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Apple Announces App Store Small Business Program

(www.apple.com)
830 points todsacerdoti | 10 comments | 18 Nov 20 11:04 UTC | HN request time: 1.308s | source | bottom
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gtsteve ◴[18 Nov 20 11:19 UTC] No.25135526[source]▶
Looks nice but it doesn't solve my fundamental problem:

1. I invest loads of time and effort developing an app

2. Apple rejects it

-or-

2. Apple approves it

3. I ship a new update

4. Apple rejects the update and now decides my app should have been rejected retroactively.

I'm especially concerned about what happened to Hey and others but my customers are demanding smartphone apps and there are still limits to what can be done with a mobile web browser.

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cwhiz ◴[18 Nov 20 12:22 UTC] No.25135968[source]▶
This isn’t a problem exclusive to Apple anymore. Google has implemented some draconian nonsense this year to the point where I ended up distributing my Android app as a PWA. I had no problems with Apple.

Apple gets all the headlines, and certainly gets more chatter on HN, but they aren’t alone in this bullshit. As an example... Fortnite was also banned by Google.

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1. andybak ◴[18 Nov 20 12:30 UTC] No.25136035[source]▶
> Fortnite was also banned by Google.

I think the main reason this wasn't as newsworthy is that sideloading it was trivial for Android users. Untick a warning and install it yourself.

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2. cwhiz ◴[18 Nov 20 12:35 UTC] No.25136066[source]▶
Trivial for you, a reader on HN. Not trivial, and potentially unsafe, for my grandmother.
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3. andybak ◴[18 Nov 20 12:41 UTC] No.25136109[source]▶
Considering we're talking about Fortnite I would suggest that it's trivial for anyone who can figure out how to play Fortnite.
replies(1): >>25136312 #
4. xuki ◴[18 Nov 20 13:08 UTC] No.25136312{3}[source]▶
If it was trivial they would not bring Fortnite to Play Store at all, but they did.
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5. toyg ◴[18 Nov 20 13:10 UTC] No.25136325[source]▶
If there is a niche for “appstore for grannies”, a free market will eventually get it.

Security is a non-issue. If Apple were really worried about that, they would allow appstores in a regulated form with certain security rules.

6. Dylan16807 ◴[18 Nov 20 13:17 UTC] No.25136380{4}[source]▶
Being trivial in difficulty doesn't ensure that people want to do it, especially for a free app.

If you want a better experiment, have a play version with normal fees, and a sideload version where v-bucks are cheaper.

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7. xuki ◴[18 Nov 20 13:36 UTC] No.25136518{5}[source]▶
Previous they did not have a Play Store version at all. If someone wants to play, they HAD to sideload. And people still don't do that.
8. dan1234 ◴[18 Nov 20 17:09 UTC] No.25139324[source]▶
Obviously not that trivial considering Epic added Fortnite back to the Playstore after seemingly giving up on getting people to side load it.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/apr/22/fortnite-...

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9. andybak ◴[18 Nov 20 17:27 UTC] No.25139538[source]▶
It's not a contradiction to say both "sideloading makes banning from the the Play Store less of an issue" and "it's better to be on the Play Store".
10. andybak ◴[18 Nov 20 17:28 UTC] No.25139563{4}[source]▶
> If it was trivial they would not bring Fortnite to Play Store at all, but they did.

I think you're taking "trivial" to mean "completely frictionless with no downsides" which is not the sense in which I intended it to be taken.

To quote myself above:

> It's not a contradiction to say both "sideloading makes banning from the the Play Store less of an issue" and "it's better to be on the Play Store".