Apple made a major announcement to its app developers yesterday that should result in a major change to iPhone apps. Until now, there was no way to try an app before you bought it. Apple's policy was that free apps should remain free, so you either had to pay full price to buy an app, or the developer could offer a free "lite" version of the app but it had to be a separate app that would always retain all of its features for free. For the past few months, Apple has allowed developers to include in-app purchases, but developers could only include this feature in a paid app, not a free app. As Daring Fireball, Macworld, and many other websites have reported, Apple has now changed its policy, and now free apps can now include the ability to purchase additional features within the app. This means that a developer can let you download a free version of the full app that has some limitation but which also includes the ability to pay to add more features to the app, such as upgrading to the "full" version of the app. Hopefully, many app developers will use this feature, and this could mean the end of separate, "lite" versions of apps. I look forward to seeing what developers do with this. Other notable iPhone news from the past week:
- For those of you who subscribe to Apple's MobileMe, the service was updated on October 9, 2009. All of the updates are minor and only two directly pertain to the iPhone, both of which are improvements to the Find My iPhone feature. First, there is now an icon for Find My iPhone in the toolbar at me.com, which makes it easier to find the feautre. Second, there is now a URL to go directly to this feature: http://www.me.com/findmyiphone Click here for Apple's full release notes for this update. By the way, the MobileMe service costs $99 a year, but you can get a discounted price of $72.99 through Amazon by clicking here
, and if you use that link, Amazon provides a tiny amount of money back to iPhone J.D. to help pay for this website.
- This is a little "Inside Baseball," but Daniel Eran Dilger provides a fascinating story at AppleInsider about the "Pink" project at Microsoft, an attempt to develop a competitor to the iPhone. The article gets most interesting about halfway through when it starts to quote an anonymous former employee. Apple may not be perfect, but it does seem to have a consistent vision for the iPhone and iPod touch, something which Dilger says is lacking at Microsoft.
- For a while, all we heard about were iPhone app developers becoming rich overnight and quitting their day jobs. But according to this Newsweek story, many app developers struggle to make a profit. This is an interesting contrast to another Newsweek story from last year, and also reminds me of what Cliff Maier, who develops apps for lawyers, told me in this interview last year: "The other advice is this: don't think you're going to get rich. The economics of the app store right now are that you have a tiny chance of making a lot of money, and a huge chance of making hardly any at all. Do it because you need something you can't get from someplace else, do it for the technical challenge or the personal satisfaction, or do it to help society. Don't do it for the money. For me, the law is why I leave my house every day, but engineering is my passion."
- John Brandon writes an interesting article for Computerworld on how the different hardware features of the iPhone work.
JD Supra launched a free iPhone app called Legal Edge which allows you to view recent law-related articles, news, shared work product, blog posts and court filings.
- USA Today reports on an app that can be used instead of a key to unlock and start your car.
- Your iPhone can help you make a great cocktail. Earlier this year I reviewed the excellent Cockatils+ app. Macworld recently reviewed some similar apps, although that article indicates that Cockatils+ is still probably the best of these apps.
- It is technically possible to share your iPhone's 3G internet connection with your computer, a feature called tethering, but AT&T has not enabled the feature. 9to5Mac reports that based on a recent statement from AT&T, we might not see this enabled before 2010.
- And finally, iPhone Alley reports on another use for the versatile iPhone: saving your life by distracting a bear.
Apple's new policy was a cause for celebration over here at TheLawBox. When we developed our software, we assumed we'd be able to give it away. But because our app included downloadable content, we were forced to list it at 0.99. I can't tell you how excited we were to be able to cut the price tag off our software entirely.
Posted by: Nicholas Zeltzer | October 16, 2009 at 12:10 PM
It seems that developers are using this new feature to put "expirations" on their free apps. I recently downloaded the "free" version of UNO with its limited features. After an hour or so of game play, it won't let me play the game anymore, but stays stuck on the screen asking me to buy the full version of the app. From your description, I would expect to still be able to use the limited features of the game, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I'm not sure if this is what Apple intended.
Posted by: Sapna | October 19, 2009 at 10:18 AM