The Digital Reader

The Best News and Info on Ebooks and eReaders

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Entries Tagged as 'app store news'

Amazon Appstore Revenue Now Second Only to Android Market For One Dev

January 31st, 2012 · Amazon, app store news

A lot has been written about the Amazon Appstore, including how developers aren’t happy bout the free app deals, DRM issues, and other matters, but one detail that I have been wanting to see was revenue.

Amazon has been selling Android apps for just over 10 months now, and given their competitive nature I assumed that they would have at least a small part of the overall app market.

But it wasn’t until earlier this week that I finally got some proof. One Android developer producing games as Ziggy’s Games has been blogging about his experiences, and earlier this week Mike Cane tipped me to a post on app downloads.

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Updated: Amazon Appstore Expands to Australia, Netherlands, India – Elsewhere?

September 19th, 2011 · Amazon, app store news

I’ve just gotten word from an Australian gadget blog I follow that Amazon have quietly expanded their Android Appstore to include Australia. It’s not mentioned on their support pages, so I’m still waiting for confirmation.

My source reports that they successfully installed the Appstore client and registered it with their existing (Australian) Amazon account. This is great, but does it work anywhere else? I ask because I would expect that Amazon enabled Canada, UK, NZ, as well as Australia, only they haven’t announced it yet.

Final Update: Amazon appear to have closed off the loophole. The Appstore is back to being US-only again.

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A Tale of 2 App Stores – Amazon and B&N

September 12th, 2011 · app store news

A couple interesting stories passed over my desk this past week, and when I put them together it is fascinating how they reinforce each other.

You may have read today that Barnes & Noble had recently signed a deal with Appcelerator. This is a company with an app development platform, and B&N will be adopting Appcelerator’s platform as a way for developers to make apps for the NookColor (and later Nooks, probably). This partnership will give Appcelerator’s existing 200,000 developer partners the opportunity to submit their apps to the Nook App Store with a minimum of effort. Pretty smart move on the part of B&N, isn’t it?

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iTunes is no longer the biggest app store

August 27th, 2011 · app store news

This actually happened a couple weeks ago, but I can’t see that anyone covered it but me.

According to a couple tracking sites, the Android Market now has more apps than iTunes. The margin is not very wide, but it’s real. The Android Market now has just over 480 thousand apps listed, and iTunes has 460,000.

Curiously enough, in the 2 weeks since iTunes fell into second plac, the Android Market added 20 thousand apps (approximately). In comparison, iTunes added only 5,000 more apps in the last 2 weeks.

The story is actually  more interesting now than it was 2 weeks ago. The Android Market is growing 4 times as fast as iTunes. It’s not only unseated iTunes, there’s also a pretty good chance that iTunes will never be able to catch up.

BTW, the Amazon Appstore had around 10 thousand apps in late May. If you were thinking that it was a serious competitor , think again.

via Androlib, 148apps

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Hidden Expedition: Amazon now back in the Kindle app store

July 28th, 2011 · Amazon, app store news

A couple weeks ago I posted about a free app that had just been released for the Kindle. Then something strange happened. They took it down only a few hours after it was released.

Today I noticed that Hidden Expedition: Amazon was available again in the Kindle store, and this time around it costs $5. This is a hidden object game, and I don’t think it’s worth getting.You have to use the d-pad in place of a mouse and it doesn’t work well. The effect of watching the cursor scroll across the screen is annoying.

But the more interesting detail here is that this app was only one of a bunch of problems in the Kindle Store that week.  An ebook was uploaded (with incomplete data and nonsensical description) and removed. There was also a Kindle app that got released with the wrong metadata, a generic cover, and a game inside that had nothing to do with the name of the app. And then there was the Accuweather app, which was released and then pulled from the Kindle app store.

That was a weird week. I wish I’d thought to get screen shots; it looked like the Kindle Store was having a stroke.

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Wall Street Journal to cut ties to their iPad app

July 24th, 2011 · app store news, Apple

The WSJ announced a few minutes ago that they will be following in the steps  of Kobo, Netflix, and B&N.

Some time in the near future the WSJ plan to release a new version of their iPad app, and it’s going to be missing something. Readers will no longer be able to click on a link in the app and sign up for a subscription.

News Corp.‘s Wall Street Journal, which has been circumventing Apple’s payment system by providing links to its website from inside the iPad app, will soon remove all purchasing options in the app in response to Apple’s new rules. People who download the app and want to subscribe will have to either call customer service or visit wsj.com.

“We remain concerned that Apple’s own subscription [rules] would create a poor experience for our readers, who would not be able to directly manage their WSJ account or to easily access our content across multiple platforms,” a Journal spokeswoman said.

The WSJ app is going to be as bare of helpful links as any of the ebookstore apps. Now that’s a great way to build rapport with your customers.

What a weekend. In the space of not quite 40 hours we’ve seen Apple attempt to extort a 30% vig from publishers be revealed as a complete failure. Okay, I know I expected this, but seeing it come to pass is still a big deal.

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Developers aren’t happy with the Amazon Appstore

July 5th, 2011 · app store news, opinion

One of last week’s Free Daily Apps is about to get pulled from the Amazon Appstore.

Apparatus is a Rube Goldberg type app where you build a track for 1 or more pinballs to follow. It offers motors, levers, springs, anda bunch of other features. It’s the second game of a small Swedish game company, and it’s quite good (I have it).

Bithack is pulling the app because from their point of view, the Amazon Appstore is a distinctly second rate app store. They posted an open letter yesterday explaining why.

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Hulu are now the first to comply with Apple’s new app rules

June 20th, 2011 · app store news, Apple

Apple announced a new set of app rules a few weeks ago, and now we have the first content provider to fall in line. That was quick.

Actually, Hulu is the second company to comply. The first was bol.com, and their reading app was released in back in March.

Hulu updated their Hulu Plus iOS app on Friday and they removed the subscription link. This link led from the app to the Hulu website, which is where you could sign up for the $8 a month subscription for Hulu Plus. BTW, the app doesn’t work with the free Hulu subscription.

I was wondering when this would happen.

I noticed way back in February, when Apple first started the in-app purchase rules, that there was a marked lack of discussion about how the new rule would affect the streaming content companies like Hulu, Pandora, Netflix, Rhapsody, etc. Most have apps that shared a key detail with the ebook apps. They had a link from inside the app to the website where you bought stuff (content, subscription, etc).

I couldn’t get an answer out of any of the companies, but I’d say that we got one today.

via AllThingsD

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Apple just made “Read Only” apps official

June 9th, 2011 · app store news, Apple

You might recall that about a month ago I reported on a loophole in one of Apple’s rules for iTunes.

The rule was that reading apps like the Kindle had to sell content inside the app if they sold it outside the app. The loophole I discovered required reading apps to remove links to any external ebookstore. If they did this, Apple would let the app into iTunes. (I could prove this loophole existed a month ago because Bol.com used it back in March.)

Apple set a deadline of 30 June for the exiting readign apps to comply with their rule. There’s barely 2 weeks left before that deadline, and today Apple made that loophole an official rule. MacRumors have a copy of the new iTunes developer rules. There’s a new section that covers this specifically:

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Amazon Appstore updated

May 27th, 2011 · Amazon, app store news

Amazon have updated the Appstore, one of the updates is a little surprising.

Buying apps is now a 2 step process.  I’d guess that a lot of people have been buying apps by mistake (I did). Of course, this update wouldn’t have helped me; I was on my laptop at the time.

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