Category: Apple

Apple and auth

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

I wrote this yesterday and realized I left something out.

In trying out that stupid taxi app that only offered a botched Facebook login or 7 fields, I was reminded of why didn’t Apple do something about auth for apps? The iTunes ID has to be used by anyone getting an app and it would seem to me if Apple got behind something simple for iOS apps that is tied to the iTunes ID – it would simplify things a bit.

Furthermore it is time to Apple to combine this with dropping the commission from 30% to 20% to fuel more use of payments. They make enough money – they don’t need to make it on the backs of this charge.

Last post from Samui. Back home and on to the next thing.

Let the bloodbath begin!

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

Banged this out yesterday – http://www.nokpis.com/2016/04/18/the-actual-state-of-ott-in-emerging-markets/

The idea being that the expansion of OTT across the planet will be a full scale war and that it won’t simply be handed over to Netflix on a silver platter.

Now we have Netflix with the okay quarter but with a shady forecast: http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/18/netflix-posts-a-mixed-q1-but-adds-6-74m-new-subscribers/

Don’t get me wrong here. Netflix is huge and growing but the cost of building out tech and a library for the globe won’t be cheap. They are also losing paid subscribers who can no longer VPN to get the good content. I am in Singapore and the size of the library sucks here. I can’t even get the latest season of many of the Netflix shows. Thankfully I still use my mom’s account so not like I am sweating the subscription.

However on top of dealing with all the regional players, Netflix has to now contend with Amazon.

http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/04/amazon-starts-offering-prime-video-as-a-8-99-monthly-subscription/

I always assumed Amazon would do this at some point but didn’t expect it this soon. To be frank I had Prime for a bit so I could play with the video service but didn’t keep it due to not having enough content. With the service now being split out I may try it again but I have always found their tech and apps to suck in comparison to HBO and Netflix. Amazon always does just enough to get by versus build the best app ever. It shows with their video apps but maybe this breakout will force them to compete more. Time will tell.

One thing we do know is video is growing like mad – even in Asia. http://variety.com/2016/digital/asia/online-video-further-growth-in-asia-report-1201755475/

I think the market will split off into a few groups and that there will never be one dominant player for the globe or for the Asian regions.

But who the hell knows.

Of course Apple’s so called streaming service is a no-show

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

Not a very thorough article but jogged my memory some :: http://www.techinsider.io/apple-streaming-tv-service-delayed-2016-2

I think people don’t realize that the launch of Netflix global is going to set everything back a bit before things can move forward. I love watching all the haters coming out and bashing the OTT companies over content or VPN issues. Folks – you are bashing the wrong crew. It’s the content owners to bitch at – not the streamers.

The world of content rights is such a mess it’s not even funny. Just look at all the audio guys – even Pandora can’t make money. The only guys making money in streaming audio are the owners of the rights and the infrastructure guys. Not the artists or the streaming companies. Spotify is huge but I am sure they don’t make money.

Apple wanted to upend the market and offer some sort of global subscription with content from all over at a fair price. Great. Bring it. But the content guys don’t want that cause they sold the rights a zillion different ways and until all the rights are reset and the system capitulates nothing will happen. Apple will probably keep trying but I bet it takes years.

What I don’t get is why Apple is trying to do this stuff when there is a ton of things they are not doing to make it easier to build a better OTT system on their platform. Apple is trying to be everything these days while at the same time they are not building or shipping the best tools for those who focus on OTT to build the best product. At this point Google has pulled ahead in this platform game in my opinion.

Google:

– Cheapest device to get content on the big screen – Chromecast
– Allows the app developer to implement multiple payment options – not just Google Pay
– Is shipping a basically free DRM platform that works well across chrome, android and chromecast. Plus it includes download as a core feature

Apple:

– Apple TV is pricey and still buggy as hell
– Apple only allows Apple payments and only credit cards. Emerging markets totally missed
– Shipping a DRM system that works well enough across Apple ecosystem but reserves the use of download only for Apple. Pathetic!

I have faults with both these guys in general:

    Tons of pirate apps in the stores
    Still taking 30% for content subscriptions when they know the margins don’t support it
    Unfairly using DRM to control the ecosystems

OTT biz is hard but these guys could do a lot more to help create the best platform versus trying to be the end user product.

Have fun dodging the VPN blocks!

Whither Android…

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

I haven’t seen much mainstream coverage of this move. We all know Google battled hard to do a non Oracle Java but seems that didn’t work out. Legally I always thought Google was wrong but of course I am not a fan of Oracle and the way they steward Java.

Read this about the latest on Oracle and Android.

If you thought overall Android performance sucks now, I think it does, it sure won’t get any better with issues like this : Google has of course its own Android UI framework. Swing will now sit on every Android phone, using up resources.

I don’t know if this is the final word on the subject or if Google has other ideas but I sure do appreciate Apple’s native stack designed from the ground up for mobile.

I won’t argue the point that Android is huge but this isn’t a good sign of where it is heading.

If anyone has some good opposing links or counters please chime in using the comments.

I was hoping Tim Bray had covered it but not yet.

Is Apple all about China?

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

My brother sent me this link :: http://om.co/2015/03/16/apple-is-all-about-china/

Actually I don’t think they are all about China although they are emphasizing it more and more but somehow I don’t think they will always do that. I think they used the last keynote to highlight how far they have come in China since everyone always talks about how the valley tech companies get hosed in China. And mostly they do. Look at Google, Yahoo, Tesla and many others who have tried and have failed to go big in China. Now look at Apple. Killing it in China.

I think from here on out it will just be the norm for them. I don’t think it will have to be continually highlighted.

However I would add that the focus on China is really just a pivot to Asia in general and that is the right pivot. I find it comical when people say oh the Chinese will love that gold iPhone. Or that gold macbook. Sometimes I think the people saying this crap are the same people pontificating about Asian trends just because they eat at Panda Express a few times a week.

Folks – all of Asia is quite similar to China. I suspect more than a few rich Indonesian, Thai and Singaporean folks will be doing all they can to order a gold Apple watch to go with their gold iPhone and iPads. It just comes with the territory.

So yes – China is huge for Apple. But I know they are working hard to crack India and to make a thorough dent in SEA region as well. My guess is they only get more dominant for the time being.

Is human curation the next cool thing?

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

Rumors are the Apple is looking to do this for Beats music. I think it would help me find stuff to listen to.

Roku is having some luck with it:

One hint of how that might work is Roku’s Roku Recommends barker channel. Roku’s search engine is well regarded for its ability to search for content across all 2,000-plus apps on the Roku platform. But in mid-December the set-top box maker launched the human-curated Roku Recommends channel to help surface content consumers didn’t know to search for. According to Roku VP of programming Doug Craig, the channel is now among the most popular with Roku users.

This was taken from here :: http://concurrentmedia.com/2015/03/06/supply-side-content-discovery/

It’s cool to have bots and big data but maybe nothing beats human taste?

The app economy

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

As I browsed DF today I can across this :: http://vesperapp.co/blog/native-support-for-ipad-and-landscape/

I think I bought the vesper app when it was on sale for 2.99 and thought to myself that it was a decent price for the app. I didn’t think it was a steal or a huge bargain because I felt like that was about what I would pay for a notes app. I am sure others thought that it was a huge bargain, an app made by some semi-famous folks that was suddenly on sale.

So here we are today looking at a 9.99 price tag now that the app goes horizontal and works on an iPad. I find this slightly comical. Any of us in the app world normally won’t ship an iOS app that doesn’t work on an iPad from day one. At least I wouldn’t.

The app economy is bizarre since the whole notion of pricing has been eroded to the point where Gruber is almost using this move as a line in the sand. Hey indie devs – put your price up so people value the ecosystem more and truly respect the value of our craft.

I hope it works but somehow I doubt it will.

If Gruber and his tribe can’t survive on a reasonably priced app – 10 bucks is not reasonable, then I am not sure who can. Without a doubt vesper gets way more traffic flowing across it than most other apps just due to Gruber talking about it all the time. 

Unlike Marco with overcast, who has open sourced some of his financials, vesper is three guys who ship stuff pretty slowly. It’s nice stuff but I never have seen it as earth shattering or amazing. Just a good solid notes app that I use to supplement my Evernote addiction. Trip stuff, quick meeting notes and my grocery list type of things are in vesper. Everything else is in Evernote.

So if Gruber can’t make it on decently priced apps then who can?

I know lots of indie devs – http://www.mailtoself.com/ – but these guys have a day job. They are doing this to be able to craft stuff outside of work and see how they can dent the universe with apps. 

Then there is – http://www.cleanshavenapps.com/ . I use dispatch all the time and I have beta tested some new stuff they are working on. This team does well but I don’t know how well or what their view is when it comes to this pricing stuff. I do know that they realize it’s more about marketing than anything else now.

I can remember when I did one of my fist startups whike blowing through millions of dollars having to buy real hardware, databases and app servers – just to launch. Now one guy can rent hardware and use his own code with open source stacks to launch an empire.

However the issue still is about how does one get exposure? Some have to buy it thus increasing the need for capital. Some people are famous and use their fame to launch or propel an app. I am guessing with the vesper price move they didn’t get as big as they had hoped cause if they had millions of users even on 2.99 they would be doing okay.

When I chat with any indie dev it’s all about getting the word out, holding on to their users and the hope that if they build something new, their current users might be customers of their new product.

We all know the app gold rush is over. Done.

Users think everything should be free or cheap – it’s sad it got to this but it happened. I don’t know what the answer is since I have only built apps that come as part of a service versus building an app I needed to sell to make a living.

Will be interesting to see how vesper does with the new premium pricing.

New YouTube kids app

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

Just search in the Google or Apple Store for it – YouTube kids.
 
 My daughter was up and rolling with it within a minute – she is two.
 
 We found some content to not load – could be a geo issue thing since it’s not globally released and I use my USA based accounts.
 
 The interface is awesome and their are parental controls which allow you to turn off things like search. The sounds effects are fun – I think both my kids will like the effects. I do think my seven year old will easily get past the parental settings control though. They should allow the parents to create a password for them.
 
 I didn’t log in so I guess it works without an account and even has some privacy adjustments. You can turn off search and then there is just the curated and featured content which is nice but I am assuming even with search on one cannot find non kids content? Need to play with it more.
 
 Best part about it though? There is a timer so you can have it auto shutoff. Need to play with that as well.
 
 Slick stuff.
 
 I just wish they would offer a download feature for when we are not online.
 
 
 

Jonathan Ive profile in the New Yorker

~ michael_msft ~ Leave a comment

It’s a must read – even if you are not into apple :: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/02/23/shape-things-come

The scale of the article and the access to the inner core at Apple is amazing. Clearly a new Apple when it comes to media access.

Stuff I gleaned from it:

– the amount of wealth centered at the top of Apple employees must be incredible

– Ive is working a ton which is interesting considering he almost retired at some point prior to the iPhone

– everyone talks about Apple in the vein of everything they do must be at iPhone scale. But reading stuff like this makes me think they are free to do almost anything they want – whether it is huge scale or not since overall the business is at enormous scale regardless

– amount of luminaries working for Apple is stunning

– Apple could work on anything really and obviously the car rumors are going nuts but I am curious what are they working on that we know nothing about

– if this current team running Apple stays together for a few more year my guess is the consumer market for music, video and payments is just starting to see a new level of disruption

Enjoy the long read!