I've noticed recently (by that I mean the last few years!), that those devs that don't go for subscription models to sell their software are increasingly opting for upgrade pricing only being available for a short period of time after which point you end up paying full price. I find this irksome and not supportive of loyal customers. The last one that came through like that made me drop the app entirely.

Sorry to rant, but the customer is no longer king and being relegated to a very poor servant.The long term effect of this is that there will also be no loyalty from customers to developers either.

Does anyone else have a problem with this upgrade model or is it only me?

Hi, Simon,

I understand your point, but for me it depends on the price of the app to begin with. If the app is cheap (under $20), I am less inclined to feel a lot of pressure. (I wonder that the low-price apps are even worth the developer's time.) But with higher priced apps, I'd find it annoying to only have 48 hours to decide if I want to upgrade.

I wonder if any of that has to do with restrictions from the App Store.

Steve Z.

Apps cannot be supported without cashflow attached to them, since the first flush of registrations of a new app cannot carry over indefinitely. A decade ago apps cost several times as much as they do now, and they were sometimes locked down to a specific machine. Today things have changed dramatically. With things like Apple's App Stores, there's no such thing as an upgrade, apps can be installed on as many computers as desired (attached to the App Store login of the purchaser), and on iOS most iPhone apps also run on iPads.

Apps that don't have subscriptions also have higher support costs to handle users of previous, buggier versions as well as the latest ones. And those support costs take away people and money from developing the app. More, non-subscription app developers have to 'bank' new features and frameworks and interfaces and bugfixes as incentive to convince people to upgrade. This results in odd and unnatural development cycles, and devs dependent ever more on getting people to upgrade.

That some devs are tightening upgrade periods should be no surprise to anyone in the current environment. Not only are there more apps, more devs, easier app distribution channels, and lower prices than ever before, non-subscription apps are starting to compete with subscription apps that have lower support costs (everyone is on the latest version), faster feature/bugfix iteration (since there's no need to bank features to sell upgrades), and a clearer development process as the devs have an understandable, dependable cashflow - compared to the chaotic, and sometimes disastrous nature of selling upgrades.

So I can't agree with the complaint. Generally speaking, we're getting more for our money than before. Customers were never 'king'. And times have changed competitively.

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

the developer's time.) But with higher priced apps, I'd find it annoying
to only have 48 hours to decide if I want to upgrade.

What applications are Simon and you talking about?
I know of no higher-priced software (>$100) that gives me such a short time limit. That's definitely not the case with Office 365, Mindmanager, Camtasia, Quark XPress, Dragon, The Brain.

If I use software regularly and like it, then 48 hours is ample time for me to decide whether I want to upgrade. Miss the deadline? My bad.

I suppose it depends a bit on the *type* of software, too. Outliner software is such a niche that I don't mind an additional investment to keep the developer in potatoes and pixels - provided, of course, that the software is good and the developer reliable when it comes to support and bug fixes.

Hi, Franz,

When I wrote about higher priced software, I was speaking hypothetically... speculating that it might bother me. Sorry for the confusion!

Steve Z

Franz Grieser wrote:

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

>the developer's time.) But with higher priced apps, I'd find it
annoying
>to only have 48 hours to decide if I want to upgrade.

What applications are Simon and you talking about?
I know of no higher-priced software (>$100) that gives me such a short
time limit. That's definitely not the case with Office 365, Mindmanager,
Camtasia, Quark XPress, Dragon, The Brain.

One of my favourite models is the UpNote one (sorry, Windows users: macOS and iOS only). UpNote is steadily evolving, turning into one of the nicest markdown editors around (support for images, floating windows on top, responsive to requests etc. etc.), but the Chinese developer only charges EUR 0.99 per month. Allergic to subscriptions as I've become, that's so reasonable (and clever, because it's charged every month, so sneaks under the radar, as it were), I'm perfectly happy to pay for an app that's visibly getting better month to month. It now has precisely the attributes needed to become a menu-bar fixture.

Whereas I've just cancelled my Bear subscription. Yes, it's lovely, but it's ceased to evolve...

UpNote has replaced FSnotes, SnipNotes and various other note-takers (even though they're non-subscription).

Ulysses, on the other hand, after a long struggle, I've reinstated. But then I'm lucky - I was an original user, so my subscription price is lower than most. If it was much higher, I wouldn't be renewing.

Bill, Bear is **only** $1.49/month -- for 50 cents you get a cute icon. Come on, who can resist :-)

My interest is piqued by nvUltra -- the long promised vaporware follow-on to nvAlt. Since Fletcher Penney (multimarkdown's "inventor") is on board with Terpstra, maybe we'll actually see a product this year.

No doubt though it will be Mac-only and a subscription.

Bill,

Actually, there is a Windows version:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/upnote/9mv7690m8f5n?activetab=pivot:overviewtab

I tried it out a while ago and found something I didn't like, but can't remember what that was now. But it kept me from adopting UpNote (I was looking for a genuine cross-platform note manager -- well, I still am). Perhaps I should give it another try.

Steve Z.

MadaboutDana wrote:

One of my favourite models is the UpNote one (sorry, Windows users:
macOS and iOS only). UpNote is steadily evolving, turning into one of
the nicest markdown editors around (support for images, floating windows
on top, responsive to requests etc. etc.), but the Chinese developer
only charges EUR 0.99 per month. Allergic to subscriptions as I've
become, that's so reasonable (and clever, because it's charged every
month, so sneaks under the radar, as it were), I'm perfectly happy to
pay for an app that's visibly getting better month to month. It now has
precisely the attributes needed to become a menu-bar fixture.

Whereas I've just cancelled my Bear subscription. Yes, it's lovely, but
it's ceased to evolve...

UpNote has replaced FSnotes, SnipNotes and various other note-takers
(even though they're non-subscription).

Ulysses, on the other hand, after a long struggle, I've reinstated. But
then I'm lucky - I was an original user, so my subscription price is
lower than most. If it was much higher, I wouldn't be renewing.

I remember the problem. UpNote is for Windows 10 only and won't work on my Windows 7 machine. So it may be a viable option for other Windows users.

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

Bill,

Actually, there is a Windows version:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/upnote/9mv7690m8f5n?activetab=pivot:overviewtab

I tried it out a while ago and found something I didn't like, but can't
remember what that was now. But it kept me from adopting UpNote (I was
looking for a genuine cross-platform note manager -- well, I still am).
Perhaps I should give it another try.

Steve Z.

MadaboutDana wrote:
One of my favourite models is the UpNote one (sorry, Windows users:
>macOS and iOS only). UpNote is steadily evolving, turning into one of
>the nicest markdown editors around (support for images, floating
windows
>on top, responsive to requests etc. etc.), but the Chinese developer
>only charges EUR 0.99 per month. Allergic to subscriptions as I've
>become, that's so reasonable (and clever, because it's charged every
>month, so sneaks under the radar, as it were), I'm perfectly happy to
>pay for an app that's visibly getting better month to month. It now has
>precisely the attributes needed to become a menu-bar fixture.
>
>Whereas I've just cancelled my Bear subscription. Yes, it's lovely, but
>it's ceased to evolve...
>
>UpNote has replaced FSnotes, SnipNotes and various other note-takers
>(even though they're non-subscription).
>
>Ulysses, on the other hand, after a long struggle, I've reinstated. But
>then I'm lucky - I was an original user, so my subscription price is
>lower than most. If it was much higher, I wouldn't be renewing.

MadaboutDana wrote:

Whereas I've just cancelled my Bear subscription. Yes, it's lovely, but
it's ceased to evolve...

I never liked the look or the fonts. I wanted to like it, tried a couple of times.

UpNote has replaced FSnotes, SnipNotes and various other note-takers
(even though they're non-subscription).

I've been playing with FSnotes, and I like it. But I don't like it enough to replace something else with it.

Ulysses, on the other hand, after a long struggle, I've reinstated. But
then I'm lucky - I was an original user, so my subscription price is
lower than most. If it was much higher, I wouldn't be renewing.

I'm in that same boat, and pay $30/y instead of the regular $40/yr. But I didn't realize you could drop the subscription and return to it at the grandfathered-in price!

Interestingly, others are getting an even better overall deal as Ulysses is included in SetApp, whose subscription periodically comes on sale for as little as $55/yr. The huge bundle of high-quality apps is so good that if I didn't already own most of the ones I'd use in the program I'd have signed up.

satis wrote:

Apps cannot be supported without cashflow attached to them, since the
first flush of registrations of a new app cannot carry over
indefinitely. A decade ago apps cost several times as much as they do
now, and they were sometimes locked down to a specific machine. Today
things have changed dramatically. With things like Apple's App Stores,
there's no such thing as an upgrade, apps can be installed on as many
computers as desired (attached to the App Store login of the purchaser),
and on iOS most iPhone apps also run on iPads.

Apps that don't have subscriptions also have higher support costs to
handle users of previous, buggier versions as well as the latest ones.
And those support costs take away people and money from developing the
app. More, non-subscription app developers have to 'bank' new features
and frameworks and interfaces and bugfixes as incentive to convince
people to upgrade. This results in odd and unnatural development cycles,
and devs dependent ever more on getting people to upgrade.

That some devs are tightening upgrade periods should be no surprise to
anyone in the current environment. Not only are there more apps, more
devs, easier app distribution channels, and lower prices than ever
before, non-subscription apps are starting to compete with subscription
apps that have lower support costs (everyone is on the latest version),
faster feature/bugfix iteration (since there's no need to bank features
to sell upgrades), and a clearer development process as the devs have an
understandable, dependable cashflow - compared to the chaotic, and
sometimes disastrous nature of selling upgrades.

So I can't agree with the complaint. Generally speaking, we're getting
more for our money than before. Customers were never 'king'. And times
have changed competitively.

Not sure I would entirely agree. Apps are more expensive now than ever before. I remember buying Navigon on iphone for £45 in 2009 and it was way above the price of normal apps. You can now happily pay over £100 on the app store. Everyone keeps touting that upgrades on the app stores are not possible, and yet many developers are doing it through in-app purchases or bundle purchases. Where there is a will there is a way.

I’ve come to the conclusion that users are becoming more savvy to how much they’re spending each month. People say that a monthly cost of £2 is not much, but when 10 apps ask that it does make a difference. I hear more and more people talking about consolidation. As much a CRIMPing can be a joy, I’m slowly tiring of having my data strewn across apps. Dare I say it on this forum that maybe I’m beginning to suffer from “CRIMPing fatigue” as there are too many apps, too many updates, too many subscriptions and it’s becoming wearying.

Still, better check out the Aoya update...!

CRIMPing fatigue - love it!

And yes, you're right, there is a Windows version of UpNote.

Yes, Bear is charming. I had a lot of notes in it, in fact. But it kind of... stopped. A bit like the wonderful Letterspace, formerly one of my favourites. Maybe there's a lot of exciting activity behind the scenes that will jolt me out of my CRIMPing fatigue just as soon as it's announced, but currently, nah, I'm feeling a bit jaded.

However, if Bear suddenly reappeared with folders, folding, and lots of other things beginning with "f", I'm sure I'd rediscover my enthusiasm just like that... ;-)

Simon wrote:

Apps are more expensive now than ever before.

Simply saying "apps are more expensive" is overbroad and incorrect. In 2009 the average price in the App Store is $1.39 for games and $2.58 for all apps, and that average has dropped every year since the App Store was opened in 2008. As of 2018 9 of 10 apps in the App Store are free or freemium, and the average prices are $1.01 and the average game price is $0.49, according to Statista. The popularity of cheap/free apps (led by the cheapness of customers) has driven down prices over the years, and this is something any developer on any platform can attest to.

satis wrote:

Simon wrote:

>Apps are more expensive now than ever before.

Simply saying "apps are more expensive" is overbroad and incorrect.

One has only to remember back to just before the Millenium, in the late 1990s, when no app worth having cost less than £100. WordPerfect, I recall, was £120 or more and spreadsheet apps were at least as much. Of course, £100, and $100 were then worth a whole lot more then than they are today.

Even in 2007 when Scrivener launched, its price of £35 or so was remarked upon as being unusually low compared with the prices of software already on sale in the "writing app" market. £50, £60 or even £70 was closer to the norm for that type of software. Scrivener effectively - and I suspect, deliberately - set a new, lower price-point for Mac writing applications. It worked for Scrivener - but not necessarily in the long-term for all others.

The current macOS market environment, dominated by Apple's app stores, (I'm less familiar with the Windows situation) is about as close as one can get in the real world to what my old economics lecturer called "perfect competition", where prices are forced down competitively to the lowest just-sustainable level. Great for consumers in the short-term. Not so great for producers - and not so great for consumers in the long-term if good producers are not able to afford to invest for the future.

So it's no surprise to me if prices are going up - either explicitly, or implicitly via subscription. It may perforce alter consumer habits, making us pickier, but it also may help guarantee longevity for good software.

Hugh wrote:

The current macOS market environment, dominated by Apple's app stores,
(I'm less familiar with the Windows situation) is about as close as one
can get in the real world to what my old economics lecturer called
"perfect competition", where prices are forced down competitively to the
lowest just-sustainable level. Great for consumers in the short-term.
Not so great for producers - and not so great for consumers in the
long-term if good producers are not able to afford to invest for the
future.

IIRC perfect competition is where the cost of a product is equal to its marginal cost of production. And the marginal cost of software (the cost to ship 1 extra copy) is zero (if you give no support).

Things do seem to be headed in that direction for commodity software. Many games and utilities are now free, just about supported by ever more intrusive ads.

I tried downloading a couple of games on my iPhone recently. The were completely unplayable due to the intrusive ads.

It is a race to the bottom. As a vendor and a consumer of software, I don't really like where it is heading.

--

Andy Brice
https://www.hyperplan.com

In my experience, this is mostly an issue with MacOS rather than Windows. When I added a MacBook last year, I was struck by how few freeware alternatives there were and how many mom & pop developers there were (essentially) duplicating existing programs and charging an arm and a leg for their offerings; each either issuing paid-for updates right & left or disappearing.

It's what happens when 90.5% of computer users choose something other than MacOS; there just are waaay too many developers chasing waaay too few users and so you get ridiculously priced software (to begin with) accompanied by (ultimately) ridiculously priced updates. Developers must either squeeze users further or walk away.

I don't see this occurring with Windows software, at all.

It's only gonna get worse as Apple continues to chase users away with MacBook keyboards that crap out regularly and machines which can't be upgraded. It's just a question of time before Mac users decline even more.

Listerene wrote:

It's only gonna get worse as Apple continues to chase users away with
MacBook keyboards that crap out regularly and machines which can't be
upgraded. It's just a question of time before Mac users decline even
more.

The Mac certainly seems to be in decline. Apple is pretty much ignoring it as they focus on the iPhone and other products.

Developers are squeezed by the ever declining prices in the Mac app store and Apple's outrageous 30% cut.

I know a lot of developers who are switching back to Windows for their personal laptops. I will may go back to Windows when my current Macbook gives up the ghost, rather than pay a small fortune for something that has few ports and may not have a functioning keyboard.

It seems very myopic of Apple. It is not as if they are short of resources or money.

--
Andy Brice
http://www.hyperplan.com

I'd make a couple of points here:

1. From where I sit, apps now are *cheaper* than ever before. When I first went independent, I'd be paying over £200 for office apps like Word & Excel, on top of the £150 I'd paid for Windows. When I switched to the Mac (2003), OSX was about £150 and office apps were still expensive. I think the problem for many devs is that (as others in their thread have said), their prices are being forced down and it's harder to make.a sustainable business. When people scream at Omni Group because of their "high prices" and then scream at (for example) the Airmail gets because their support is poor to non-existent, we're seeing that in action. The advent of the IOS App Store has given us a generation of customers who think that £9.99 is extortionate. The Android store has given us a generation of customers who think that £0.01 is extortionate.

2. I think subscriptions are a rational response, from a. developer's standpoint - a continuing income stream to fund the product (and the food, rent, clothes and other such luxuries :-) ), but as a customer I avoid them. I'd rather pay more up front.

3. I also think subscriptions represent a risk to developers. I think that, over time, many customers will look at their total subscription outgoings and realise that many a mickle makes a muckle and consolidate - which will leave the developer out in the cold (if I cancel my sub and I can no longer use the app, the dev has little to no chance of my coming back). The Agenda solution (keep using the product with whatever features you've paid for, but no updates) might work (effectively, you've bought your features on an instalment plan).



Simon wrote:

Not sure I would entirely agree. Apps are more expensive now than ever
before. I remember buying Navigon on iphone for £45 in 2009 and it
was way above the price of normal apps. You can now happily pay over
£100 on the app store. Everyone keeps touting that upgrades on the
app stores are not possible, and yet many developers are doing it
through in-app purchases or bundle purchases. Where there is a will
there is a way.

I’ve come to the conclusion that users are becoming more savvy to
how much they’re spending each month. People say that a monthly
cost of £2 is not much, but when 10 apps ask that it does make a
difference. I hear more and more people talking about consolidation. As
much a CRIMPing can be a joy, I’m slowly tiring of having my data
strewn across apps. Dare I say it on this forum that maybe I’m
beginning to suffer from “CRIMPing fatigue” as there are too
many apps, too many updates, too many subscriptions and it’s
becoming wearying.

Still, better check out the Aoya update...!

Andy Brice wrote:

The Mac certainly seems to be in decline. Apple is pretty much ignoring
it as they focus on the iPhone and other products.

PCs have declined in sales, while Apple's Macs have increased in sales as well as market share.
In the first quarter of 2019 Mac revenue increased 9%.
Last year Apple grew from #5 to #4 in worldwide laptop shipments.
I don't see Apple "ignoring" the Mac at all. PC sales overall are stagnating, and iOS devices have easily outsold the Mac (which is less than 10% of Apple's business) but Apple sells 3 laptop lines, two desktop lines, and two all-in-one lines, and five of those models have been refreshed within the last year.

For someone who is a Mac developer (I own your app, by the way, though I don't use it) you seem to be dismissing out of hand the considerable attention and focus Apple has consistently provided to Mac devs. This year's Catalyst framework intro alone will allow huge numbers of iOS devs to create Mac apps with the same code with relative ease. (Twitter migrated and tweaked its iOS app to Mac using that framework, using a small team, in 3 days.). Apple ported 40 frameworks from iOS to Mac, and almost the entire iOS API set with only a few exceptions, by adapting UIKit as a native framework and integrating it directly into macOS.

satis wrote:

I don't see Apple "ignoring" the Mac at all. PC sales overall are
stagnating, and iOS devices have easily outsold the Mac (which is less
than 10% of Apple's business) but Apple sells 3 laptop lines, two
desktop lines, and two all-in-one lines, and five of those models have
been refreshed within the last year.

The overall trend in Mac sales look pretty flat in recent years in this graph (up to end 2018):
https://www.statista.com/statistics/263444/sales-of-apple-mac-computers-since-first-quarter-2006/

Also I detect from talking to my peers that the Mac is gradually losing mindshare among developers (that is only anecdotal, I don't have any data to back that up).

For someone who is a Mac developer (I own your app, by the way, though I
don't use it) you seem to be dismissing out of hand the considerable
attention and focus Apple has consistently provided to Mac devs. This
year's Catalyst framework intro alone will allow huge numbers of iOS
devs to create Mac apps with the same code with relative ease. (Twitter
migrated and tweaked its iOS app to Mac using that framework, using a
small team, in 3 days.). Apple ported 40 frameworks from iOS to Mac, and
almost the entire iOS API set with only a few exceptions, by adapting
UIKit as a native framework and integrating it directly into macOS.

I was referring more to the hardware. The major changes there seem to be to remove ports, make the keyboard worse and add a 'touchbar', which I'm not sure many people use. I don't see many signs of the hardware innovation that the Mac used to be known for. A lot of the PC laptops now have aluminium cases and high res displays.

--
Andy Brice
http://www.hyperplan.com

As I pointed out, 5 of Apple's 7 Mac models were refreshed in the last year. Sales have not declined. It rose in the rankings of shipped laptops during a period of overall worldwide PC decline. The macOS is not being given short-shrift either. And individual discussions with some developers don't amount to more than some self-selected data points that ppear to mainly reinforce an opinion that is otherwise debatable.

As a committed Apple user, I must nevertheless agree that Apple haven't dealt well with a couple of issues:

- the Keyboard Thing!
- the ridiculous Touch Bar
- the lack of ports, in particular of SD card ports.

My various Macs date from an era before they did away with so many ports; my SD port is a vital part of my backup strategy.

But the latest developers' shindig did appear to be a big turnaround, with the introduction of a genuine Mac workstation and a genuine Mac professional monitor at prices that are highly competitive with other professional workstations (despite the sad, deluded press wittering on about how expensive the Mac Pro is: detail's in the name, people). Plus a fantastic boost to macOS, and the exciting hiving-off of iPadOS.

I'm hoping they'll have been listening to their users' views on laptops, too. We'll see.

One thing Apple have always got right: their laptops are built like tanks and last for ever (apart, it appears, from the keyboard). Long may that continue!

I am one of the 3 people in North America who likes the TouchBar. I think there's a fellow in Uruguay who likes it, also, and a doctoral candidate in Kazakhstan who depends on it for her thesis work.

Otherwise, not widely used.

satis wrote:

Simon wrote:

>Apps are more expensive now than ever before.

Simply saying "apps are more expensive" is overbroad and incorrect. In
2009 the average price in the App Store is $1.39 for games and $2.58 for
all apps, and that average has dropped every year since the App Store
was opened in 2008. As of 2018 9 of 10 apps in the App Store are free or
freemium, and the average prices are $1.01 and the average game price is
$0.49, according to Statista. The popularity of cheap/free apps (led by
the cheapness of customers) has driven down prices over the years, and
this is something any developer on any platform can attest to.

You know what they say, "there are lies, damn lies and statistics". Many "free" apps are not actually free and have fairly hefty IAPs or extremely intrusive ads or collect all your data and sell to the highest bidder or a mixture of the three. Stats on prices are too simplistic. In terms of the end user, most I know attest that software is more expensive on their monthly budget than it has ever been. Again, I know others have quoted prices, "back in the day", but development cycles were further apart and the quantity of software purchased by the average user was not nearly as high as today. Plus most users did not upgrade with every new version. OS's could run two or three iterations between upgrades as could applications such as Wordperfect or MSOffice. All these options are disappearing. I would happily pay for a stable Tiger OSX rather than the beachball version of today. Plus devs are now selling beta versions allowing the customer to pay to iron out the bugs, some of which never get fixed.

In this endless debate (which I started and apologise for!), my personal experience is that it is costing me more now than it did before. That is my bottomline. It feels a bit like things were in the day of post (you know, the envelopes you put stamps on and send off). You knew once that letter was sent it was at least 3-5 days before you had to deal with that again. With the advent of email the reply comes when you sleep the same day. Software use to be purchased, used for a good while, upgraded at your leisure, costs where manageable, but now this has all gone. It's push push push, spend spend spend. Of course you don't have to, but in the CRIMPing world you always feel there's a better piece of software around the corner! Someone once said that it was better to use a few programmes well than have many that gain occasional use. Perhaps CRIMPing has a lifespan after which one loses interest realising that that one app we're all looking for will never materialise, or maybe cost finally catches up with each of us or that in the myriad of apps we can no longer find the information we need!