It's very likely that the AppStore market follows a power-law (or Zipf or Pareto) distribution of some sort. That is, the top 10 take 10% of the revenues, the next 100 take 10%, the next 1000 take 10%, etc. What the scaling exponent and constants are is anyone's guess without detailed sales data.
This is similar to how most unregulated markets work. Consider restaurants. There are a handful of massive international chains, a small number of medium size chains and a huge number of mom & pop eateries, some of which do quite well (relatively speaking) and some of which just fail.
Final analysis: you won't get rich on apps unless you're either A) very lucky or B) efficiently create quality apps at good prices with good marketing. I'd hope that most people on HN would opt for B :-).
The thing is, Camera+ frankly isn't that impressive. It has a cute but useless SLR animation but there are better camera apps out there (Hipstamatic, GorilllaCam or just the built-in app). I'm actually disappointed that I bought Camera+ and can't help feeling it's hype (marketing) over functionality.
Having the pretty Lisa (http://mostlylisa.com) as spokesperson can't have hurt either (yeah, I'm cynical like that)
which, I should add, should be a lesson for everyone: marketing > functionality. One which I need a serious lesson in too.
Particularly in the app store where there's no trial periods and customers are accustomed to taking a risk on low-priced apps. The app store just doesn't seem structured to make the "best" apps rise to the top, only the most popular.
you know I don't think it's so much marketing > functionality so much as the much more general status > utility. when you compete on utility you are always in a race to the bottom with your competitors. others typically can't compete with on status if you manage to establish yourself as "the thing to own".
I'm sorry. I can't really relate to tap tap tap. They're amazing at what they do (and proof you need a custom UI to deliver some user experiences best).
I really like Andrew Johnson of TrailBehind, Inc. He's active on HN and succeeding in the competitive iPhone market.
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For a counterpoint, my start-up (me, my fiancée, and my good friend) started an indie GPS app at the tail end of last summer. We worked hard, did many iterations, built up our userbase, and now we have several top grossing navigation apps, and we are piling up cash in the bank.
That's the danger in reading taptaptap blog posts. Alot of app devs say there is no money in the appstore except for big names like EA, Gameloft, or brands like Tetris and Monopoly; or that success is flash-in-the-pan and cannot be replicated.
Taptaptap, tapulous, and even HNers like Spreadsong prove that if you have a sound and stable functionality, a decent value proposition, and focus on presentation and polish almost to a certifiable degree, you can pretty much succeed on every outing.
The ones who doubt these companies' commitment to quality are the ones who, let's face it, are strictly in it for the "gold rush" and turn out bad product or blatant "me-too" knock-offs. People still make loads of money in the App Store, but there's a difference between "I'm going to get rich on fart apps" and "I aim to be rewarded for making the highest possible quality products I can for my chosen platform".
Name 3. If there are countless apps fitting that, I'd love to see them. They should of course have the same quality, utility and polish, too. Not Glossy Fart-o-Rama +.
I mean, even the darling of iPhone app developer angst who constantly ranted publicly about pricing and poor sales, David Barnard of App Cubby, made over a quarter of a million dollars last year from ostensibly 3 mobile apps, _and_ signed a deal with Fram for a branded version of an existing apps (terms of deal undisclosed, of course).
There is money (sometimes millions) to be made in the app store and in mobile apps in general. You just have to have a good idea and execute to the same quality you would any other business you really want to succeed.
I'm not an iPhone user myself, so I don't know the app store. Your David Barnard, whom I also don't know, at least seems to be a recognized name. It doesn't matter if it is Angst or something else, as long as you have decently sized exposure.
This app was backed by their immense marketing machine that they built up over time. Not to say that this app wouldn't have made a lot of money but we have to take that advantage into consideration.
It's true that one need to keep that in mind (meaning that somebody building the exact same app probably wouldn't have met the same success), however they've always backed it up with well designed, ultra-polished apps.
Their marketing machine is one multiplier, the quality of their apps is another.
A friend of me showed me the app on his new iPhone 4 and my immediate thought was "what an incredibly cheesy app". Putting a fake SLR viewer on the screen, at a time when even real SLR cameras don't have that kind of viewer anymore? Come on...
More power to taptaptap, though - they clearly have their market cornered. It is just sobering, because I personally would never have created that kind of app.
Psychologically, it seems to be a very interesting case. I guess iPhone people really buy into a fake reality and manage to live in it, more or less (that is now they feel like they have a sleek SLR camera). As long as money doesn't run out anyway.
I seem to have a similar reaction to all the Appleish design as the girl from "Pattern Recognition" has to the Micheline Man.
This is similar to how most unregulated markets work. Consider restaurants. There are a handful of massive international chains, a small number of medium size chains and a huge number of mom & pop eateries, some of which do quite well (relatively speaking) and some of which just fail.
Final analysis: you won't get rich on apps unless you're either A) very lucky or B) efficiently create quality apps at good prices with good marketing. I'd hope that most people on HN would opt for B :-).