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Comment by jacquesm | Hacker News Reader

This is absolutely true.

The problem with a market driven approach is that it's hard to convince people to get in to 'glorified bookkeeping' or other stuff like that. Industry applications typically are not sexy but they're a fantastic way to make money because businesses don't have a problem to pay for things that will save them money, time or both.

If you're in it for the money go for b2b any time over b2c, b2c is sexy, everybody will write about you if you score but the fact is you most likely won't.

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Yep, agree with your recommendation of B2B. Going B2B instantly simplifies a lot of issues that startups face because (as you say) businesses are usually inclined to pay money for services even if it is in $100-$1000/mo range. Consumers, on the other hand, will cringe at the sight of paying $5.

99 cents apps, thanks so much for setting expectations of consumers that everything on the web should be free or sub $1 range.

you know what 99c apps have done?

They've got people paying for software. Normal people. People who have probably never paid for software in their life, save for Office (probably bundled with their PC), and a few XBox games

They've got used to paying 99c for apps, then they've slowly adjusted their price expectations up to the $5-10 range for iPad apps, and the advent of the Mac Store looks like helping ease prices people are willing to pay even higher. Pixelmator has sold more than a few copies at $30. Cheap for what it is, but people are buying it. Apple have trained people to pay for software

As opposed to all that open source stuff for free in the repositories, yes. But paying for software is something that has meanwhile been superseded by people paying for services, and that's where the real money is in the long run.

Someone paying $10 for your software is great but not as great as someone paying $4.95 monthly for the use of a service.

The difference is that if you intend to hold on to your userbase on a subscription basis that fart apps are not going to cut it (pun intended), you will have to deliver value for the money your subscribers pay you.

Apple has not conditioned people to pay for software any more than google has conditioned people to click on ads, both companies simply used their economies of scale to make it worthwhile to market to their particular audience, google through their adwords (not adsense!) program and apple through their app store.

Just wait for the 'facebook phone' and it's associated app store, it's only a matter of time.

It's not as though Steve Jobs invented 'software for sale' with the app store, software has been sold to individuals and businesses alike for decades now, the things that have changed the equation here are:

  - download sites for PC software
  
  - open source

  - massive piracy

   software has been sold to individuals and 
   businesses alike for decades now, the things 
   that have changed the equation here are:
   
     - download sites for PC software
     
     - open source
   
     - massive piracy

How are those (except for open source) new? Piracy has always been massive, in the past even more than it is today. Do you know anyone who actually payed for any piece of c64/atari 8-bit software?

And for a long time the first place to get software from (particularly games) were BBSs.

In these times of Steam, App Store(s) & easy on-line purchases via the likes of Paypal I expect people actually buy software a lot more often than in the 80s or 90s.

The internet has changed the piracy game completely, copying a cassette tape or ROM was time consuming and required some skill.

Download.com and Tucows basically destroyed the shareware movement, barring a few exceptions.

The upside is that there are now many more people that are using software so the markets are much larger in potential and the area where the app stores shine are convenience.

A few clicks to download and pay for a piece of software is a massive convenience when compared to the hassle that used to be involved in buying licensed software.

The internet has changed the piracy game completely

Eh, were you actually around then? Copying floppy disks was generally just as easy as anything else, and the skill level of the average computer user was much, much higher. Based on my experience I'd say piracy per capita was nearly 100% in the 80's. These days there are large swaths of computer users who simply don't install anything that isn't pushed at them, let alone browse through TPB. Before the Internet became popular in the mid 90's a large number of BBS's were dedicated to piracy.

Keep in mind ASP on software is a fraction of what it once was. In 1983, Lotus 1-2-3 sold for $495. Duplicating the functionality of the $150 Office Home and Student would have been over $1000.

I actually made pretty good money in the early 80's from programming games and later selling licensed software on the net.

Yes, large numbers of BBS's were dedicated to piracy but large numbers of meters of shelf space in retail stores were dedicated to 'boxed' software too.

I think trotsky is referring to sneakernet piracy, not the odd BBS. I was very young in the '80s, but I remember all the computer users I knew were extremely liberal in their sharing of programs, the same way that people were with music cassettes. "Oh, I bought this cool game. I think you'll like it. Here, let me make you a copy."

Maybe the game has changed by the time the 5¼-inch floppy becamse popular - or maybe it was just different where I'm from (Israel) from the Netherlands - but I don't think I've even seen more than maybe 10 pieces of legal, original packed software (except in stores) until the time CDs (which for a while were significantly harder to copy) started replacing floppies.

Is there any evidence they've "got used to it"?

People got used to paying for ringtones, and then the market pretty much disappeared.

Part of me thinks the app store model is a short term fad.

Ringtones were pretty much always a worthless ripoff. There might be particular market segments in the app store that will die off (I don't know, maybe book apps will be superseded by ebooks), but the App Store as a whole offers a lot of value and convenience, and the "fad" for those things has been going strong for hundreds of years now.

I'd say the vast majority of apps area ripoff. The majority are available on various websites for free.

Amen, If I could I would upvote all day..

Hearing my uncle say 'This is less than a coffee, why not?' or 'For this price (10$), I get more fun and entertainment than going to the cinema' has no price.

Thanks Apple

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