Maybe someone in Boston shouldn't be making (or voting on) laws that affect someone in New Mexico. Different cultures, different values, different communities. Hell, people in NYC shouldn't be making laws for the people upstate. This problem would be solved if more governance was local, and less at the federal/state level.
We don't need "Open Source" governance, we need to let communities govern themselves.
The 'business owner' needs to grow a pair. "Ohhhhh! Woe is me, I have to sit in my easy chair and answer E-mails! THE AMERICAN DREAM IS DEAD!" A little dramatic, are we?
Actually, Apple does not provide any sort of advertising. In fact, unless your app is already one of their top-N titles in one of the categories, they provide NO exposure whatsoever. They have even recently tweaked their search engine to give more weight for already highly-ranked apps, effectively providing nothing in terms of new app discovery. App developers are on their own for advertising and promotion.
As far as hosting and bandwidth goes, these costs are miniscule. The cost to store and download a 150K app is going to be a fraction of a cent per month.
This leaves payment processing, which as others have noted, should be nowhere near 30%.
If 30% for "hosting, distribution and all finances" is such a great deal, surely they would have nothing to fear by allowing competing services to perform these difficult and expensive tasks. I mean, very few companies on the planet have yet mastered the intricate technological challenges of inexpensively hosting downloads.
30% (plus $100/yr, don't forget) is an insane amount for the minuscule amount of "service" Apple provides.
The discussion was about the tax advantages of hourly contracting vs. salaried wages. None of the things you mention have anything to do with employment. Obviously what the guy meant was that if you work as an employee, you have none of the tax write-offs available to independent contractors, and 100% of your salary is subject to the normal rules and non-employment-based deductions.
Besides special cases like transfers to retirement savings and medical savings, W4 employees get taxed on their entire gross pay. I can't deduct my travel costs, office supplies, meals, etc. Please share your secrets!
If you're right out of school, go for an internship or something--anything to get work on the resume. You won't be paid as if you had 10 years of experience, so be prepared to get a few roommates or live with your parents---just like we all did when we were just out of school.
Even if I don't have to move, you generally have to pay significantly more than I'm getting now, period. Welcome to "hiring 101". Why would I change jobs for a 2% bump in salary? If I'm that good, I'm getting yearly bumps by that amount already.
I wish I hadn't already replied to this thread. This needs a mod-up. Perfect way to put it.
She thinks the secret is to just take what was cool in Company A and transplant it into Company B? LOL. What even qualifies her to be CEO? Lucking into being employee number ten at Google? That's all it takes now?
Huh??? From what I have heard, Google's pay is by far the best in the 'Valley, both cash only and total (including stock/benefits). That said, you're not going to get rich working for either them or Yahoo. You only make it big here by lucking into an employee-number-[2..20] role.
Steve Jobs (praise be his name) had a quote about IBM and institutionalizing process without focusing on the company's actual product:
Companies get confused. When they start getting bigger they want to replicate their initial success. And a lot of them think well somehow there is some magic in the process of how that success was created so they start to try to institutionalize process across the company. And before very long people get very confused that the process is the content. And that’s ultimately the downfall of IBM. IBM has the best process people in the world. They just forgot about the content.
C & C++ will be there, but I wouldn't hold your breath over OpenGL.
Interesting, I have to admit I haven't been following Windows Phone 8 closely, and didn't realize how drastically they changed their stance from what it was for Windows Phone 7. I stand corrected. C and C++, great!
Cool Story Time:
About a year ago, MS invited all the members of a local Silicon Valley iOS developer "meetup" group to come in to their Mountain View office for a presentation on how cool and awesome developing for Windows Phone 7 is. Some of the speakers were 3rd party developers who got up and talked about how nice it was to essentially have to re-write their app to work on the platform. Afterwards, MS brought a marketing guy out to do Q&A after the presentation. During the developer Q&A, the first questions were, paraphrasing:
Q1: "Will you support C and C++?" A1: "No, not a chance. You'll love C# though!"
Q2: "What about OpenGL?" A2: "No."
Q3: "So, let me get this straight, if my mobile app company maintains 100,000 lines of C++ code that works across Android and iOS, I have to re-write it all just to support Windows Phone 7?" A3: (snicker) "Well, I DOUBT there's a--mobile app--with that many lines of code!" (audience kind of shocked at this point)
It kept going from there...
Nice to see that they have taken these comments to heart and opened up Windows Phone 8 to C and C++ ports.
From reading about DirectX and shared code bases with Win8, I'd say they're trying for overlap with Win8 games, and NOT the Android/iOS games platforms.
This would be a great strategy if: 1. There are lots of existing Win8 games and/or 2. There are not lots of existing iOS/Android games
Microsoft technology lock-in, as a strategy, will not work this time. MS is still using their 1990s-era playbook, but hasn't realized that the game has changed.
Suppose you've already got a game where most of the core code is written in C++ and uses OpenGL. Right there, you're hitting iOS and Android (assuming a minimal amount of Objective-C &Java simply for integrating into the platform).
Now you've got a decision: work on some cool, valuable features for the next version of the Android/iOS game, or completely re-write it using the Microsoftie languages, technologies, and UI idioms they force you to use, and have to maintain two code bases. I know which one I'd choose
Windows Phone is not going to get any real developer love until they give in and stop forcing their technology stack on us.
Microsoft, while you're bootstrapping your platform and trying to attract developers, wouldn't it make sense to make porting easier?
Good point. I'd guess it's the screwed up mentality that comes from working in Venture Capital: It's better for one or two companies in your portfolio to make-it-huge than for 50 companies to have modest, but sustainable returns. He's just applying the same concept to this contest.
I realize you're probably just trolling, but there are people out there actually like this, and they REALLY need a dose of "Mind Your Fucking Business". Not saying revenge is right, but deliberately being a prick to neighbors who have done nothing to you (besides not living exactly the same way you would) is a good way to get your tires slashed, your pets poisoned, or antifreeze sprayed over your lawn.
Sorry, but I'm skeptical that enough "competitors" of ad purchasers out there have the required combination of net-savvy and risk tolerance to be renting botnets. Sure, a small number, maybe. I believe you that it doesn't take a genius to go look up the right.ru sites offering such services, I just doubt that their use is widespread. Do you have a link to a study that even estimated how many companies actually partake in these services? It sounds kind of far-fetched.
It's similar to companies blaming "competitors" for bad Yelp reviews. Do competitors sometimes submit bad reviews of a company's product? Of course. Do competitor-authored reviews make up a significant fraction of most reviews? Not a chance.
He seems to be butthurt over something called "Sandboxing," but throughout his entire rant, he fails to actually explain to his readers what this Sandboxing thing is and how it affects developers. All he offers is some jargon about "incompatibility with the current set of sandboxing entitlements" whatever the heck that means.
He might as well be ranting over Apple's "leafbowl" restrictions or their policy of "chicken frying" developers. Without some background, who knows what he's talking about with his jargon?
If it was such a bad decision, then go put a proposition on the ballot to repeal it. Surely it will pass in a landslide!
Maybe someone in Boston shouldn't be making (or voting on) laws that affect someone in New Mexico. Different cultures, different values, different communities. Hell, people in NYC shouldn't be making laws for the people upstate. This problem would be solved if more governance was local, and less at the federal/state level.
We don't need "Open Source" governance, we need to let communities govern themselves.
The 'business owner' needs to grow a pair. "Ohhhhh! Woe is me, I have to sit in my easy chair and answer E-mails! THE AMERICAN DREAM IS DEAD!" A little dramatic, are we?
Actually, Apple does not provide any sort of advertising. In fact, unless your app is already one of their top-N titles in one of the categories, they provide NO exposure whatsoever. They have even recently tweaked their search engine to give more weight for already highly-ranked apps, effectively providing nothing in terms of new app discovery. App developers are on their own for advertising and promotion.
As far as hosting and bandwidth goes, these costs are miniscule. The cost to store and download a 150K app is going to be a fraction of a cent per month.
This leaves payment processing, which as others have noted, should be nowhere near 30%.
Hell, I'm an Apple fan-boy and I can see this.
If 30% for "hosting, distribution and all finances" is such a great deal, surely they would have nothing to fear by allowing competing services to perform these difficult and expensive tasks. I mean, very few companies on the planet have yet mastered the intricate technological challenges of inexpensively hosting downloads.
30% (plus $100/yr, don't forget) is an insane amount for the minuscule amount of "service" Apple provides.
The discussion was about the tax advantages of hourly contracting vs. salaried wages. None of the things you mention have anything to do with employment. Obviously what the guy meant was that if you work as an employee, you have none of the tax write-offs available to independent contractors, and 100% of your salary is subject to the normal rules and non-employment-based deductions.
Besides special cases like transfers to retirement savings and medical savings, W4 employees get taxed on their entire gross pay. I can't deduct my travel costs, office supplies, meals, etc. Please share your secrets!
That's equivalent to ~$14.50/hr. You might as well sell sneakers at the mall. Move to civilization!
I don't know what geographic region you are in, but if you're in Silicon Valley, you're going to have to offer about 1.5-2X that for someone "solid".
If you're right out of school, go for an internship or something--anything to get work on the resume. You won't be paid as if you had 10 years of experience, so be prepared to get a few roommates or live with your parents---just like we all did when we were just out of school.
Even if I don't have to move, you generally have to pay significantly more than I'm getting now, period. Welcome to "hiring 101". Why would I change jobs for a 2% bump in salary? If I'm that good, I'm getting yearly bumps by that amount already.
I wish I hadn't already replied to this thread. This needs a mod-up. Perfect way to put it.
She thinks the secret is to just take what was cool in Company A and transplant it into Company B? LOL. What even qualifies her to be CEO? Lucking into being employee number ten at Google? That's all it takes now?
Huh??? From what I have heard, Google's pay is by far the best in the 'Valley, both cash only and total (including stock/benefits). That said, you're not going to get rich working for either them or Yahoo. You only make it big here by lucking into an employee-number-[2..20] role.
Because he's supposed to walk from the USA to Europe? Or bicycle?
Steve Jobs (praise be his name) had a quote about IBM and institutionalizing process without focusing on the company's actual product:
C & C++ will be there, but I wouldn't hold your breath over OpenGL.
Interesting, I have to admit I haven't been following Windows Phone 8 closely, and didn't realize how drastically they changed their stance from what it was for Windows Phone 7. I stand corrected. C and C++, great!
Cool Story Time:
About a year ago, MS invited all the members of a local Silicon Valley iOS developer "meetup" group to come in to their Mountain View office for a presentation on how cool and awesome developing for Windows Phone 7 is. Some of the speakers were 3rd party developers who got up and talked about how nice it was to essentially have to re-write their app to work on the platform. Afterwards, MS brought a marketing guy out to do Q&A after the presentation. During the developer Q&A, the first questions were, paraphrasing:
Q1: "Will you support C and C++?"
A1: "No, not a chance. You'll love C# though!"
Q2: "What about OpenGL?"
A2: "No."
Q3: "So, let me get this straight, if my mobile app company maintains 100,000 lines of C++ code that works across Android and iOS, I have to re-write it all just to support Windows Phone 7?"
A3: (snicker) "Well, I DOUBT there's a--mobile app--with that many lines of code!" (audience kind of shocked at this point)
It kept going from there...
Nice to see that they have taken these comments to heart and opened up Windows Phone 8 to C and C++ ports.
This would be a great strategy if:
1. There are lots of existing Win8 games and/or
2. There are not lots of existing iOS/Android games
Microsoft technology lock-in, as a strategy, will not work this time. MS is still using their 1990s-era playbook, but hasn't realized that the game has changed.
Suppose you've already got a game where most of the core code is written in C++ and uses OpenGL. Right there, you're hitting iOS and Android (assuming a minimal amount of Objective-C &Java simply for integrating into the platform).
Now you've got a decision: work on some cool, valuable features for the next version of the Android/iOS game, or completely re-write it using the Microsoftie languages, technologies, and UI idioms they force you to use, and have to maintain two code bases. I know which one I'd choose
Windows Phone is not going to get any real developer love until they give in and stop forcing their technology stack on us.
Microsoft, while you're bootstrapping your platform and trying to attract developers, wouldn't it make sense to make porting easier?
You're missing his point: People who have lots of money are smarter than the rest of us and always know better how to spend it.
Yes, people actually believe this.
Good point. I'd guess it's the screwed up mentality that comes from working in Venture Capital: It's better for one or two companies in your portfolio to make-it-huge than for 50 companies to have modest, but sustainable returns. He's just applying the same concept to this contest.
I'm sure someone will reward you richly for saving them from the absolute TERROR of yard-parkers.
I realize you're probably just trolling, but there are people out there actually like this, and they REALLY need a dose of "Mind Your Fucking Business". Not saying revenge is right, but deliberately being a prick to neighbors who have done nothing to you (besides not living exactly the same way you would) is a good way to get your tires slashed, your pets poisoned, or antifreeze sprayed over your lawn.
Get a hobby.
Sorry, but I'm skeptical that enough "competitors" of ad purchasers out there have the required combination of net-savvy and risk tolerance to be renting botnets. Sure, a small number, maybe. I believe you that it doesn't take a genius to go look up the right .ru sites offering such services, I just doubt that their use is widespread. Do you have a link to a study that even estimated how many companies actually partake in these services? It sounds kind of far-fetched.
It's similar to companies blaming "competitors" for bad Yelp reviews. Do competitors sometimes submit bad reviews of a company's product? Of course. Do competitor-authored reviews make up a significant fraction of most reviews? Not a chance.
He seems to be butthurt over something called "Sandboxing," but throughout his entire rant, he fails to actually explain to his readers what this Sandboxing thing is and how it affects developers. All he offers is some jargon about "incompatibility with the current set of sandboxing entitlements" whatever the heck that means.
He might as well be ranting over Apple's "leafbowl" restrictions or their policy of "chicken frying" developers. Without some background, who knows what he's talking about with his jargon?
Easy, fire her for insubordination. Problem solved.