The Whole Subscription Hubbub ➝

I really enjoyed Matt Drance’s write-up regarding Apple’s new subscription model. Especially this bit here:

The problem is that Apple has changed the game on people. John Paczkowski clarified that “Apple’s made no change to its App Store guidelines–it’s simply enforcing a rule that’s been in them all along.” That doesn’t really close the book. Whatever the fine print says, Apple is no longer letting developers do things it had been letting them do — and build businesses on — for almost two years, and many developers are quite understandably upset about that.

I do believe that Apple is doing the right thing with this subscription pricing deal. I’m not sure if 30% is the right cut but I can understand the reason to keep it that way. What’s frustrating is that businesses have been built on the old rules — or Apple’s decision not to enforce them — and these new rules feel extremely limiting to developers.

Unfortunately for these developers, Apple doesn’t look like they’ll be changing the rules anytime soon. And their best course of action may be to either modify their strategy to make working in the iOS ecosystem work or simply move to Android.

Moving to Android, as Matt put it: “may be the best way to make a long-term statement that forces Apple’s hand. There’s a word for that: competition.” Unless Android starts stealing a significant amount of Apple’s market share on the back of subscription purchases, Apple’s isn’t going to change anything for anybody.

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