Comment by warwick | Hacker News Reader

Comment by warwick | Hacker News Reader

I'm an indie Mac developer (what Mac guys call Micro ISV's), so I scanned down this list and compared it to my checklist for a recent release. Out of the 124 items listed here, I'd say that ~105 of them are either essential or good ideas to have. I don't really agree with the ordering: for example, I can't imagine leaving usability testing to #116.

That being said, the ones that should be in place ought to be in place from day one.

I don't see any point to several. EULA's on first run, asking at the BOS forum, PAD files (though I understand these are pretty important in Windows download sites), various pricing levels, obfuscation, or physical disk shipping.

The one that really bothers me is #88, 'box shot 3d'. If you don't ship boxed software, you shouldn't have a picture of boxed software on your site.

> The one that really bothers me is #88, 'box shot 3d'. If you don't ship boxed software, you shouldn't have a picture of boxed software on your site.

You should A/B test it, shouldn't you? At least a number of years back windows users were more comfortable buying an online product if it had a box shot. Even if they knew there was no box version. It's a question of being comforted by the familiar..

I have long thought that, like the Hacker Free logos, favoring box shots is a symptom of a vague distrust of the Internet and all the scammy thieves who are waiting to take your money even though no software exists. A box shot (or screenshots) proves that the software actually exists.

Based on the alacrity with which I'm called a scammy thief if something goes wrong anywhere near the payment process, I'm going to guess that this really does weight on my customers' minds.

"Box shots mean it is real!" is not less rational than any of a thousand things I've heard about software over the years. (Some of them from techies.)

Except for sophisticated users who think that showing a box shot actually makes it seem MORE scammy. The gentlebox doth protesteth too much, as it were.

> I'm an indie Mac developer (what Mac guys call Micro ISV's)

you should put what your products are on your hacker news profile, i was curious to see what you made, sad panda :)

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