Archive for category Android Market

Android Flavors

Posted by Simon Judge, Freelance Mobile Developer in Android Market on May 28th, 2009

newyorktimesThere’s an article at the NYTimes on the three flavors of Android. The first type of phone doesn’t run any Google applications and hence won’t include the Android Market. Google has no way of knowing how many such phones are in development. The majority of phones Google knows about (12 to 14 phones this year) will be of the second type “to include on the phone Google applications” but no mention is made whether this includes the Android Market or whether this is optional. The third type of phone ( 5 to 6 this year) must include an uncensored Android Market.

I believe the success of Android partly depends on users having access to the Android Market. If handset OEMs or carriers choose to run their own application stores then there’s going to be consumer and developer confusion and disappointment.

Compatibility Challenges

Posted by Simon Judge, Freelance Mobile Developer in Android, Android Market on April 29th, 2009

This morning I posted on mobilephonedevelopment regarding Google’s new article on backward compatibility. I have just read that some developers are viewing 1.5 as a catastophe because they don’t have enough time to download the new firmware and update their application before end users start downloading on their new phones.

One of the problems lies with the Android Market…

“…developers aren’t able to simply create a new, 1.5-friendly update and leave the existing version in place for those without Cupcake”

Whether intentional or not, this seems to force developers to maintain backwards compatibility. It could be argued that we could put up a new application with the title ‘My App for 1.5′ but, as we all know, end users aren’t really going to make any sense of this. Also, the newer application would lose all its ratings and comments.

As for my freeware applications, they are fairly simple and, reading the docs, there shouldn’t be any problems. If there are, I’ll just take them off the market while I fix them. I can see the problem though where people are selling applications. Also, if developers such as myself remove an application while they fix it, how many of them will bother? It might actually cause a reduction in freeware on the Market and/or an increase in the number of applications that don’t seem to work.

New Android Market Distribution Agreement?

Posted by Simon Judge, Freelance Mobile Developer in Android, Android Market on April 28th, 2009

androidmarket1I just logged into the Android Market to view my latest download statistics and I was presented with a new distribution agreement. So what’s changed? Turns out, nothing. There was a bug a while ago that caused some people to be able to register without viewing the correct agreement. Google are forcing everyone to view it again so everyone is covered.

Android Market Fragmentation

Posted by Simon Judge, Freelance Mobile Developer in Android, Android Market, Linux, My Freeware, phones on April 22nd, 2009

pocketgamerbizPocketGamer.biz has an article on ‘What’s wrong with Android Market’. There are lots of criticisms of the Market many of which I have also expressed here and on MobilePhoneDevelopment.com. However, there’s one new piece of information at the end that I found interesting…

“At least one major carrier is specifying their Android devices to come without the Android store”

This ties in with my previous thoughts that some Android phones might not come with a full set of Google applications.

Presumably a carrier not using the Android Market would implement their own application store. From the carrier standpoint, I can see the sense of this in terms of controlling what’s on their store, app certification, the commission structure, payment mechanisms and ultimately perhaps what the users can install on their Android phone. However, I can see consumer confusion as to why they can’t get particular applications on their phone. There’s also likely to be general developer disillusionment that they can’t easy publish their application to all Android users.

Cross Currency Android Market Sales

Posted by Simon Judge, Freelance Mobile Developer in Android Market, Linux on April 21st, 2009

androidmarketThere’s an interesting post on the Android groups regarding paying over double for an Android app on the Android Market, due to cross-currency credit card fees. The problem is that when paying for a $0.99 app, the fixed credit card fees become significant.

I wondered how Apple solve this problem. It turns out they use a combination of ways…

  • Aggregating multiple payments within a small timeframe so that several micropayments become one
  • Allowing payment by PayPal
  • Allowing payment via iTunes cards (available via retailers)

It seems the Android Market will need to start accepting other payment types if people are not to be put off buying single applications cross currency. This is one area (probably the only one!) where the BlackBerry App Store minimum $2.99 app price seems to make sense.