payable for Apps with a List Price of $0.00." in Section 2(a).
100,000 apps were given away to people who would have ignored your app and gone for someone else's free app if yours wasn't free.
If your app is worth anything, you just earned more than 100k word of mouth sales at ${full_price}.
No..seems pretty clear. Amazon offered 0%. They accepted and got 0%. 0% of $0 is....well, $0.
From TF- no, wait, from the second sentence of the summary:
"their terms say that they pay developers 20% of the asking price of an app, even when they give it away free."
RTFS I guess?
No, originally the agreement clearly said 20% of the original price. It was changed sneakily, though I'm sure it was legal. See http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2361318&cid=36965966
Speaking of which, it seems like you didn't RTFA, which states that Amazon publicly declares 20% to developers, even for free apps, but then sends an email saying it's actually 0% and that you're not allowed to publicly discuss it. That was followed by a list of other major problems with the store.
Even the usual Slashdot logic which predicts that giving away something for free is "free advertising" that somehow generates sales didn't happen in this situation. Fail all around.
The List Price, as originally defined, was set by the developer. Not Amazon. Thus the original agreement effectively said "20% of the original price".
Amazon told them in advance that they would get 0% of revenue (which would be $0, anyway). Amazon repeated this when they asked for confirmation. They recieved $0.
The only problem is an apparent error in the reporting which stated $54,800 in revenue on $0 of sales. But that is the only contradiction here.
Is this a good deal for developers? I don't know. Is Amazon screwing developers out of promised revenue with "secret back-door deals"? I see no evidence here.
Too bad Apple wont let me sell my apps. Oh, and Amazon is not Google. But rant on you crazy person. If you scream loud enough I hear that Steve Jobs will come to your birthday party.
Written from my MacPro in Camino.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Amazon used intentionally misleading and vague wording. They did not state definitively whether or not the devs would receive 20% of the earnings, but I can see where there was confusion. It's always good, especially when dealing with businesses, to err on the side of caution, due to situations such as these.
No, that isn't how it's supposed to work. On Amazon App Store, the developer is supposed to get either 70% of the sale price, or 20% of the asking price, i.e full price, whichever is higher. Amazon will often sell apps at a discount. That means if the list price for your app is $4.99, than amazon owes you at least $1, even if they decide to sell the app for $0.99. If they sell it at $4.99, you get $3.50. You are giving Amazon the right to set the selling price to whatever they want, in exchange for a small guaranteed cut at any price. This can be advantageous, because Amazon could adjust prices until it finds the most profitable point. Selling at 50% off list price is a good idea if you can sell three times as many copies that way.
The summary implies that the developers didn't know that they would get no money. The article makes it clear that they not only were told they would get nothing, but they confirmed in subsequent emails with Amazon that they would get nothing. Knowing this, they still decided to go ahead with the deal.
The Amazon emails have a good point:
The Free App of the Day promotion is the most valuable and visible spot in the store. It hosted the launch of the likes of Angry Birds Rio, Plants v. Zombies and more. Amazon will not receive any sales rev share from the Free App of the Day; and in fact, with as the Free of the Day for one day, you will receive a subsequent Appstore main page placement for the following 14 days. All these highly valuable placements are at no cost to you. We want to promote your app and in exchange of the placements, at the 0% rev share for one day only.
Being "Free app of the day" is a huge advert for your app - and adverts have a cost. Being app of the day is optional - not mandatory - the developers in question could have said no. And the cost is not 101,491 copies of your app - that's RIAA accounting. The majority of downloaders will try your app once and then never use it again. Some may continue to use it, and when they do, if you're smart you'll figure out a way to monetise their usage (e.g. charge for version 2, offer premium feature updates etc.).
thanks to Amazon's secret back-door deals, we made $0 on that day.
Amazon also made $0 that day (from your app). You agreed to the deal. It gave your app enormous exposure. You didn't lose 101,491 sales, because the vast majority of those people would never have bought your app anyway.
Amazon, google, apple, microsoft and all the other big players control the market for apps. This is a very bad position for individual developers because it means that to get a foothold in the market, they need to be a part of one of them.
Is the moral of the story to read the contract, No. The moral is to stop feeding these companies and stop them from being able to command the market.
I really hope tech people realise this soon else we can safely say that we asked for this state of affairs to come about.
Please please please, stop giving your hard work away to these monsters just so they can grow bigger. Seriously, what else do they do apart from get bigger? It is us as individuals that do all the innovating, not them, they just pick up our innovations and run away with them. They are leaches!
How about we start distributing our hard work ourselves?
Unless they won't sell your app or you are using a subsription model and don't want to markup your prices by like...what was it? 20%? 30%?
So you don't think it's fishy how Amazon publicly advertises 20% even for free apps? And in the screenshot, Amazon told them they received $54,805.14 in earnings that day? As stated in the article's comments section, the terms are confusing and fuzzy.
This has absolutely nothing to do with Android. These are Amazon's App Store's terms and conditions. I find it amusing that you talk about "Android fanboys" when your Apple fanboyism is very evident.
Grow up, and get your facts right.
It's software. It cost nothing to duplicate. You get exposure.
Quit whining.
According to the RIAA and MPAA, that's 101,491 lost sales.
Isn't enough that I ruined a pony, making a gift for you?
Read the article and note the increased support and hardware costs.
By that logic, there shouldn't be a market for anything in print, artwork, music, movies, or anything else that can be digitally replicated. You're using the cover story of someone who downloads music for free, then rationalizes that somehow word of mouth will convince your friends to pay for what you just downloaded for free.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Which is exactly the stuff the article is NOT about.
The article is about the fact that Amazon advertises that they're paying 20% for each app in "Free App Of The Day" promotion, but in fact they're paying 0% because they've made a deal behind the curtains. Yes, they've accepted the deal, no argument about that.
The really sad thing is they probably could sell this app for a long time, they'd continuously get small amounts of money from it and maybe the app would grow over time (good supported app is worth the money). But now they have nothing, because everyone interested already has the app, so they probably won't get even the small amount of money from it.
So you don't think it's fishy how Amazon publicly advertises 20% even for free apps? And in the screenshot, Amazon told them they received $54,805.14 in earnings that day? As stated in the article's comments section, the terms are confusing and fuzzy.
Not to mention that it takes more effort to make them confusing and fuzzy than it would to make them simple and clear. While it proves nothing, it strongly suggests that this is intentional.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Loving it! Maybe you fucks will give up on that shit and develop apps for a real smart phone.
I'm hoping those fucks give up on developing "apps" and get back to developing applications.
Software that does shit, software that runs on my local machine, software that comes with documentation, etc.
But alas, those days are over.
They present one deal publicly, then renegotiate every Free App of the Day deal depending on whether or not they feel that the it is to Amazon's advantage. The Angry Birds get paid, the small local guy does not. This is predatory, though not illegal, and shows that they fundamentally misunderstand the ecosystem they need to foster in order for them to do well. If they were the only game in town, this might work for them, but they are not.
I have only anecdotal evidence, but it seems to me that the Amazon Store is used to grab free apps and nothing else. It's not compelling for users or developers.
I see people posting about "free exposure" and that sort of thing. But this is only getting exposure for Amazon, who presumably wants to build a user- and application-base for their own upcoming Google-free Android devices.
See, advertising is about drawing attention and profiting when people purchase your product. Regular advertisements do this. Even sales do this. But giving your stuff away doesn't make you money. Any exposure you got was immediately lost to those exposed who either wanted your product or didn't even want it for nothing. Anyone who didn't see it wasn't exposed, and therefore doesn't matter, or worse, will pass on your app even on sale to just wait for the next "free" one. Why pay anything?
However having free stuff does net Amazon a lot of exposure and incentive for new customers. This will sell their devices and platform through exposure.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
A company Amazon's size shouldn't have issues in clearly communicating the terms of the deal. Every email was poorly worded, and then they turned around and showed a profit of 54K when none was actually there. This smacks of the same sort of deals that record companies make. They prey on the new artists who need exposure and don't realize their own worth.
Making excuses from Amazon doesn't change the fact that it's a dirty tactic.
WOW! Amazon is cheap bastards... Apple offers 70% (Seven - Zero) of sales. And you set your price... Apple NEVER does.
I think the confusion is the "0% revenue share" in APPLE Store talk that means the HOUSE cut would be 0%... so it SOUNDS like a good deal. Until you realize it's YOU that is getting the "revenue sharing" ... for your OWN APP. I can see people wanting to try out Amazon.. for the sole purpose of it being "not Apple" and "not Google" but under terms like that there's just no way.
There are some older terms here: http://www.slashgear.com/amazon-android-app-store-tcs-leak-29104993/
it's easy to see how a developer could be confused. If that email is read DIFFERENTLY, that "revenue sharing" could actually mean Amazon is trying to CHARGE THE DEVELOPER for putting their app on sale!!!! You gotta love that section 5i that defines "list price"... in other words because they put the app on sale, the "list price" became zero that day because it was the lowest price.. it's not hard to comprehend. But when you deal with terms in clauses.. that reference clauses... in other paragraphs... reading the WHOLE story for "lets put your app on sale" is not the TRUTH.
You mean you need a lawyer for everything? washing a car, eating a donut, doing basic math etc.?
Becaue the article is not about law or signing a contract. It's about the fact that Amazon describes the promotion as "20% for the developers" but in reality they make deals with the developers so that they pay them 0%. Yes, both sides obviously have enough brain cells to be responsible for their actions, so it's their fault they've signed the deal. But the article is not a whining about this - it's a warning to the other developers and to the public that those 20% is just a virtual reality.
Once again, Apple's app store remains the only place to actually make any money and get a fair deal. The Android fanboys are already making smart remarks to defend their platform, but it doesn't change the fact that this is yet another mark on the face of Android development, on top of so many things.
Worst Apple fanboi troll ever.
it's all about the "list price".. but you wouldn't think a SPECIAL SALE PRICE would affect the list price, right? Why else would Amazon have the flat 70% OR 20% of list if they choose to have a sale on the app? What's a situation where Amazon's price would be lower than list... and how would that ever be LOWER than the straight 70%? The whole paragraph dealing with that is nothing but funny business...
To be fair, you're 100% wrong. I have two apps, one of which is just a better version of the other. It is a niche program, intended for Orthodox Jews. In the nearly 3 years I've been in the App Store, I've made 6 times what I've spent in subscription fees. I've made enough to pay for the iPod Touch and iPad that I would have bought anyway. In fact, I bought the iPod Touch before I had any idea I'd be writing any apps.
I am not making a living by any stretch, but as a hobby, it more than pays for itself.
It most definitely costs something to support all of those users that got it for free, however.
Like countless other foreigners, my Amazon appstore account has a fake name, fake US address, and fake US credit-card number.
Using it to get a paid app might be crossing a line, even if it worked.
Sad that people have to put their Apple-street-cred as a signature any time they don't suck up to Apple in a post. Wouldn't want to be accused of being an ASP.NET developer for HP who still runs Windows XP SP2 on a sub-$1,000 PC and has respect for Bill Gates' philanthropic efforts writing anti-Apple posts using Internet Explorer 6 now would you?
Written while being arms length from my Mac Mini and imaging myself having sex with Steve Jobs while listening to music purchased on iTunes
Every Amazon purchased app will try to contact the Amazon Appstore when it is launched.
The Appstore itself will try to phone home at least a few times a day even if the Amazon purchased apps are not running.
Some Amazon purchased apps will not launch if you uninstall the Appstore.
http://www.the-digital-reader.com/2011/04/12/apps-from-amazon-routinely-phone-home-and-other-interesting-details/
l Slashdot logic which predicts that giving away something for free is "free advertising" that somehow generates sales didn't happen in this situation. Fail all around.
Unless its addictive the only thing you get by giving something away for free is that the receiver values it zero and expects you to continue to provide it for free.
I've gotten the "We're a big name so do the work for free and you'll be able to say you did x for us" to which I reply "How about you give all of your products for free and I'll tell everyone I know I use them?"
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
The difference between free and 0.01 is infinite. The sort of people who will come to the trough for a free download are not the sort who will pay money, unless there's something very, very special about the app.
In fact, giving it away (even for a day) can be harmful. It tells the people who did pay for it that they've been suckered. They are now lost customers if there's ever an updated version. They won't pay for that, they'll remember how they got shafted the first time and wait until it gets given away. Same with all the people who got it for free - the author has now defined the base price (i.e. 0.00) and people out there will not feel inclined to pay more than that for it.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Its a little disapointing they only printed stats for a few days before of sales and stopped at that they should have posted the after stats so we could see if the exposure they got was worth it as amazon tried to say it would be.
In that case amazon is also out of pocket. For promoting *their app*
If you mod me down the terrorists will have won
Reading the summary is hard.
But it didn't. In RTFA, they point out that they even emailed for clarification and the answer was:
All these highly valuable placements are at no cost to you. We want to promote your app and in exchange of the placements, at the 0% rev share for one day only
Further, there was clearly no confusion about it, because he goes on to say:
All this seemed way too one sided to us, Amazon is being predatory here, and asking developers (who are often desperate for exposure) to give away their app, in order to promote Amazon. A heated debate broke out in our office about whether we should or not. I was firmly against, my business partner for. In the end we agreed that we had entered the world of Android development as an experiment, and it would seem silly not to add more data to the experiment we were conducting.
So, they consciously decided to give it away as an experiment, and now they are complaining that they didn't get paid (mostly because of a temporary reporting glitch that showed some revenue).
The Amazon Store does sound horrible, but they knew what the terms were.
Um, no moderations are subject to meta-moderation any more. Meta-moderation is actually just a random sample of posts you get to moderate unaccountably. Try it some time - you get ten posts and you get to either +1 or -1 them. It's just yet another thing Slashdot fucked up.
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Yes, and the article says that they saw this, asked Amazon about it, Amazon confirmed that it was 0, and they decided to do it anyway because they wanted more data points for their Android developing experiment. They didn't misread anything. They knew they were getting screwed, wanted to know how badly, and then wrote about it.
Stories like this have been circulating lately about sites like Groupon/Living Social, etc, where the company (Amazon in this case) promises the world as far as exposure and sales, but then when you sign up for the promotion, you discover that you lose money hand over fist, and the business doesn't really pick up on the back side of the promo. A lot of small businesses have gotten in trouble by signing up for stuff like this.
Seems to me these guys were testing Amazon to see if the same could happen there, and then reported that it can.
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
The summary implies that the developers didn't know that they would get no money. The article makes it clear that they not only were told they would get nothing, but they confirmed in subsequent emails with Amazon that they would get nothing. Knowing this, they still decided to go ahead with the deal.
The Amazon emails have a good point:
The Free App of the Day promotion is the most valuable and visible spot in the store. It hosted the launch of the likes of Angry Birds Rio, Plants v. Zombies and more. Amazon will not receive any sales rev share from the Free App of the Day; and in fact, with as the Free of the Day for one day, you will receive a subsequent Appstore main page placement for the following 14 days. All these highly valuable placements are at no cost to you. We want to promote your app and in exchange of the placements, at the 0% rev share for one day only.
Being "Free app of the day" is a huge advert for your app - and adverts have a cost. Being app of the day is optional - not mandatory - the developers in question could have said no. And the cost is not 101,491 copies of your app - that's RIAA accounting. The majority of downloaders will try your app once and then never use it again. Some may continue to use it, and when they do, if you're smart you'll figure out a way to monetise their usage (e.g. charge for version 2, offer premium feature updates etc.).
thanks to Amazon's secret back-door deals, we made $0 on that day.
Amazon also made $0 that day (from your app). You agreed to the deal. It gave your app enormous exposure. You didn't lose 101,491 sales, because the vast majority of those people would never have bought your app anyway.
The underhanded bit is that they represent to the public that they compensate the devs for their work even when Amazon chooses to give it away for free, and then underhandedly tell the dev that he's not getting paid, and he's not allowed to tell anyone.
And apparently, since Amazon can set the prices on the apps, they have pretty good leverage to get away with it:
In other words, "Ey. Yous gonna agree ta put da app on da store for free or Louie here's gonna bust it down ta 5cents a copy."
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
They got on the plane, they knew what they were getting into.
I say, let 'em crash." -- Airplane
Get over it. You knew who you were getting into bed with. You signed up. Nobody put a gun to your head.
Not really. I pretty much hate all thing Apple these days, but as an developer that has an app for sale on both Android and iOS told me (on LinuxTag even), one of the big stumbling blocks he has encountered with Android:
- When you sell an app in the Apple store Apple handles sales tax and all other applicable paperwork in the country of sale, you can sell your app worldwide by placing it in one app store, and you only have to deal with one accounting contact.
- In all Android stores he knew YOU have to handle the taxes and paperwork for each country. (That's probably one of the reasons the Amazon App store only works "US Only" as mentioned in the article, so you might even have to put your app into a different store for each country you want to sell it in.)
So it's pretty easy to sell internationally with the Apple Store, but when you want to sell something on Android you have to sell at least a few dozen or even hundreds of apps per country to even break even the cost of filing the taxes in that country.
What *I* would truly like to see, though, is a true open and free OSS mobile platform. Android doesn't seem to keeping the early expectations in that direction.
Actually, if you tried to tell Google that, they'd look at you funny. Then after thinking about it a while, they'd say "ooohhhh, you're illiterate! How precious! You need to talk to Amazon about that, they're the guys you're selling through".
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
You're so close... except you can say "no" and they don't give it away.
But hey! Why let facts get in the way? This is a populist cause! Amazon is rich! DOWN WITH THEM!
There are over 100,000 people using Amazon's app store!? That *is* shocking!
when someone wants to give away your app and pay you nothing, say no.
Don't whine about it. I mean, you knew you where going to give it away, so don' complain about the added hardware costs.
Clearly they're upset to learn that there app is just useful enough to be worth 0 dollars to most people, but worth the time to down load.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
So it's pretty easy to sell internationally with the Apple Store, but when you want to sell something on Android you have to sell at least a few dozen or even hundreds of apps per country to even break even the cost of filing the taxes in that country.
Or do what I and most businesses do... and don't worry about it until sales are high enough to warrant it.
Are you really seriously worried as a US citizen that Italy is going to send international tax lawyers to harass you over $9 in app sales to that country to collect $2.19 in taxes? Maybe they'll have you extradited?
This is much ado about nothing.
OK, FOURTH time looking at the article
I need a link to that.
http://www.amazonappstoredev.com/2011/06/submitting-your-app-for-fad-consideration.html
is no help. Or have my eyes blown out again?
OK, you got a glass of unsweetened lemon juice. Here is how you put some sugar and water in to make it taste better:
Time to come out with a pay-only upgrade. You have 100,000 users. If you charge just $1, you have a chunk coming your way, depending on how many upgrade.
Done in one.
Oh, and this is why apps should always have a way for the developer to message the user with a link. This way if you get sick of the market that distributes your app, you can tell you users to "Get super awesome app 2 here (links to app store that isn't the one you are mad at)."
Finally, you can use the same in app message feature to tell your users about your other apps.
Or you can go sulk about your 100,000 user new customer base. It's up to you.
-- $G
Since this has nothing to do with the platform, his point still stand. The poster is a crazy fanboi.
Unlike Apple, the devs can sell their apps some place else.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Moral of the story - read the contract?
I just don't know how Amazon could be so short-sighted.
Do they REALLY think that this is the way to compete against the 800lb. Gorilla that is the Apple App Store?
The developers were told that they'd get no income from the giveaway.
The developers asked Amazon for confirmation that they'd get no money.
Amazon responded that yes, they would get no money.
The developers decided to give their app away regardless.
The developers were upset that they then got no money.
The developers decided to bitch and moan about it.
Cry me a river.
And where is the evidence that they didn't see increased sales from this? Where is the evidence that Amazon refuses to let developers publicly discuss the terms -- especially considering that this dev is publicly discussing the terms?
Right in the summary it says Amazon asks developers to give it away. If you accept that, well what's so surprising that they don't give you anything? That's what you agreed to, no?
And what is predatory about asking developers to participate in a promotion?
What would be saying if it was Apple that did this?
If they have significant support costs, then they shouldn't have agreed to give the app away for free. The article is very clear that they knew what they were getting into and decided to do it anyway.
Back in April the International Game Developers Association released an advisory to members detailing how onerous the terms and conditions of this app store are. http://igdaboard.wordpress.com/2011/04/14/important-advisory-about-amazon%E2%80%99s-appstore-distribution-terms-2/ .
You might have a point if all stores were equal. But, hey, sweep this one under the rug since it doesn't affect Android devs at all!
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I think the main point of the developer is to clear up a misconception about Amazon's app store (which I also had until I saw this story). Many people assumed that Amazon would still pay the devs 20% of list even if it the free app of the day. Now that I know the nitty-gritty how it actually works I understand why it's actually 0%. If Amazon reduced the price w/o the dev's agreement, he would get 20%. In this case, though, the dev was asked if he wanted to see his app as free app of the day, i.e. you had to opt in. 0% revenue for that is a fair price since in return you get a lot of free exposure, that you, as a dev, have to know and understand how to make the most of it.
Even further down the author actually admits "As we said in our post, we deserved what we got, because we did indeed agree to it". Simply put, if they had asked the right question, and not beat around the bush, they would have gotten it explained.
They make this comment, which I found kind of snot nosed brat kind of comment, back to Amazon at the initial onset:
We’d be happy to reconsider if you decided to pay us the 20% that we agreed to in our original developer agreement, but this new one seems to favour only you, at the expense of us?
Amazon's response is:
... and in fact, with as the Free of the Day for one day, you will receive a subsequent Appstore main page placement for the following 14 days. All these highly valuable placements are at no cost to you. We want to promote your app and in exchange of the placements, at the 0% rev share for one day only.
Amazon never said they would get 20%. Matter of fact, Amazon emphasis that there is no expense to the developers to get potentially highly profitable placement. Their actual technical complaints, slightly valid, accounts for about 7 bullet points, and 20 sentences. Their first technical point is rather naive. Assuming that Amazon would immediately post something is... well stupid. Just cause Google does it, does not mean Amazon is Google.
The developer's use of the words "expense" implied a different meaning to people in marketing and sales. The developer's point was that they would not make money and have costs of supporting the free sales. The marketing / sales / accounting people, think of expense as the cost of doing business. Grasshopper chose his words poorly.
The reality is they do not have enough business savvy. They hopefully will gain this over time.
Its always amusing to me cause in college, CS and Business Admin students mock each other. And yet when it comes to the real world, they both need knowledge from the others area of expertise.
I can't believe ANY developer would submit apps to the AppStore under those conditions. I'm not talking about the "secret" ones, I'm talking about:
"Amazon gets to set the price of your app to whatever they want, without any input from you, or even the chance to reject their price"
That would be a complete deal-killer for almost every developer I know. How would anyone come up with a business plan if they don't know how much their product is going to be sold for?
Is the MarketPlace that awful, that developers would accept these terms from Amazon?
So they tell the public the developers get 20% but tell the developers they will get nothing.
Not a company I want to do business with. Already using their competitors due to their outsourcing to third world states when requested to track sales tax.
Blar.
Joe Tablet probably believes the app he downloaded is kicking 20% of the purchase to the developer. It's a dick move.
Blar.
I wouldn't know, I'm not a US citizen. ;-P
And the project in question was http://www.skobbler.com/, which as a routing app for Europe has of course smaller countries to deal with, and the EU where prosecution across borders is easier. And their sales are high enough to warrant tax people looking into it.
>WOW! Amazon is cheap bastards... Apple offers 70% (Seven - Zero) of sales. And you set your price... Apple NEVER does.
I think you're getting confused here. Apple keeps 30% of the revenue, and so does Amazon when an app is sold.
The difference is that Amazon will sometimes run a discount to push sales, but they say they give atleast 20% even if they're taking a loss on that(the article says it didn't apply to them). A big difference from what you said which seemed to indicated that Amazon is taking money from customers but giving only 20% to devs which is flat out wrong.
This space for rent.
It's amazing how many problems and complaints would be solved if every ToS, EULA, and online agreement required some kind of electronic signature to be valid. It should be something that would take more than a quick mouse-click to apply.
Impatient people who "just want to see the dancing bunnies" would install an OpenPGP plug-in that makes it "a quick mouse-click" to sign an agreement.
You should read the article. They did in fact understand it and followup up to verify the information. They only went through with it for the hell of it since taking part in the android platform was an experiment.
So they tell the public the developers get 20% but tell the developers they will get nothing.
Not a company I want to do business with. Already using their competitors due to their outsourcing to third world states when requested to track sales tax.
Amazon sold it for $0.00? What's 20% of $0.00?
You could correctly argue that the developer received 1000% of the sale price.
So some developers really thought that Amazon was actually going pay them 20% per app downloaded for free out of the kindness of their hearts? Why? How would that possibly benefit Amazon? The way it works now is Amazon eats the hosting costs, and creates thousands of possible "word of mouth" advertising walking billboards...
Sometime I find very strange to see people who seems to use an online service (here a spot to sell their stuff) only to moan about the rules once the boat has left the port. It makes me wonder about who has made the initial choice to be there...
They already signed a contract clearly stating that they get 20% of the list price for everyone Amazon distributes. Amazon sneakily said "can we change the "list price" for one day" without making it clear the changes in the existing contract. They have a signed contract guaranteeing them $54,000 for the number of apps "sold" for free. Amazon is not honoring that, claiming that the list price was not the list price explicitly stated in the signed contract. The developers are very happy with what they signed. Amazon is not honoring the written and signed contract and instead claiming that there was an unsigned modification to the contract that lasted 24 hours only. Predatory is asking developers to participate in a promotion, and then not honoring the signed contract for the promotional period and not making that clear to the developers. So the developers are essentially funding Amazon's promotion.
Learn to love Alaska
Amazon never really said that they'd give developers 20% of their asking price on the free app day.
Here's a recap of how Amazon's app store works:
The developer sets an asking price, X.
Amazon comes up with their own price, Y.
Customers pay Y.
Amazon pays the developer 0.2X or 0.7Y, whichever is greater.
Now, you could look at this and say, "Aha! On the free app day, they're just lowering Y to $0. I should get 20% of X!" But this would clearly be a hugely losing proposition for Amazon, and they never say that this is how the free app days work. Instead, they get your agreement to lower X to $0 on that day. Neither you nor they make any money on "sales" that day. But you both get publicity.
At no point were they dishonest about how the free app day works. No rational person should expect Amazon to be giving away tens of millions of dollars a year. The devs knew full well what they were getting into. They were looking for an excuse to bash Amazon.
In fact I would be ashamed of myself to admit publicly like this that I have not taken advantage of potential 100.000 customers. Ridicule does not kill and it's a good thing for this guy...
But what situation would they devalue your app so badly that the 20% rule kicked in? Their definition of "list price" is the OPPOSITE of what a traditional MSRP would be... The whole thing is "Hollywood" accounting at it's finest...
I do agree the guys could have been sharper on the contract... Except the way those percents are written they are INTENDED to be misread because the "sale price" is scattered on 5 different pages of the contract.
Amazon sold it for $0.00? What's 20% of $0.00? You could correctly argue that the developer received 1000% of the sale price.
The publisher said Amazon claims to give developers 20% of the normal asking price, not the current sale price.
You don't understand the terms.
Apple offers 70% of the list price, with the list price being the developer's asking price.
Amazon offers 70% of the list price, or 20% of the developer's asking price, whichever is greater.
If I make a $1 app and sell it in both Amazon's and Apple's app stores, I'll make 70 cents from each and Amazon/Apple make 30 cents. The difference is that Amazon reserves the right to sell my app for, say, 50 cents instead, in which case I only make 35 cents from that sale and they make 15. You can argue that Amazon shouldn't be the one to set the price -- if so, don't use their store. But they aren't doing it out of greed. They take the same cut regardless. They are doing this because they think that they're better at setting a price than you are. And they're probably right.
You don't seem to understand how it works. If my app costs $1, and Amazon decides to "punish" me by selling it for 5 cents, then I make 20 cents on every sale (20% of asking) and they lose 15 cents. The free app day is an exception to the 20% rule.
Do you know that the metamod doesn't really feed back into the mod? I figured they just simplified the Fair, Unfair bits by seeing if you modded the same way that the mod did.
Did you ever look at a comment before and after metamod to see if the score changed?
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Don't worry, I still came to the conclusion that their app store is a shady rip off, and I'd never use it. I agree that it's misleading, too. But it's not a bait and switch if they specifically asked a question about it before signing up and were told the correct answer, and decided to do it anyway. Do I have to quote their article AGAIN?
All this seemed way too one sided to us, Amazon is being predatory here, and asking developers (who are often desperate for exposure) to give away their app, in order to promote Amazon.
Sounds like they knew the terms to me...
You'd have more of a point if Amazon had paid these guys for the apps that they *did* sell.
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
This doesn't really surprise me. My last job was as a technical support rep/SQL scripter for a company that specialized in software that interfaced with e-commerce solutions. As you could guess, I spent a good deal of time helping out customers who sold on Amazon. I remember one story a customer told about how they didn't like to give Amazon full information on the products they sold, even though Amazon threatened to remove them as a seller if they didn't. The reason they wouldn't do it is that Amazon had a funny habit of finding out the statistics on the sales of their products and, if they seemed to be making enough profit, they would put up their own listing and try to undercut the customer's prices. What a way to do business, eh?
fact that Amazon advertises that they're paying 20% for each app in "Free App Of The Day" promotion
Where is this "fact" demonstrated? Can you link to where they advertise that?
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
You are completely ignoring the fact that they agreed to the amendment.
Amazon at some point was offering 20%
Amazon then wrote to them and said "what about 0%"
They said, no, what about 20%?
Amazon said, no, it's 0%
THEY AGREED.
End of story.
You do realize that he isn't complaining about Goog;e. but Amazon?
You seem to be still confused. Haven't you seen things being given away in Black Friday sales? In Hollywood accounting, the studio keep the extra money. The only benefit here that Amazon is getting is publicity and usage for their store, not money.
This space for rent.
Contracts have explict processes for amendment. often it specifies "in writing" or "signed" and a chain of emails is neither.
Learn to love Alaska
All of that explicitly agreed to by the developer, the free promotion being optional. If you can't handle the load you say "no thanks" to the deal. The developer complaint seems to be: I wanted something up and beyond than what I agreed to.
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
The developers were told that they'd get no income from the giveaway.
The developers asked Amazon for confirmation that they'd get no money.
Amazon responded that yes, they would get no money.
The developers decided to give their app away regardless.
The developers were upset that they then got no money.
The developers decided to bitch and moan about it.
They thought it was a raw deal afterwards, came to their conclusion and quit the Amazon Store. Then they issued a nice article warning others and explaining their reasons. What's not to like ?
And where is the evidence that they didn't see increased sales from this? Where is the evidence that Amazon refuses to let developers publicly discuss the terms -- especially considering that this dev is publicly discussing the terms?
RTFA : "Did the exposure count for much in the days afterwards? That’s also a big no, the day after saw a blip in sales, followed by things going back to exactly where we started, selling a few apps a day." Also they added a graph of sales to the article as proof (see update 2 in TFA)
Where is the evidence that Amazon refuses to let developers publicly discuss the terms -- especially considering that this dev is publicly discussing the terms?
You want proof people are being told not to discuss the terms from the people who are being told not to discuss them but doubt the person who did come forward ?
Let Amazon issue a clear denial.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
What would be saying if it was Apple that did this?
Really? What are you, president of Apple SVU - Apple Special Victims Unit?
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
You say that the article is not about signing a contract and then say that it's their fault for signing a deal. What kind of legally binding deal exists in your neck of the woods which isn't a contract?
In fact I would be ashamed of myself to admit publicly like this that I have not taken advantage of potential 100.000 customers.
Freeloaders != potential customers. Their conversation rate if they managed to up-sell somehow would probably be less than 1%, which when you take into account the costs of supporting 100,000 free users indefinitely does not make any financial sense.
Amazon have always been predatory, and I think the developer has made the right move here by dumping the Amazon store as they have concluded the costs outweigh the benefits for everyone apart from Amazon.
Do they REALLY think that this is the way to compete against the 800lb. Gorilla that is the Apple App Store?
Probably not, considering that the Apple App Store is for iOS devices and Amazon's store for Android.
Here, Amazon is competing with Google's Android Market.
Instead, they get your agreement to lower X to $0 on that day. Neither you nor they make any money on "sales" that day. But you both get publicity.
At no point were they dishonest about how the free app day works. No rational person should expect Amazon to be giving away tens of millions of dollars a year. The devs knew full well what they were getting into. They were looking for an excuse to bash Amazon.
No no no. Amazon were being dishonest right from the word go, because the developers' agreement states that if you are selected for Free App of the Day, you get that 0.2X. This is the only publicised figure for FAD. Well it would appear that this is a bait-and-switch, because they "renegotiate" it down to zero at the drop of a hat. As this is designed to draw developers into the market place, it sounds like grounds for a multi-million dollar class action lawsuit. (Of course, only people who refused the deal would be allowed to sue, as people who accepted have agreed to a revised contract.) Amazon would then be forced to disclose how often they honoured their agreement.
Note that TFA also says that a lot of Android users claim to use the free-app-of-the-day offer on the grounds that they believe they're helping out the developers. that's tantamount to false advertising.
HAL.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
The harsh bite of reality also states that if those 101,491 free purchases had not been free, then 101,491 purchases would not have been made. How many who "purchased" that app are actually using it, how many still have it installed. Let's be honest it seems most of those apps are lazziness apps, simply replacing doing it directly yourself.
Looking at some of that companies apps it seems like Apple might have specifically made in difficult for end users to 'do it themselves' in order to drive revenue and a lot of app creators are in on the game, 'eww'.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
I feel for Shifty Jelly but could almost see stuff like this coming, and more.
While minor compared to his nightmare,
I purchased something from Amazon.com and they charged me tax saying this was in case
they had to pay tax for the transaction in the future, they would be covered.
(Washington state)
California tells Amazon.com they now have to pay tax on transactions, they bail California.
I don't have anything to do with Amazon.com any more,
and I can truly say they lost a lot of business recently.
Newegg.com all the way!! No tax, no lies, and a very
decent return policy that I've never had a need to use.
Newegg.com is just easier to use as well, with all the info one needs
for a product on one page. Yes I'm a fan.
The really sad thing is they probably could sell this app for a long time, they'd continuously get small amounts of money from it and maybe the app would grow over time (good supported app is worth the money). But now they have nothing, because everyone interested already has the app, so they probably won't get even the small amount of money from it.
If you buy something in the Amazon app store and later delete it from your phone, I assume the app store remembers this and lets you reinstall it at no extra charge later. And possibly even if you upgrade your phone, too.
If so, it's in the phone owner's interest to download every single free app, because it's free (use the home broadband, though) and it'll stay that way if it ever turns out you're going to need it.
This makes the FAotD offer a particularly poor marketing technique, as the only people who'll find out about it are people who will never have to buy it.
HAL.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
It is a bait-and-switch. The "bait" is the developers' agreement, which says 20% of list price on free app of the day. The "switch" is the email that offers FAotD listing only once the developer has released an app. "Bait and switch" involves changing the terms of a contract or sale just before signing on the dotted line. Changing the deal afterwards isn't bait-and-switch, it's fraud, and even Amazon isn't big enough to get away with that.
It's not a bait-and-switch aimed at getting devs onto FAotD, it's a bait-and-switch aimed at getting devs to list their apps in the Amazon app store, and it has been very effective. First up, app stores need to be able to quote a high number of apps to draw in the customers, and offering the 20% really does attract devs, because they understandably expect to get more out of 20% FAotD than out of normal sales. Amazon win. Amazon don't really care if someone turns down FAotD because they'll just move on to the next guy. Amazon win.
HAL
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
You can cross link by putting a link to the comment numbered link on the top right in this case #36966086.
Having said that, that post is totally beside the point. The way the deal is publicly presented makes it look like it's a good opportunity for developers. You get a chance to get some cash now and increase your installed base at the risk of some loss of full price sales. You also get good placement. That makes Amazon's app store more attractive for those developers.
The trick is that when you actually do get offered a free placement, then it turns out that the deal which is published is not the deal which is really available. By that time you have already committed to Amazon's app store so it is too late to back out. This looks to me like a bait and switch situation which would be illegal for a consumer product sale.
It's important to note, that if you had Read The Fine Article Properly you would have seen that they went into this as an experiment and are publishing not to complain but to warn others. You would also have seen that Amazon stated that the promotion gives
"highly valuable placements"
but it turned out that the influence on app sales beyond the promotion was very small, possibly even negative.
Further note that, even when asked
If I read this correctly youâ(TM)d like to give away our application for free, and pay us nothing?
Amazon responded
instead of just clearly stating that there would be no revenue. What does that mean? That Amazon will take 0% of the revenue? That the promotion will cost you 0% of the revenue or that you will get 0% of the revenue. Now, thanks to Shift Jelly's valuable posting, we know exactly.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
No, you missed the point of the article. The developers agreed to the amendment. They are not complaining about this. They are simply warning other devs that the promised 20% on Free App of the Day is a myth, because Amazon will always "renegotiate" for 0%. As the FAotD offer is as much about attracting developers to the Amazon app store as about attracting customers, they're walking a dangerous line, and the first dev to sue them is going to get full data on how much they've honoured the original agreement as part of "discovery", and it'll be pretty grim reading for Amazon....
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
In several other posts here is described how Amazon changed their distribution agreement (i.e. a contract with developers). Most developers are unaware of the change, just like the users who buy the apps - all believe the developers will get 20% even for free apps.
Yes, it's not as if Amazon put adverts saying 20% goes to the developers.
Then the robbery continues on the terms and conditions. You can set the list price of your app but it cannot be any higher on Amazon Appstore than it is on other app stores. So if the list price is $9.99 on Marketplace it has to be $9.99 (or less) on App Store. And like Marketplace you take a 70% of the sale price. But... the sale price and list price are not the same thing. You set the list price, Amazon sets the sale price. Amazon can deep discount your app all the way down to 20% of its list price if they like. So instead of getting $7 revenue from $9.99 you get $2 from $2. Or Amazon could even give the app away and you get nothing at all. Basically they're using your app to fuck you over.
Frankly it's daylight robbery. I'm quite certain that Amazon will launch their own tablets before long and some app writers will be compelled to serve this market, but I wonder if there will be a general revolt over what is going on. They're not in a position to dictate this stuff as Apple might. Perhaps Amazon tablet users can enjoy gimped "Amazon edition" apps where functionality has to be unlocked with micropayments or similar. I certainly don't see the situation as being tolerable even for the more popular apps.
A more fair system if Amazon preferred to compete with other marketplaces would be to allow the developer to set the wholesale price and an MSRP. Amazon would discount within those two bounds, presumably by comparing the price on Marketplace and undercutting it but within agreed limits. I expect Google would reciprocate with its own version of the same and the two markets would compete much like stores do for real world goods. That would be fair. The current situation absolutely isn't.
Amazon promises 20% on Free App of the Day because that's what's in the contract Amazon signed with the developer. Sounds more like a hypothetical from the actual contract contents, rather than an attempt to lie to sign up more devs, but that's something that takes court subpoenas and such to figure out.
Learn to love Alaska
It's a scam for developers and one could argue it's anti-competitive too since it means Amazon's sale price always matches or undercuts the price on Marketplace. A fairer system which would allow them to undercut would be to allow devs to set a wholesale price and an MSRP. Devs would always get 100% of the wholesale price. And Amazon could discount anywhere between MSRP and wholesale that they wished. It allows devs to set their "bottom line". Chances are Google would reciprocate with a similar scheme so that both stores would be competing against each other rather than stiffing developers.
In the absence of this I strongly expect that devs will produce a "special edition" of their apps on Amazon which prevents like for like comparison and lets them adjust their pricing in a more favourable way. I expect the Amazon edition will find it gimped in some way, or the price bloated by some minimal extra functionality so devs can recoup their costs for using the app store.
Amazon is poised to launch a bunch of tablets of their own. A captive audience. Once that happens you can bet that apps will still be deep discounted to give the impression that the app store is cheaper than marketplace. Which it is of course but only by fucking over developers in the process.
There is no arguing that they should be allowed to compete. The point I expect most devs would make is that 20% of the list price does not represent it's "wholesale" cost.
And you should have a lawyer when doing that. Obviously, they did not understand what they were signing when the partnered with Amazon.
If I were to consult with a lawyer as much as a typical "speak to a lawyer" poster on /. recommends, I'd have a crack legal team advising me whether or not I should get out of bed in the morning.
The concept that they'll become regular customers is also as flawed as the one used by Groupon. People who are looking for extreme bargains are not interested in sticking around when the deal is over. They'll just swoop off somewhere else looking for the next one.
I don't think it's the contract they're complaining about so much - they knew they were signing up to get zero when they agreed.
What they're complaining about is:
- Amazon proudly advertise that you still get 20% of the usual price even when they discount it to zero.
- Except if they plan to discount it to zero, the first thing they'll do is send you an email offering a "revised" agreement - they'll discount it to zero and you get zero. This email contains a note saying "Oh BTW the contents of this email are confidential".
- A developer may think "You know what? I'll accept that and chance that it'll work out in the long term, because it's good advertising". Which is exactly what these guys did.
- Lo and behold, when discounted to zero the app sold like hot cakes. 100,000 copies in one day.
- They now have 100,000 users to support. Furthermore, if the app phones home (which many do), they need the server capacity to handle 100,000 copies of the app phoning home. None of these 100,000 users have paid. This is the law of unintended consequences, and it'd seem they didn't really think about this. Nevertheless, it may not be the end of the world - after all, if it improved paid-for sales enough they could afford to deal with that....
- It didn't make the slightest difference to paid sales.
Again? You're the one making the mistake. The OP most probably hasn't RTFA.
The developer received the terms of the deal, and decided to try it anyway, in the interest of experiment. TFA explains the results of that experiment: Amazon App Store is awful.
Personally I don't even see why people would consider Amazon's app store. What does it have to offer that Google's Marketplace doesn't?
They did understand it. They decided to try it as an experiment to see if the advertising from the free app day and the favourable positioning for 14 days afterwards increase sales. It didn't. Amazon gave their app away for free, in the hope that both would benefit:
It turns out that only Amazon benefits. If you agree to participate in this promotion, then you don't get anything, but Amazon does. They're warning other devs not to agree to it, because it doesn't generate any sales and probably does lose some sales (at least some of the 100,000 who downloaded it for free would probably have bought it - even 0.1% would be a reasonable amount of revenue).
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No, not the end of the story. They agreed, as an experiment, to see if it was worth it as an advertising deal. It wasn't. Now they're telling everyone else that it isn't worth it. Then the story ends.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
The developers decided to bitch and moan about it.
You're wrong. The developers decide to inform the public that the Amazon App Store is a bad idea for developers, and lying to customers (who think the developers still get 20% of their original price). It takes every possible bit of power away from developers.
It makes sense for other developers to learn from this experience and avoid Amazon.
20% of nothin' is still nothin'.
Just saying...
Kid-proof tablet..
While they got 100,000 d/ls that doesn't mean they lost 100,000 sales - many people, myself included, will take a shot with a free app to see if it's worth anything. More on this later. What will be interesting is how many people continue their use after a few weeks of months? That is a better indicator of "lost" sales than the initial download.
Since "free" means "just garb it and see if I like it cause it has no cost to me if I don't" to many people a developer should weigh the increased support and fixed costs (more servers if the app is an online service as was the case here) against the value of getting their name out and building awareness of other apps. It also means it will be harder to go back to a higher price if many of your potential customers grab the free one. In many cases, you'd be better off dropping the price to $.99 - it's still at the impulse purchase point (hey, it's not even a buck so no big loss if it sucks) and you get some cash for each d/l. When you rais eteh price again, people are more likely to think - "I missed my chance to grab it cheap" than "WTF - this was free and now you want $?" Plus, when people pay for something, even a small amount, they tend to value it more and are more likely to think it was a good choice and pay in the future as well.
So what to do with the 100k free apps out there? After a while, come out with a paid upgrade to v2. Give it away to paying customers for free to get them, charge the free ones an upgrade fee, and end the v1 service. That way, you've converted the customers that value your product and lowered your costs while getting some cash flowing in as well. If you promised some duration of availability keep that promise; but wen you can work to migrate customers to a paying mode.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
nobody is forcing you to distribute PC or Android applications through an app store. And if you don't like the ecosystems that force you to use an app store (e.g. iOS or Windows Phone), don't develop for those platforms.
Would you be giving the same advice if Android had near-zero market share? Because that's how it is on the video game consoles. There are no well-known consoles with a fairly open environment comparable to Android with "Unknown sources". Nor (if CronoCloud, CastrTroy, and other Slashdot regulars are to be believed) are there enough "home theater PCs", or PCs used as if they were consoles, to make a market for games with a home theater PC mode. There's only one console with anything like Apple's App Store, and that's the Indie Games section on Xbox 360. The other two consoles and the main area of Xbox 360 are even more restrictive than Apple.
the reasons are quite simple. their bonus matrix is fucked up, the 'revenue' tab there being a clue to it, that's why it's 54k+$ even though it should be zero. but they'll count it against their bonuses, they being some amazon middle management bozos. so those bozos give away stuff they then pretend was bought on a powerpoint slide.
and for those fucks who think that the developer company could just mark that against their taxes as expenses are just plain fuckin' naive idiotic fucks- the TAX office can't be scammed quite that easily, if it were, no sw company would ever do profit, they'd simply give away a special copy of sw for the amount they could claim as expenses against the taxed profit(sure many companies do move their profits to tax heavens pretty much exactly like that, maybe using expensive pencils instead of sw licenses though as the fake product, but you can only do it if you're a multi hundred million size company, which is unfair of course).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Apparently he's somebody with a point you don't have a rebuttal to.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
>The developers were told that they'd get no income from the giveaway.
But is sounds like a bait and switch: why is Amazon even "advertising" the 20% if in fact that is NO WAY that any developer will be able to realize 20% in the free app giveaway program? It's not an issue of what the developer signed up for. It's an issue of Amazon's false advertising: "HERE'S A GREAT DEAL FOLKS!!! (But you can never actually get it since you have to agree to terms that won't let you)."
So I won't cry you a river :-)
Twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.
20% of the list price (set by the developer) is not nothing.
Because that was how it worked - Amazon had the right to give it for free, but had to pay 20% of the list price to the developer.
The article most certainlyis a whine about Amazon, but in fact it just shows the naivete of the developers.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
No, you consult a lawyer if you're signing a piece of paper which potentially loses you $50,000. For example.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
What a load of bollocks, if Amazon had somehow broken the contract, the developers would be suing the fucking shit out of them, not whining about it on a blog.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
How is an email not in writing? Because it's not recorded on a stone tablet?
Yes and no at the same time.
It's clear most of the 100.000 buyers were not really interested in the app. I guess 95% just noticed there's a free app and downloaded it. The other 5% might be considering buying the app for the original money and this was just the final push. That's a 5000 potential customers, and if only 20% actually bought the app that's 1000 customers.
Is it enough or not? I have no idea, but the app seems quite nice so there's chance they'd buy it anyway. The problem is they got 100.000 customers, 0 paying customers and they have to support 100.000 customers. Which is a problem because the application needs a running server. With a device-only app it'd be a annoying decision, but having to support customers that gave you $0 actually makes it a bit more expensive.
PS: Yes, I've made up most of the numbers. No, I don't have any reliable stats.
You know, I live in Central Europe and 20 years ago we had a communism here. But I've seen enough capitalism to understand that no one is going to give you anything for free and everyone is fighting for his interests in the first place. I'm not saying it's unfair - I find it much better than the communist hypocrisy.
But I find it constantly funny how people sign a contract and then expect the other side (Amazon, Groupon, their bank, ...) will prefere their interests before it's own. For example that Groupon will schedule the coupons to the least busy times (i.e. when there's not enough customers) or that the bank employee will give them unbiased advices about their money.
The agreement says amazon can lower the price of the app-- say, give a $10 app for $5--but your cut of the profits will never drop below 20% of your asking price (i.e. $2). Amazon came back and said, "We want to do a front page FREE promotion, but you get 0%. You won't get paid, but you'll get exposure. Do you want to do this?" and he said "YES!"
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The big guy pisses over the little guy and thinks he should be grateful for the refreshment.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
But I find it constantly funny how people sign a contract and then expect the other side (Amazon, Groupon, their bank, ...) will prefere their interests before it's own.
It makes business sense to operate in such a way that you take a minor hit to immediate profits in order to ensure a balanced deal with your partners and your customers. In other words: you want to make an exchange of wealth that's advantageous for everyone. By doing so, you, as a business, become a desirable partner or a desirable vendor, attracting more business partners and more customers.
Should you make the ultimate sacrifice? Hell no. Should you give up that last 10% margin increase and profit $90 instead of $100 off each mark, just to make sure your customers are 80% happier? Hell yes, 80% happier means 80% more returning business and 80% more customer recommendations, which mean $90 each from 1800 people instead of $100 from 1000 people.
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True but if they had some sort of ad based revenue in the product like so many "free" Apple apps have then they would still be getting some revenue off of that. Does Android have anything like that in place for ad revenue? Being Google, I'm sure they do. Sounds like the developers missed out on a big opportunity even if they gave it away.
Although admittedly if it was a paid app initially, I wouldn't want ads in it. Perhaps they should consider something like that when signing up for the Free App A Day promo.
I don't think Black Friday sales are quite the right analogy. If a store has a big sale on blenders, they've already paid the blender manufacturer $X per unit, and then set their prices based on that, or even below if they think it'll add enough overall sales on other items to make up for the loss. They don't get to tell the blender manufacturer "Hey guys, we're having a big sale, so instead of paying you $X, we're only going to pay you $Y".
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Oh boy, if we do this, we'll get rich. Read and do research? You're crazy, bub. I don't need to do any of that. I just need to sit back and let the money flow in. While I'm at it, I'll also sign up for Groupon. I heard I'll get some crazy business out of it. No need to plan or do any research for that either. The money just jumps straight into my wallet without any effort. After this I have two more plans and then I'll retire in my 30s. I'm going to make money by going to garage sales and selling things I bought cheap for hundreds, if not thousands of dollars on ebay. When I'm done with that, I'll make money by putting ads in newspapers.
Yes, that's definitely right. But in many cases the benefit from balanced deal is so far away they just go for fast money.
Take for example real-estate - when a regular customer wants to sell a house, the agent is in a hurry to be the one who sells it. The owner might sell it without them, so they accept much lower price than they might - when the agents are selling their own houses, they usually get about 25% more for it because they're patient and waiting for the right offer.
Amending a contract is normally a very formal process involving lawyers and signatures or at least initials, an email asking "hey, can we change the list price of this for today" is very informal and not likely to cause the responding party to think that it would affect the contract. I think a judge would likely side with the developers were it to go to trial but the problem is you could never litigate a contract dispute for less than $50k so even if you won you would lose. Public shaming is probably the only way to make Amazon live up to their agreement.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Yeah, because you can really litigate a contract dispute for under $50k....
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
...even 0.1% would be a reasonable amount of revenue).
0.1% of the $50,000 they would have made that day is only $50, and only 100 downloads.
The 0.1% is completely pulled out of the air, but since it's your number, I'll use it... that would mean that actual losses that day were only $50, because all those other people wouldn't have bought the app anyway, and they gained exposure to 1000x's the people they normally would have - people that might buy their next app, or the next version - let alone the people that saw it and didn't get it - that's eyeballs, and easily worth the $50.
We're all taking about make-believe money in a situation they agreed to and knew full well going in that they wouldn't make the money. I don't see where the complaint is. Or even the warning... they got 100k downloads that day! that's an advertisement that it works!
It's amazing how many problems and complaints would be solved ...
Your mistake is assuming everyone wants these problems and complaints to be solved. It is not in Amazon's interest to solve them.
Amazon is particularly a vile company. Its entire business is taking advantage of internet. Which was a government funded project with amazing amount of intellectual property created in universities by extraordinarily creative people given away for free and in the public domain. Just the sendmail or http or ftp protocol or mosaic browser alone is worth million times more than that stupid "one-click" patent of Bezos. But it plays hardball with other web sites over its "invention". It sticks the government with all the costs of enforcement of patents of trivial ideas and the litigation etc. Then it sticks to the letter of law and refuses to collect sales tax for other states.
All we need is two or three more unpatriotic anti-American myopically selfish companies, to bring America down. Nah, Amazon alone is enough.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The point is that they gained nothing from the exposure. They thought they would, which is why they tried it, but it made no difference to their sales. Amazon got 100,000 visitors that they could try to sell other stuff to, but the company that produced the app got nothing of value. Advertising isn't valuable in itself, it's only a tool for driving sales, and only Amazon seems to have benefitted in this case. Their warning is that, if you do this, then you're effectively agreeing to buy an advert for Amazon.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
exactly. Android does have apps with ads in it, but if it's a pay app you can bet your reviews will be in the tank if you have ads flashing around in it.
And I doubt Amazon would play ball with the "sure, run a free day, but use this version instead of the normal version of the app" plan.
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
> This hasn't been a financial success, but it's not hurt them that badly either.
Actually it did hurt them bad. They sold something like 2 copies (at 2 bucks) a day afterward, but had to buy freakin *new* servers (at what? $1000 bucks) just to support all the new people.
This comment is more about apple than amazon, but something that concerns me is the issue of customer ownership. Whether the app is free or costs money, there is the issue of who gets the customer in their database. As a small developer, I sold my product and I got to know who the customer was. They went into my rolodex. Then if I had something to say to them about a new version, or a bug fix, or even to contact them and ask them if they would like to buy something else, I could. When the app store keeps the customer for themselves, all that potential for follow-on communication isn't there, and after a ton of software goes out for free, you haven't earned any money, and you customer list hasn't gotten any longer. It has to be a bitter-sweet thing to hear how many copies went out
you will receive a subsequent Appstore main page placement for the following 14 days.
A main page placement for a paid mobile app seems pretty valuable to me. I would do a free for one day deal, and get zero on that day in exchange for 14 days of possible profit.
Now if in those 14 days I made nothing, then there is a problem, either with the placement or with my application.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
It's the contract version of a bait and switch. First the Devs are offered 20%, and then sometime later, possibly after the Devs made plans around this promotional event, Amazon switches 20% with 0%, hoping the Devs will settle for the dubious gains of word of mouth rather than a solid 20% in their pocket. Doing it for some specific reason or change in circumstance is one thing; doing it systematically is pretty clearly predatory.
I thought the rebuttal was obvious enough that it didn't need stating - same terms, same situation, same response. The thing is, "macs4all" has a history of hundreds of posts of apple apologia to the point of irony in that in his opinion if Apple does something, its always good and righteous even while he condemns another manufacturer for doing practically the same thing.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
How is the 100,000 visitors a valuable thing for Amazon, but worth nothing of value for the developer? Either visits and exposure are good (and they both benefit) or it's worth nothing (and neither benefits), though it's probably somewhere in the middle... some visits are valuable, some aren't.
My gut feeling is that Amazon probably gets less out of this than the developer. These 100,000 downloads grabbed the developers app. They're less likely to grab some other app, cause they just downloaded something new. And the developer has a (non-paying) customer now... but it's a customer that can be upgraded to a paying customer. Just release a version 2 with a new API like all the other bait-and-switch people do... those that would have paid will likely pay, and maybe some that wouldn't have made the jump originally will now pay cause they've found value in your app.
"No publicity is bad publicity"... this article is probably doing more for Amazons benefit than the free downloads from this app.
How is the 100,000 visitors a valuable thing for Amazon, but worth nothing of value for the developer?
Because Amazon sells lots of things, while the developer sells only one thing. It's a classic loss leader. You sell something at below cost to get people into your store, and then they buy more of your stuff. In Amazon's case, the daily free app gets people into their Android app store and then they can sell them other things. 100,000 people are going to Amazon's store to grab the free app - that's a lot of people to potentially sell other things to. The developer, on the other hand, is selling one app. 100,000 people get it for free. That's a lot of people who now won't be buying that app.
When supermarkets do loss leaders, they still pay their suppliers, so their suppliers make a profit (although often a small one - big supermarkets will negotiate a very low price for things like milk that are loss leaders). Amazon negotiated a zero price for theirs, which means that they are benefitting from 100,000 daily visitors (assuming that this is a typical download rate for the free app), but the app developers get nothing.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
You know that Apple has promotions for specific apps, and limited time free app offers, right?
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
Only a geek would still believe that there is actually such a thing as something for nothing.
love is just extroverted narcissism
Ok, we agree, nothing to do with the topic at hand.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Because nobody could certify the "sent" item is identical to the received one. Blame the lack of digitial singatures, but electronic transmissions are generally not considered written communication, even if printable, like emails.
Learn to love Alaska
People do all the time. You ask for damages and costs, so if you win, you made a profit suing them and it didn't really cost you anything.
Learn to love Alaska
It also offers you posts that have not been moderated prior.
For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
Neither am I, but the point still stands. Canadians don't have to worry about Mexicans, Spanish don't have to worry about Americans, etc.
And their sales are high enough to warrant tax people looking into it.
Then their revenues are enough to deal with the paperwork.
I'm countering the argument that its hard to distribute to multiple countries because you have to sell hundreds to make the paper work worth it.
The simple answer is: don't worry about the paperwork until you are making enough money for it to be worth it. If you sell 1000s to a country, THEN do the paperwork... if you sell 7, don't bother and don't worry about it.
Well, that seems senseless, then!
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Of course just the fact that the Amazon Android App store is "US only" seems to point to the fact that you can not even sell ONE copy in another country without actually going to an App store for THAT country to sell it. If Android really wants to take on Apple it must be as just as easy, or at least SOMEWHAT as easy as to do it in the Apple store.
Do YOU know ONE Android app store that you can put your app on to be sold at least "somewhat" internationally?