That would make it a Countup 
I hope you are successful, unfortunately there is already a very large dataset present that indicates it will be harder to gain a foothold and monetize anything meaningful.
Apple has made it so easy to install apps userâs simply install apps by the dozens because most are free and there are a million apps that can do anything imaginable. People will download 10 different photo filtering/editing apps to find one that does what they want. I believe apps are like commodities at this point. I find it interesting that the statistics that would debunk this theory are non existent, yet Apple can tell you how many times a user sends a text message through iMessage or can track and store your location.
I wouldnât discount the needs of some legitimate business uses but in most cases those will be a limited functionality mobile app of a fully functional desktop app, or an extension of it. This might offer Xojo developers an opportunity to expand their product offerings/skill set to business customers who they do consulting and development for.
Donât get me wrong, iOS has been a commercial success for Apple, but I wouldnât say it has been for all of the developers creating free and .99 apps. For the foreseeable future the money will still be on the desktop business side, with a few exceptions and break out products (angry birds).
I really wish that Xojo would have chose Web or iOS to focus on but not both, itâs just too much for the resources they have. I would prefer Web but thatâs only because I donât do any development for apple productsâŠ
Of course thatâs my opinion and we know what those are like or worthâŠ
I agree, the perceived value of an iOS app is negligible as compared to a Desktop one. Because the iTunes Store has adopted the downloadable music model, which is by large a whim and brain dead market. A Justin Biber app with nothing but good looks will probably succeed more than another less glitzy with more features.
Yet, my particular core business happens to have been impacted by such a fate early on. Fonts cannot be copyrighted in the US, so forget going after cloners. There is no technical mean to protect them either, as they are no program per se and no protection scheme can be put in them. In the early 90âs, I released 30 or so shareware fonts with very little limitations (punctuation and accented characters missing). They came in zip archives with all the needed documentation for users to purchase if they liked.
Today, type âBujardet Freresâ in Google, you will get gazillions of sites saying âdownload the Bujardet freres fontâ, but yet none of them care to distribute the zip archive or to link to my site. The font has been stripped of any documentation and is simply presented as free. So for a user to find where to buy is impossible, since my site is buried way behind all these rascals.
Amazingly enough, I still sell them on FontMenu.com and while not in large number, it is still nice to be able to afford a couple diners with that avery month. On a more positive note, I do sell in fairly large number fonts that are needed to teach or to print checks. So even in a free for all market, nice software is still purchased.
I placed my fonts in the Mac App Store back in 2013 without much illusions. And they do sell. This proves that customers will buy when they feel something is worth it, and probably prefer commercial than garbage when it comes to important things for them.
I have every intention to place exactly the same titles with much more than $0.99 price tag on it in the iTunes Store and see what happens. From what I see, there are almost no competitors there, and it figures since installing a font on an iDevice is less than trivial. As a matter of fact I have found a way to deliver but am still struggling to build the equivalent of Font Book for iOS.
That also conduces to another interesting fact : all the hyenas who offer my fonts for free on the Internet cannot offer the fonts for iOS, since they have to be in the iTunes Store to be installed. So in the gutter they stay.
I have other apps that are in niche markets too, that do not exist yet in the iTunes Store. So my goal is to bring them there, again with the proper price tag of NOT .99.
Yet another nice aspect of the iOS market is that torrent sites cannot offer pirated apps 
@Michel Bujardet, after receiving your personal message and your last two posts, I come to realise that in fact I did misunderstood you. To be honest, I simply did not see the importance IOS can be for a programmer until your last posts here in this thread.
I only can agree with you, that serious users are willing to pay for software, fonts, applications when they are good quality. At least I do. In any sense, quality rules over quantity.
I hope I can convince my wife our next best investment will be a Macbook Pro, so we can try out IOS for ourselves too. I never made applications for the mass market, but it is never too late to start or give it a try. Anyway I like to broaden my developer horizon which makes it interesting.
I want to apologise for the former post I made which was based on a misinterpretation of my side. Thank you very much for your personal apology. Like I have said, you are a very respectfull and sincere person.
Chris
[quote=144402:@Chris Verberne]@Michel Bujardet, after receiving your personal message and your last two posts, I come to realise that in fact I did misunderstood you. To be honest, I simply did not see the importance IOS can be for a programmer until your last posts here in this thread.
I only can agree with you, that serious users are willing to pay for software, fonts, applications when they are good quality. At least I do. In any sense, quality rules over quantity.
I hope I can convince my wife our next best investment will be a Macbook Pro, so we can try out IOS for ourselves too. I never made applications for the mass market, but it is never too late to start or give it a try. Anyway I like to broaden my developer horizon which makes it interesting.[/quote]
Chris, please do not apologize for not liking my poor choice of words.
I am glad you start to see what I try to convey, which is simply that we should hold to our present market, but be able to move into the portable device one when needed.
I wish you get your MBP soon