If Apple removed all the "spam" apps, would your sales go up?

Discussion in 'Public Game Developers Forum' started by bravetarget, Feb 14, 2010.

?

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  1. Yes

    21 vote(s)
    67.7%
  2. No

    9 vote(s)
    29.0%
  3. My sales would go down, because I distribute spam apps

    1 vote(s)
    3.2%
  1. bravetarget

    bravetarget Well-Known Member

    Sep 14, 2009
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    Probably not.

    Spam apps only hurt in the release date section; which consequently is ignored for the most part.
     
  2. iPhoneGlobs

    iPhoneGlobs Well-Known Member

    Mar 14, 2009
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    Software Developer
    WHAT? I have to disagree. I have noticed several spikes in downloads when I re-released apps in the past. Visibility is the most important thing in the App Store and is what drives the majority of sales. If there were no spam apps other legit apps would take their place. That would affect sales of some other apps for sure.
     
  3. DPP13

    DPP13 Well-Known Member

    Jan 24, 2010
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    College Student
    No because crap apps are crap apps whether spam apps are there or not.
     
  4. mobile1up

    mobile1up Well-Known Member

    Nov 6, 2008
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    Technical Director
    Munich, Germany
    this was a factor before - but now when you release an update you dont get the visibility that you used to before.. so; this is a no-go honestly. who is the judge of what is a good and bad application as well? there are obvious crap apps; but, there are also some good apps that maybe some people dont like - but others do.
     
  5. thothling

    thothling Well-Known Member

    Dec 23, 2009
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    Apple can not remove application because they thought it's not good enough.
    But can allow customer get their refund if a customer really hate some application. Then developer won't release so much useless application.

    Now, customer can get their refund, but they don't know.
    And if they ask for refund, developer not just give 70% back, but 100%. [apple keep 30%]
     
  6. MikeSz_spokko

    MikeSz_spokko Well-Known Member

    May 27, 2009
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    this will never happen as Apple doesnt give a damn about quality of apps. all they care is to be able to say "we have bazillion apps on the store and DS has just few hundreds". no mention of the quality and nothing even suggests things might change...
     
  7. mpcovcd

    mpcovcd Member

    Feb 8, 2010
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    Without worrying about if apple would ever do it or not, of course sales would go up. Its pretty easy economics if I set out to buy an app, and I buy a spam app thats taking away from your sales (and probably has more effects down the road ie. user is more cautious when buying apps), then if that app never existed the user is more chances of stumbling across your application..
     
  8. Stroffolino

    Stroffolino Well-Known Member
    Patreon Silver

    Apr 28, 2009
    1,100
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    Software Engineer
    Pennsylvania
    Spam apps are approved in bursts, sometimes 12 at a time. They push other new apps off the new releases page. The new releases page is make it or break it for most indie apps. It's their only sure burst of broad visibility, and the best chance (without costly advertising or brand name IP) to make the hop from there to a top list.

    I wouldn't trust Apple to judge which apps are spam and which aren't, but I wouldn't mind seeing a per app fee or perhaps a throttle on apps per-developer (i.e. no more than 2 at a time per dev per day).
     
  9. CommanderData

    CommanderData Well-Known Member
    Patreon Indie

    I agree, and posted a similar comment in the unauthorized Mario Soundboard thread. By removing all those spam apps, the size of the pie for other developers increases by a small but significant amount in most cases.

    You're correct. Spam apps can be approved in such volume that you end up 3 pages back in new releases. I've seen it before first-hand. A limit of one approval per day, per developer combined with a fee per submission would be fantastic. The fee per submission should be a minimum of $100, maybe more like $500 or $1000 per app. Frankly, if you don't think you can make at least enough to cover that cost you probably shouldn't be submitting the app anyway. ;)

    For the people who complain about submission fees per app, maybe Apple could make it so that you can submit a couple of apps per year at no cost, then you must pay for each additional one beyond those freebies.

    The biggest problem as MikeSz_spokko points out is that Apple has not shown the least bit of interest in quality over quantity, so likely nothing will be done no matter how much it may help the store.
     
  10. mobile1up

    mobile1up Well-Known Member

    Nov 6, 2008
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    Technical Director
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    why complain?

    why complain about this? embrace what apple has provided.

    i've been a developer on mobile platforms for over 10 years - and trust me; back in the palmos, windows mobile, symbian development days we had to deal with our own distribution model; let alone trying to get our applications into the hands of end-users. apple has provided an excellent ecosystem for developers to actually get found and provide a model where they dont have to worry about distribution.

    sure; some developers will abuse the system - but, it is a market place. either way, apple gets 30% from every purchase made and they may be about quantity than quality - but seriously; how does this affect the end user - it doesn't. instead of crying over the fact that some indian dude is posting 10-30 useless apps to the app store and flooding the market with junk, why not try and do something new and unique and get press about it - thats the best way to get recognized and featured/whats hot etc..

    junk will simply fall to the bottom of the pile; just like silt does in a river. maybe someone will even dig it up in a few years as a fossil :)
     
  11. MikeSz_spokko

    MikeSz_spokko Well-Known Member

    May 27, 2009
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    just because something is better than other solution doesn't mean having no right to bring in constructive criticism, does it ?

    while I agree with many things you say, there's one very important counter-point to the argument as a whole. There's simply TONS of really good apps that have never received the attention (and profits) they deserve. would games have bigger chance to be noticed if they were not instantly moved out of new releases list of there were no companies like Brighthouse Labs (well over 3000 apps, recently simply a plague of slider puzzles on various themes) ? sure they would !

    even 50$ per submitted game would greatly alleviate this problem. but as I said - Apple is not interested
     
  12. mobile1up

    mobile1up Well-Known Member

    Nov 6, 2008
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    we are on the Internet - everyone has an open opinion - including me! :)

    who defines what is good or bad?

    there are certain types of applications that appeal to some; but not to others - my game and watch games are one. the generation between 25-40 loves these games; as it takes them back to their childhood. however, the current teens say "oh, no 3D - this sucks".. who will judge what is good or not?

    i think one thing apple needs to do in the review process is investigate the application from a level of usefulness - is it simply a junk application? should the developer be forced to identify its key audience? they obviously have let through a lot of junk; same applications with different graphics.. this is bad.

    this is stupid. i would drop the platform myself if they did this - and to be honest; your just promoting something to make apple more money; not provide any value to consumers. it is bad enough we have to pay $99 a year to even distribute applications on the platform.

    why not take an alternative approach? let users rate applications and reward users with itunes vouchers etc - instead of having to hire people to do these type of reviews. if an application or developer is clearly abusing the system - the users can report it for review - and by giving users benefits for doing so; it'll be done quickly and relatively cheaply.
     
  13. GregH

    GregH Well-Known Member

    Sep 12, 2009
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    Hmm I think thats a good idea, I would support 50$ per submitted app. I'm sure there would be controversy though; people would say that apple is shafting developers and things like that. But this would be a small enough charge that even an indie with basically no money could come up with and yet it would make the hundreds of copy-paste slider puzzle apps with different images on them go away (at least I dont *think* they sell 50 copies... do they??? hehe)
     
  14. MikeSz_spokko

    MikeSz_spokko Well-Known Member

    May 27, 2009
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    well, of course noone can rule whats good and whats bad, that's beside any discussion ;)

    2 games just from top of my head that I think were really great, had really really good reviews yet never had any serious luck on the platform - Airport Mania and Toki Tori. Airport Mania has over 4 stars average which is really high but has never been in top 75 games even

    why is it that way ? in PC/console market games that receive praise from reviewers in most cases will have nice sales. not so on the iPlatform, here you can have great reviews, be featured have great ratings yet sell relatively little. of course the customer is different here, but I think most of us agree that it all comes down to being visible in the crowd. and being visible in a situation when your new game is visible ONLY in the new releases and can disappear in a matter of hours from this list (thanks to spam apps in most cases) is extremely difficult

    sorry, but judging games based on their "usefulness" is even harder (and way more prone to bias) than judging if its a good game or not ;)

    of course its not a flawless approach, but right now appstore is under constant abuse. something should be done and I personally would have no problem paying 50$ per app. even our worst games earned considerably more than that. I really think that vast majority of GAMEs earned more than that. it would hit hard the spammers, but not real developers

    or of course make a limit of say... even 10 apps a month are free and for extras you have to pay. excluding lite versions of games of course. does any REAL dev exceed those limits ? I dont think so

    didnt you just say that you think that appstore is so much better than everything else ? ;) j/k

    well, the problem is - people dont read. just check the mario "game" in the top 2 spot. its 3 dollars per copy and 90% of reviews start saying "do not buy this, it is not a game" or something along those lines. then how come they bought it themselves ? and how many people completely ignore reviews ? must be tons, the game is in #2 spot !

    ---

    well, back to the topic question - in my opinion:

    if the spam apps were removed, our sales would probably not change by much. what damage has been cannot be undone (you're out of the new releases list anyway). removing spam apps wouldnt get you higher in the rankings, so little changes to existing apps

    but if no spam apps were on the appstore, our future games would benefit greatly from increased visibility
     

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