Re: IPhone Wax

[Benjamin Tolputt <btolputt@...>]

Andrew Lentvorski wrote:
> Is that still true?  I expected that iPhone apps are like Flash apps. 
> A few people get very lucky at the beginning and make money, and then
> it quickly becomes a development ghetto.
>
> Is there something nonobvious preventing that?

Yes. Being a contractor, I get paid regardless of the success of an
application. I take risks on my own projects, but try to avoid taking on
the risks of others. I've been burned in the past by this and don't wish
to repeat it. The two types of clients I know of in the App Store market
are those that think their idea is a money maker and those that cannot
afford not to be on the iPhone regardless of the loss they are prepared
to make.

In the first case, you need something unique to make money in the iPhone
market, be it a game or a utility. If it is something unoriginal (such
as another Tetris clone) or something anyone can implement (yet another
calculator) - it's not going to make much money (if any). The gold rush
is over and you must have something unique to make your money back, let
alone a decent profit from the App Store.

In the second case, there are companies (generally web-based ones) that
cannot allow their competitors to be on the App Store without a similar
application available. These clients tend to release their application
for free in order to spread their brand, service, and (generally)
advertising to anyone willing to download their app. A typical example
would be Domain (not a client - so I can talk about them). They have an
iPhone application for the searching & viewing of real-estate on the
property market. They release this application for free because they
cannot allow their competitors to gain market-share by ignoring the
iPhone. These are my favourite clients :)

In either case, we've strayed from purpose of this list, being about Lua
the language & platform. To which I can only repeat myself in stating
that a Lua framework for app development is a good thing and I will be
closely watching it's progress.

-- 
Regards,

Benjamin Tolputt
Analyst Programmer