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Phone number formatting should be system configurable like dates. I don’t care that parsing is a hard problem. 😤
https://mastodon.social/@daringfireball/116416217286978150
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@bryan That contacts app he suggests is 8 bucks a MONTH! Crazy. Subscriptions have ruined everything.
@Unabart
😂 I’m fine with the built in contacts app. wtf does someone need a custom contacts app for?
@bryan To feel important, I suppose. I've carried the same contacts list from phone to phone, platform to platform, for almost 15 years. Never once have I felt the built in contacts app lacked anything or feel a need to complain about the phone number formatting. Slow day at the Daring Fireball blog idea desk. Or, in his case, slow day at the Daring Fireball idea subscription app.
I'll pay outright for apps I use a lot and like. I will never pay a subscription. Ever.
@Unabart
Would you pay for per use? Like would you rather subscribe to an email app to unlock advanced features like complex sorting or would you prefer the app does everything but you need to buy “gems”. Sending an email cost 4 gems, replaying costs 2 gems, and sorting an incoming email costs 1 gem?
Maybe 1000 gems costs $1.
As I write iOS apps I’m always trying to figure out what is acceptable to people for monetization.
@bryan I want to pay once. Period. And own what I bought. If there's a major overhaul, offer a respectable upgrade price. For nearly every piece of software in existence there is a free, less polished version. I'll use that before I let anyone pick my pockets with any kind of pay to play setup. I may not be the best case study at 55 years old and done with all the bullshit. Function over fashion. Give me a good working piece of software and a donate button and you'll get my money.
@bryan Continued: the old shareware model was the best. Give the user enough time to decide if they are going to like and depend on the software, then limit functionality for a fair payment. Author emails you unique unlock key and you're good to go. Of course that doesn't squeeze every last drop of blood from the user, so now ppl shamelessly make their apps a subscription. I won't do it. People once made a living writing software without having to rip people off. It's just greed.
@Unabart
I don’t know if that is a fair comparison. For example I might drop a BryanMail app that does it all and you pay once $19.99. But September comes and now there is a folding phone, and it isn’t Liquid Glass it’s now just “solid glass”. A framework for doing something (like accessing contacts) changed along with some other 💩.
Do I update everything and release BryanMail27 with the new look and features and leave BryanMail original to continue until Apple drops framework compatibility at some random date in the future? Or do I keep updating the original app adding features even if few new purchases happen? A little of both?
What’s the best way to make money but insure my users are satisfied? 😬
@bryan offer the old version for people with older devices And/or a reduced cost upgrade to the newer/better version with knowledge that deprecation will eventually make the older app unusable, albeit out of your control.
Then I can decide if I want to buy the new BrianMail or try the boring FOSSMail.
@bryan But no world exists for me in which I'm going to rent apps or buy in-app currency to use them. There's more ethical ways to do it.