Top 1% of iOS Game Developers Make a Third of All Revenue

donniebaseball23 writes "The top one percent of iOS game developers earn over a third of the gaming revenue made on the App Store, according to a new survey of iOS developers. The survey, set up by Canadian indie developer Owen Goss, found that the bottom 80 percent of iOS developers are splitting a mere three percent of all App Store game revenue."

Comments

Re:Solution?

[bit trollent]

Every app developer pays Apple 30%.

That's alot more than can be said about our federal tax laws which are more like a record of bribery and scams than a rational tax code.

Google dodges taxes using techniques known as the "Double Irish" and the "Dutch Sandwich" to reduce its tax rate to 2.4 percent.

citation provided

Re:This isn't too different from traditional softw

[MrAngryForNoReason]

iOS easily is the most level playing field in existence yet.

Except the App store is the only playing field of iOS and it isn't as level as you seem to think. Apps that get promoted by Apple within the store get a massive increase in sales, often propelling them into the top 10 / top 50. Top 10 / top 50 apps are naturally bought a lot more than others so they tend to stay in the top charts. Apps that don't get promotion by Apple languish in the depths of the App Store.

This wouldn't be such an issue if the App Store was organised better with better categories, or filters instead of having to endlessly hit "show me more" to get another screen of icons with no real info about what the game is. At the moment the order of apps is based on a combination of sales and star rating which wouldn't be so bad if the star ratings weren't so misleading (obligatory xkcd).

Re:top one percent of X control large amount of Y

[MemoryDragon]

Well it is also the situation of production value. If you look at the app store, then you have 100 clones of one existing successful program, with myriads of developers trying to cash in on the same concept.
Those really getting money are either ones

a) with very high production value
b) with a very good concept and good implementation which has not been cloned to death

Its as easy and as hard as that. I just wonder who is constantly buying all the canabald clones all the zombie shooter clones and hidden object games which come out a dime a dozend every week?
Obviously someone must do it otherwise they would not come out anymore.

You're mistaken

[shunnicutt]

Actually, the plus symbol has nothing to do with in-app purchases. It denotes universal apps -- apps which will run on the iPhone or iPod Touch as well as the iPad.

Re:Disclaimer says it all

[somersault]

I see you aren't a programmer either. Until is a conditional too. As in

until (programmer.hobby_income >= enough_to_survive_on) or programmer.is_dead
{
          programmer.make_games_for_fun();
}