That ‘s the headline on a Cult of Mac post earlier today. The post author is pretty pleased with the weekend ‘protest ‘ by the developers of an iPhone game called Alchemize, and links the protest to ‘rampant idiotic ‘ reactions to the recent Tweetie upgrade pricing fuss, including mine “ saying the developer of Alchemize has ‘clearly had enough of this kind of attitude ‘.
Here ‘s the gist of the protest, from a tweet by the developers of Alchemize:
Apparently the developers have received 3,400 emails in a month, ‘moaning about the price of his three-dollar game ‘ “ and the protest pricing is the response to those emails.
I ‘ve seen quite a few people applauding this protest today “ from individual folks on Twitter to a writer over at Boy Genius Report. I don ‘t agree with their sentiments at all. I ‘m over in the whining morons section, booing this protest.
Before giving some quick reasons why I ‘m not a fan of this protest, I want to mention that it is not because I have any problem with paying $3 for good iPhone apps, or $9.99 for good iPhone apps, or higher if the apps are good enough or compelling enough. I ‘ve paid for dozens of apps priced at $3 and above. I ‘m also not against iPhone developers getting paid for their hard work and creativity. I like reviewing apps from smaller, independent developers, and love to see success stories for small, independent devs.
I also realize that the App Store is a very tough marketplace right about now, particularly for smaller devs “ and that the current pricing levels for apps has got to make it even tougher.
What I don ‘t understand, in a tough market or any other kind, is how it makes any sense to respond to customers and / or potential customers questioning of pricing levels, by making it known that you view them with contempt. That you think of them as whining morons who are not worth having as customers, and feel happy letting that be publicly known.
Oh, and in case you ‘re thinking ‘hold on, that was a blog post title, not a statement from the devs ‘ “ here ‘s the dev happily retweeting that blog post referring to users / potential users that way:
In what other business is it ever, ever a good idea to treat your customers / potential customers with that level of disdain?
If 3,400 people are interested enough in your product to email you about it, even if the emails are to ‘moan about the price ‘, isn ‘t there something more constructive to be done to respond to them?
I realize that many developers have huge concerns about the ‘race to the bottom ‘ in App Store pricing. But is this really how devs want to go about ‘educating ‘ the market so that prices can move up to a better level? By treating their audience, or at least a segment of it, as a bunch of useless morons?
Amongst the bashing I ‘ve seen out on the web for anyone who dares to question pricing on an app if it ‘s in the $3 neighborhood, I ‘ve often seen an argument along the lines of ‘If you paid X hundred dollars for your iPhone and you ‘re paying X for data per month, then shut up about paying $3 for an app ‘. Just piss off and don ‘t buy it kind of thing, with the gist being that that app cost is just a fraction of what you pay for hardware / service and data.
Again, I don ‘t see the logic there. So what if I spent whatever sums of money on the hardware and service? If you spend X thousands of dollars on a BMW does that mean you instantly lose the right to question the cost of a car stereo for it? Or any add-on or replacement part you happen to want or need for it?
If you spend six-figures on a house, do you then forfeit the right to ever question the cost of an improvement or repair to it, that is just a fraction of the house ‘s cost?
If you pay big money for season tickets to your favorite team ‘s games, can you never question the owners about the price of concession items, just because they ‘re only a fraction of your ticket cost? If you do, should the response from the team ‘s ownership be to treat you like a whining moron?
Ok, enough questions. There are lots of ways in which the App Store needs to improve, and maybe the pricing model is one of them. But it seems pretty sad to me if the way forward is to treat users with contempt when dealing with these issues.
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