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Posts tagged with "app store"

David Smith’s Widgetsmith reaches 100 Million App Store Downloads→

Source: [david-smith.org](https://www.david-smith.org).

Source: david-smith.org.

100 million of anything is a lot, and 100 million downloads on the App Store are rare. Rarer still, and perhaps unprecedented, is 100 million downloads of an app made by one person.

When it comes to apps, I can’t think of a single app made by an indie developer that has reached the milestone that David Smith did today with Widgetsmith. The app, which was released in September 2020 alongside iOS 13, lets users create personalized Home Screen widgets using photos, text, weather data, and more. Since its release, the array of customization options has continued to expand, and last fall, Lock Screen widgets were added to the mix. Most recently, Widgetsmith was updated with gradient backgrounds.

The latest update of Widgetsmith adds gradient backgrounds.

The latest update of Widgetsmith adds gradient backgrounds.

It’s been remarkable to watch Widgetsmith take the app world by storm. Thinking back to the summer of 2020 when Federico and I were testing Widgetsmith, I remember liking it, but I know neither of us had the slightest inkling that it would go viral the way it did not long after its release. Congratulations, Dave. Widgetsmith’s success is well-deserved.

Don’t miss Dave’s post on his website about Widgetsmith’s milestone. Also, the latest gradient background update to the app is available now as a free update on the App Store.

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A Final Update to Tweetbot and Twitterrific That Allows Users to Support Tapbots and The Iconfactory

Usually, when a big company shuts down an API, they give customers time to prepare. It’s the right thing to do regardless of what any terms of service say. That’s not how things went down with Twitter. Instead, as I wrote in January, Twitter eliminated access to its API for many third-party apps, including Tweetbot by Tapbots and Twitterrific by The Iconfactory, with no notice at all and then made up an excuse for why they did so after the fact. One moment the apps worked; the next, they didn’t.

The ramifications of Twitter’s actions are unlike anything we’ve ever seen before on the App Store. Tweetbot and Twitterrific were both subscription-based apps. Because they had no notice, neither company had a chance to suspend new subscriptions or take other actions to deal with a change that, under the best of circumstances, would pose massive challenges to their development teams. As a result, both Tapbots and The Iconfactory are faced with refunding the 70-85% of subscription revenues that they received on a pro-rated basis. That’s how the App Store works, and it’s potentially devastating to both companies given how events played out.

To try to mitigate the damage, both Tweetbot and Twitterrific were updated this week with new interfaces. Now, both apps give subscribers the option to indicate that they don’t want a refund. Tweetbot also offers to transfer a user’s Tweetbot subscription to Tapbots’ new Mastodon app, Ivory, which Federico recently reviewed and is excellent. If users do nothing, they’ll receive a refund that will be credited to their App Store account automatically by Apple.

Tapbots and The Iconfactory have played an important part in the Apple developer community for a very long time, and their Twitter clients were two of the best ever created. It’s been hard for us at MacStories to watch as the makers of two of our favorite apps have been treated with such callous disregard by Twitter, which owes no small portion of its past success to both apps.

If you were a subscriber to either or both apps, you’re absolutely entitled to a refund, but we’d ask that you open the app you use and tap the button to decline a refund as a final act of support for their developers instead.

The App Store’s success is built on many things, but its cornerstone is the developers who care enough to make apps like Tweetbot and Twitterrific. Many of us have moved on from Twitter, but let’s not leave behind the developers who made it a place where we once enjoyed hanging out.

If you’ve already deleted either app from your devices, both Tweetbot and Twitterrific can still be downloaded from the App Store.

Apple Introduces New Peer Group Benchmarks for Developers→

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Today, Apple introduced new analytics for app developers designed to reveal how their apps are performing compared to peer apps. The developer site says that:

With data from the entire catalog of apps on the App Store, peer group benchmarks provide accurate, relevant, and privacy-preserving comparisons for apps across categories, business models, and download volumes. Learn how to take advantage of these insights to improve your app’s performance.

Apple defines an app’s peer group by its App Store category, business model, and download volume, providing metrics that shows where a developer’s app falls within the range of similar apps. Data is aggregated and uses differential privacy to ensure that the analytics do not reveal the identity of the apps against which a developer’s app is compared. The developer site also offers suggested actions that developers can take to improve their performance, including product page optimization tests, app events, pricing strategies, and more.

From the examples shared, the new tools look as though they will fit in nicely with existing analytics and other analytics available to developers. Providing insights into how an app is performing compared to its peers should help point developers in the direction of areas where adjustments can have the greatest impact on the success of their apps, saving them time and guesswork.

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Apple Announces the 2022 App Store Awards

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Apple has revealed its annual App Store Awards winners, recognizing the standout apps and games of 2022. This year, the company picked a collection of 16 apps and games from among the millions available on the App Store, naming them the Apps of the Year. The company’s App Store editorial team also recognized five apps and games that have had a cultural impact.

This year, the 16 winners from a wide range of categories:

“This year’s App Store Award winners reimagined our experiences with apps that delivered fresh, thoughtful, and genuine perspectives,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “From self-taught solo creators to international teams spanning the globe, these entrepreneurs are making a meaningful impact, and represent the ways in which apps and games influence our communities and lives.”

In a first, Apple has included App Store links to the winning apps and games, which I was glad to see. Another difference from last year’s awards is a new category: China Game of the Year, which was added without any explanation from Apple, although based on Apple’s developer site it appears that many of the other winners aren’t available in China, which may explain the new award.

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

This year’s app winners are:

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Apple also recognized games on each of its platforms, plus a new China Game of the Year:

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

The apps and games that the App Store editorial team recognized as having a cultural impact are:

Details about the winners are also available on Apple’s Developer site and through a dedicated App Store Today page story covering all of the winners and separate stories for each winning app and game.

To commemorate this year’s App of the Year winners, Apple’s designers created physical awards. The blue awards resemble the App Store’s icon and are made from 100% recycled aluminum with the winner’s name engraved on the back.

Congratulations to this year’s Apple Store Award winners. It’s always great to see developers’ hard work and contributions to Apple’s platforms recognized.

Pixelmator Photo Switches to Subscription Pricing and Provides a Sneak Peek at the App’s Upcoming Mac Version

Source: Pixelmator.

Source: Pixelmator.

The Pixelmator team announced today that its iPhone and iPad photo editor, Pixelmator Photo, has moved to subscription pricing, and a Mac version of the app is on the way.

Existing Pixelmator Photo users won’t have to subscribe to continue using the app and should be able to add the Mac version at a discount when it’s released. New customers can subscribe for $4.99 per month or $23.99 per year after a 7-day free trial. There’s also a lifetime purchase option that costs $54.99. Pixelmator says that the subscription pricing will increase for new subscribers when the Mac app is released, so now is a good time to subscribe if you were hoping that the team would add a Mac version.

Pixelmator Photo for iPad.

Pixelmator Photo for iPad.

There are a lot of reasons for Pixelmator Photo’s move to a subscription model, which are explained in detail in the team’s blog post. As with any move from paid-up-front to a subscription, some users will be left behind, which is a shame, but I’m not surprised by Pixelmator’s move. I’m more surprised that the switch didn’t occur earlier. Pixelmator Photo is a top-notch, high-quality app that is continuously developed to keep up with advances in Apple’s photo editing frameworks and hardware updates. That’s not the sort of app that can be offered for a set price indefinitely, as demonstrated by the many other sophisticated apps, including other photo editing apps, that have made the leap to a subscription model. Hopefully, the switch to subscriptions will allow the Pixelmator team to continue to develop Photo for a long time to come.

There aren’t many details about the Mac version of Pixelmator Photo to share except for the image at the top of this story, but I like what I see. If you’ve used the iPad version of Pixelmator Photo, the Mac app will be immediately familiar with its spare UI and focus on the image being edited. There’s no word yet on when the Mac version might be released, but when it is, we’ll have a complete review.

The Pixelmator Photo update that adds its new subscription pricing model is available on the App Store now.

App Developers Can Apply to Use Third-Party Payment Processors in South Korea With Limitations→

To comply with a recent amendment to South Korea’s Telecommunications Business Act, Apple is allowing developers to use third-party payment systems for the first time. However, the new App Store entitlement comes with substantial limitations.

Developers who want to use a third-party payment processor must apply to Apple for a StoreKit External Purchase Entitlement. Apps with the new entitlement can only be released in South Korea’s App Store, which means that developers will need to make a separate version of any app that uses the entitlement. As Apple explains, using the entitlement also means certain App Store features will be unavailable to users too:

If you’re considering using this entitlement, it’s important to understand that some App Store features, such as Ask to Buy and Family Sharing, will not be available to your users, in part because we cannot validate payments that take place outside of the App Store’s private and secure payment system. Apple will not be able to assist users with refunds, purchase history, subscription management, and other issues encountered when purchasing digital goods and services through an alternative purchasing method. You will be responsible for addressing such issues.

Third-party payment processing isn’t a way to get around Apple’s commission on purchases made by users:

 Apple will charge a 26% commission on the price paid by the user, gross of any value-added taxes. This is a reduced rate that excludes value related to payment processing and related activities.

Developers will need to handle the payment of any taxes to South Korean taxing authorities themselves too.

It’s hard to imagine that Apple’s new StoreKit External Purchase Entitlement will be attractive to many developers, given its limitations and the need to create a separate version of apps just for South Korea. I expect we’ll see this new StoreKit entitlement offered on a country-by-country basis as other countries follow South Korea’s lead, but I don’t expect it will lead to meaningful use of third-party payment processors unless and until apps are available outside the App Store via sideloading.

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The iOS App Icon Book: The MacStories Review

I’ve eagerly awaited The iOS App Icon Book by Michael Flarup ever since it was first announced in 2018. The book sits dead center among topics that are at the heart of MacStories: apps, app preservation, and design. As a result, my expectations were high, and I’m happy to report that it doesn’t disappoint. If you care about apps, you’ll love The iOS App Icon Book.

The cover of The iOS App Icon Book sets the tone with a large iridescent squircle, the shape that defines every app icon. It’s the canvas on which every app icon is created. The squircle has become iconic in its own right, creating a consistent thread that ties disparate designs together into a coherent whole. The shimmering foil used for the book’s squircle is an excellent touch that hints at the colorful variety of icons between its convers.

The iOS App Icon Book is an art book at its core. The book’s pages are packed with icons of varying sizes, but the book also features essays by Flarup, a foreward by Bjango’s Marc Edwards, a history of iOS iconography by Jim Nielsen, and profiles of a dozen designers and design studios. The focus of the book lies firmly on the icons themselves, but I’m glad the essays and profiles were included. The essays provide an outlet for anyone who happens upon The iOS App Icon Book and wants to know more about the history and design of icons, while the profiles put a face to some of the artwork on its pages.

Of course, the stars of The iOS App Icon Book are the icons themselves. Each high-resolution image is reproduced in vivid colors on high-quality paper that makes browsing through the book’s pages a pleasure. As someone who writes about apps, I enjoyed flipping through the pages, rediscovering the icons of apps from the early days of the App Store alongside the icons of apps I use every day. It’s a careful mix of old and new that blends the context of early app iconography with current design trends.

As you flip through The iOS App Icon Book, you’ll find that the icons are arranged in a number of different ways. Some are grouped by color, while others are organized thematically, like the pages featuring food, games, and photography apps. My favorite part of The iOS App Icon Book, though, is the pages that trace the evolution of specific icons. Each version is dated and connected by horizontal lines to indicate its lineage. It’s fascinating to see the directions that designers have taken app icons over the years.

The one thing that The iOS App Icon Book doesn’t do that I would have liked to have seen is trace the evolution of the icons used for some of Apple’s system apps. That may not have been feasible given the need to get rights to the artwork for printing in a book. However, it would have been interesting to see the extent to which Apple’s design work has influenced third-party designers.

iOS app icons are the first thing that users encounter when they download an app and use it for the first time. Icons set the tone and personality of an app. It’s an important part of the app experience that has a rich history on iOS. The iOS App Icon Book brings that history to life in a way that immediately had me flipping back and forth through its pages, rediscovering old favorites and studying the details of icons I’d never run across before. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in apps and design.

The iOS App Icon Book is still available to pre-order for €60.00 from its website.

Paper’s 10th Anniversary→

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a decade since the drawing app Paper was released on the iPad. Andy Allen, a co-founder of FiftyThree, the company that released the app in 2012, marked the anniversary with a post on Andy Works that recounts the app’s origin story during the early days of the iPad.

According to Allen, Paper was born from the ashes of Microsoft’s prototype device called the Courier, which was never released:

While Paper was born in 2012, its roots go back a few years prior when we co-founders first met at Microsoft working on the idea for a new device called Courier. Before the iPad, this was a two-screen digital journal + pen with an entirely new OS and apps designed for a very un-Microsoft customer—creative types. Despite internal excitement for the product, Ballmer shut down Courier in 2010, and if it wasn’t for a leaked prototype video that caused a stir online, things might’ve ended there.

Allen’s post also describes the unconventional design decisions that drove Paper’s unique look and interaction model, which anyone interested in the history and process of app design will love. What really struck me, though, was Allen’s observations about the Paper’s resilience, which is more an exception than a rule:

Most apps from the early App Store-era that were hailed for their design are no longer with us (Path). Yet Paper is still here. And in much the same form as when it was first released having weathered the many tides of changing UI trends (flat design) and iOS updates. The same principles continued guiding it through new features, experiments, and even full rewrites. Every part replaced, yet its soul intact.

Yet, despite Paper’s longevity, even it isn’t immune from the impermanence of modern apps:

In writing this article, I wanted to get the original version of Paper 1.0 running on an old iPad. I tried for a full day but failed. A reminder that our work is transient—here for its moment and then gone.

I’m glad Allen shared these stories about Paper. Too many of the tales of the early App Store have already been lost, and Paper is an important milestone in that history that illustrates the kind of creativity and innovation that the iPad made possible.

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Wordle! Developer to Donate Game Proceeds to Charity→

Wordle is the web-only daily word game that has taken the Internet by storm. The simple, free game by Josh Wardle struck a nerve, quickly spreading thanks to its social-media-friendly score sharing and a New York Times profile of the game’s backstory.

The game also spawned a legion of rip-off versions that appeared on the App Store and were ultimately taken down by Apple. However, one of the App Store apps that saw a spike in downloads last week wasn’t a Wordle clone. It was an entirely different game called Wordle! that was first published five years ago by Steven Cravotta.

Emma Roth, writing for The Verge reports that Cravotta has decided to donate the proceeds of Wordle! to charity at the end of January. According to Roth:

Cravotta says that downloads for Wordle! slowed to around one to two per day, but when the browser-based Wordle started taking off, so did his app. The app racked up 200,000 downloads in a single week, albeit from confused users who mistook it for the browser-based Wordle. Cravotta reached out to Wordle app developer, Josh Wardle, and let him know about his plans to donate the proceeds from his app to charity — Wardle sent out a tweet of his own to acknowledge the gesture.

Cravotta told The Verge that the earnings from Wordle!, which stand at just over $2,000 so far, will be donated to BoostOakland, a charity that supports tutoring and mentoring young people in Oakland, California. After the gleeful tweets by one Wordle clone developer, it’s refreshing to read about Cravotta’s plans for the windfall he received from the similarity between his game and Wardle’s.

If you’re a Wordle fan, be sure to check out WordleBot, Federico’s shortcut inspired by Wordle’s score sharing feature. The shortcut preserves the game’s iconic score-sharing graphic but adds text labels to each row to improve the accessibility of scores on services like Twitter and provide additional context to the results.

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