Why Microsoft Office For iOS Will Likely Never See the Light of Day 270
MojoKid writes "It has been over six years since Apple introduced the iPhone. Millions of apps have been written for the platform in that time, with collective downloads into the billions. Apple's App Store is a thriving marketplace with a huge amount of software available, except Microsoft Office. There's a version of Office for iOS supposedly in the works, but Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer threw cold water on the idea when asked about upcoming events for the Office suite after launching the new Office 2013 / Office 365 products earlier this week. Revenue sharing is reportedly a major sticking point. Microsoft is trying to push people towards yearly subscriptions with Office 2013 and Office 365, but Apple requires a 30 percent profit share on sales of any app in their store. Microsoft reportedly isn't thrilled at the idea of sharing that much revenue. It's ironic — when Bill Gates agreed to port Office to the Mac nearly 20 years ago, it was seen as a lifeline for the beleaguered manufacturer. Now, Microsoft is knocking on the door of Apple's business and Cupertino seems disinclined to answer."
wtf (Score:5, Insightful)
It's ironic — when Bill Gates agreed to port Office to the Mac nearly 20 years ago, it was seen as a lifeline for the beleaguered manufacturer. Now, Microsoft is knocking on the door of Apple's business and Cupertino seems disinclined to answer.
This conclusion absolutely does not follow from the sentence that came before it.
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The reason Bill Gates agreed to port Office to the Mac wasn't altruism. He was at the time trying to fight off the Justice Departments charges of abusing their monopoly. Porting Office was one way to show they weren't really a big bad evil that refused to play nice.
Re:wtf (Score:4, Informative)
Re:wtf (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed... Microsoft Excel was refining itself on the Mac when Lotus 1-2-3 on DOS was the primary spreadsheet for the business world in the 80's. It wasn't until OS/2's failure in the early 90's (when the other office software had generally gone the OS/2 path) that Office-on-Windows really picked up steam. Each version of Word was ported to Windows from the Mac until the much-maligned 5.0 version when they tried to reverse it and failed badly. The question in the late 90's, though, was whether Microsoft would cancel the Mac version of Office entirely or keep it going. The fact that it was always profitable probably helped the decision, but in promising to do so and investing $150M they got out of a huge number of lawsuits they probably would have lost.
Re:wtf (Score:4, Insightful)
I think you mean Word 6.0 for Mac, which was ungodly slow on most machines. Word 5.1 was highly regarded as the last "good version" of Word on the Mac for many years.
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Re:wtf (Score:4, Insightful)
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Not only that, but Microsoft NEEDED Apple to do well in order to claim they didn't have a monopoly. Bill Gates felt no pity for Apple.
Microsoft Options for Windows, 90s (Score:2)
How come? Microsoft could have developed its applications for OS/2 (and OS/2-PPC), and proved the DoJ wrong. It could have ported them to VMS, or NEXTSTEP or (w/ more difficulty) any of the Unixes out there. In fact, the biggest evidence against their abuse of monopoly was NT/RISC. If Microsoft really wanted a 'Windows, windows everywhere' as was once alleged, they'd have been more aggressive about getting all their apps on NT/MIPS and getting Silicon Graphics to support it, as well as NT/Alpha, which D
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What "conclusion"? There is no conclusion in the text you quoted. It is two contrasting statements of fact.
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Windows 8 has a real chance at beating iOS/Android in the enterprise, which eventually makes it a challenger at home also, and this is in large part due to the ability to run Office - and *the full Office suite* at that. Why would Microsoft want to give away this advantage in exchange for short term Office sales?
Because if it is phrased like that, anti trust authorities in many countries would take action: Using a monopoly/dominant position in one area (office software) to expand market share in a different area (mobile devices) is not considered a good/legal thing to do.
Re:wtf (Score:5, Funny)
<Homer Simpson voice>Mmmmmmm.... Kool-Aid....</Homer Simpson voice>
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Actually, he's right. I'm currently trying to run an iPad as a VDI client for view, and you know what? It sucks. Bluetooth keyboard support is abysmal (various key combinations including many used in passwords simply do not reliably get sent through the VDI client and into windows), mouse support is non-existent and performance on current generation iPad hardware is "meh" (I have a 4 and a mini on my desk right now for eval).
Apple / VMware need to pull their finger out to solve those problems (not sur
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It's ironic — when Bill Gates agreed to port Office to the Mac nearly 20 years ago, it was seen as a lifeline for the beleaguered manufacturer. Now, Microsoft is knocking on the door of Apple's business and Cupertino seems disinclined to answer.
This conclusion absolutely does not follow from the sentence that came before it.
Not only that it's COMPLETELY wrong!
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Office Dependence (Score:2)
Back then Office wasn't as entrenched in the business world, either. It was one of several competing systems. Businesses *depending* on Microsoft Office is something that sorta developed gradually in the last 15 years. (Document sharing over the net sorta contributed to that, making the need to get onto a single suite more urgent.)
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That sounds like an anti-Apple conclusion, in that it makes Apple look like a bunch of ungrateful backstabbing assholes. "Yeah, thanks for saving our bacon 20 years ago. If it weren't for you, we'd be dead by now. Now, kindly fuck off and die so we can get busy pissing on your grave."
Not to sound like I'm defending Apple (who I'm really not a fan of these days), but despite Gates' attempt to repaint himself as Mr. Charity Benefactor, MS were always a bunch of predatory, bullying, market-share-exploiting assholes who only did what was in their own self interest. In this case, it was in their interest to have a token (and very distant second-place) "competitor", without which they would have more obviously been a monopoly and at risk from regulatory action (and even a possible forced spit
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Microsoft is not Bill Gates, and Microsoft can operate independant of his philanthropy.
Gates was in charge of MS at the time of their Apple "rescue", and this was long before his philanthropy.
Even that aside, if your choices are a guy that donates billions to all manner of charities around the world, or a Jobs that tells everyone to go fuck themselves, I know which one I'd prefer to see.
Maybe so, but it doesn't change or excuse previous behaviour. Jobs died and (unlike Gates) didn't get the chance to "redeem" and paint over his previous asshole-ishness.
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And made Microsoft nice stack of money in the process.
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No part of that statement implies that.
Re:wtf (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes it does. The "It's ironic" at the beginning of the quote ties the two statements together as if they are comparing to nearly identical situations. The first sentence is talking about how back when Apple was hurting and about to go out of business, Microsoft saved them by porting office to their platform. The second sentence now has to be ironic is some sense as it relates to the first. The implication is that the roles are now reversed and Apple has taken a completely different stance from what Microsoft did in the opposite situation, making it an ironic.
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$5 for a 30-second edit button. Anyhow, "comparing two nearly"...
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The "It's ironic" at the beginning of the quote ties the two statements together as if they are comparing to nearly identical situations.
That is not what "ironic" means. No part of the concept of irony requires the two situations to be "nearly identical". The situations are similar - Microsoft office on an Apple platform - but not so identical that you assume there must be an implication that Microsoft needs a "lifeline". All that is said is that the relevance of Microsoft has declined, while Apple's has increased. The irony is that two similar situations have such different outcomes, now and then.
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The first sentence is talking about how back when Apple was hurting and about to go out of business, Microsoft saved them by porting office to their platform.
You're confused. Microsoft created Microsoft Office for the Mac in 1989. More than a year before it appeared on WIndows. There was no porting of Office to the Mac. Rather it was ported from the Mac to Windows.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office [wikipedia.org]
You appear to have confused it with the settlement of their legal disputes in 1997, which included Microsoft promising to continue supporting Office:Mac. This was no altruistic gesture - this was part of a negotiated legal settlement.
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Microsoft Word was ported to mac from DOS which was ported from xenix after a name change. Excel was ported to Windows from the Mac.
I have no idea on the history of Powerpoint, rarely use it myself and could really care less.
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I have worked in MS saturated environments for most of the last 20 years. The bit I find frustrating is how they try to 'help' you constantly.
If I wanted to indent that paragraph, I would have done so myself. No I really didn't want to apply the same formula to that cell. Stop moving my text boxes for me in Visio for $deities sake, I'd just gotten them aligned how I needed them.
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No, only for things sold through the Store.
And you know what? That's how every store on the planet works. Do you think Safeway or Target doesn't take a cut? 30%-50%, and more, is very common. If you buy WoW at GameStop, Blizzard doesn't get the full $29.99! How do you think stores can afford to rent the space, keep the lights on, and pay employees? And then if you come back in and buy a WoW subscription card, do you think Blizzard gets the full $14.99?
It's called "commerce" and you go where the money is. On
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Do Safeway and Target ban magazines from their rack for including mail-in subscription cards? Apple does the equivalent.
Does Target ban the sale of blueray players that include support for netflix/hulu/amazon (allowing the user to purchase video content from other stores)? Apple does the equivalent.
It's called "commerce" and you go where the money is. On mobile, the money is on iOS
Don't be stupid. For all but a few vendors, iOS is NOT the place for app developers interested in earning real money. Do some [gigaom.com] reading [berryreview.com].
The truth is that people go where they *think* the money is -- even in the
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Your links both refer to the very same report, by some outfit called "Vision Mobile". Who?
Well, guess who is one of their clients. (RIM) and who is not (Apple).
http://www.visionmobile.com/clients/ [visionmobile.com]
You do realise this is PR puff don't you? You didn't actually believe it did you? Hope you're not making any financial decisions. You'd be insane to start developing for Blackberry now.
the MS app store better not be come the only way (Score:2)
the MS app store better not be come the only way to get windows apps as windows will lose all of it's pro apps and steam games to Linux.
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just say that if windows went MS app store only it maybe windows 7 / 8 forever and a mass dumping of windows.
android has more then 1 appstore IOS and windows (Score:2)
android has more then 1 app store IOS and windows need to copy that.
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android has more then 1 app store IOS and windows need to copy that.
Apple: Why?
Microsoft: We'd love to get a cut of most app sales.
Why do we need app stores that make software 40%+ more expensive (assuming a 30% cut, to make $10 you must charge $14.29)? Can't people sell their own software like on Windows and OS X today?
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Windows 8 already has 3 major apps stores that I can think of off the top of my head:
1) MS App Store
2) Steam
3) Any website
Also, the MS App Store lets you get Desktop Apps direct from the vendor. They don't even demand a cut of the action. The Windows 8 app ecosystem has everything going for it in spades better than iOS (easily) or even Android's openness.
If you don't go with a Metro App from Microsoft's storefront, you can still use the style elements and as I recall you can still hook into WinRT. You ju
Re:android has more then 1 appstore IOS and window (Score:5, Informative)
Apples and Oranges. You are comparing Microsoft's desktop operating system with Apple's mobile operating systems. If you compare Apple's Desktop operating system (OS X) to Microsoft's Desktop Operating System (Windows 8) then you still have the same 3 options: Apple's App Store, Steam, and any website.
If you compare Microsoft's MOBILE operating systems (Windows 8 RT and Windows Phone) to Apple's mobile operating system (iOS), you end up with the same comparison: You are able to get apps from the sanctioned app store of the vendor.
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When Apple realizes the market they managed to get consumers interested in is taking off in a new direction and decide to offer the full OSX experience on their tablets, then that would apply.
For the moment though, they are keeping the platform too walled off to be as nimble as Windows 8 and Android are becoming.
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Obvious. (Score:2)
Look at the direction office is going now. Cloudy.
They won't *need* a native iOS version: A bit more work and most of it will be able to run as a web-app. It'll need extensive tweaking for each browser to manage such a complicated interface, but MS can manage that.
Re:Obvious. (Score:4, Insightful)
It'll need extensive tweaking for each browser to manage such a complicated interface, but MS can manage that.
Right, just like OWA [wikipedia.org] works fully on all browsers. After all, it's been out for a decade already and it's been redesigned several times...
Microsoft will never even try to "manage that", because it goes against Microsoft's core business model. While most companies accept that customers want tools that do the job well, Microsoft only makes tools that do the job well only when paired with other Microsoft products. This is why the term "Microsoft shop" is so much more common than an equivalent "Adobe shop" or "Oracle shop", or even an "Apple shop" - at least when referring to more than a single tool.
Despite Apple's alarming growth and nasty business tactics, I just can's seem to gather as much hatred for them as I can for Microsoft. Apple's tools are smooth. My iPad will easily work with anything else, whether it's connecting to OS X, Windows, or Linux (though Linux has some issues still). Using iTunes on Windows doesn't leave me looking for missing features, like I usually do when trying to use OWA from Chrome.
On the other hand, I expect that Office will never have an iOS app or a full WebKit-compatible interface. Microsoft can still bring its monopoly power to bear, and use its Office market share to promote its floundering Surface tablets. Some companies (probably including my current employer) will be interested in using tablets, but they need Office more than they need any feature of iOS, so they'll buy Surface tablets out of necessity, not choice.
Office documents are the last monopoly Microsoft has. Even its hold on the desktop OS market is breaking, as alternatives are becoming more viable with every new OS-agnostic cloud offering. Since Microsoft's main tactic has been to use its monopolies to force ancillary products on customers who just want things to work, I think we'll soon be seeing more extra "features" dropped into each new version of Office, just to force competitors to waste resources and maintain the all-important market share.
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>Look at the direction office is going now. Cloudy.
Yeah, sure, and do you trust a third party with all your data? Consider your GP, who might keep documents in the cloud. Do you think that your GP would like to be on the end of a federal prosecution and eventual civil lawsuits because of the release of medical records he/she could no longer control?
Seriously, we see private data companies lose their clients' data far too often.
HIPAA is a bitch and the "cloud" is not an option.
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BMO
Funny (Score:4, Interesting)
Apple should probably pay MS to port MS Office to iOS and preinstall it on ipads.
That could tilt the movement to Android back in their direction.
just my 2c
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Office doesn't offer a ton in th
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I am not sure in which worl you live in, but in my world i have to fill the forms from the administration in excel or word. Its sad but true.
And most office packages break compatibility with office documents. So a thing which could be two minutes (e.g. fill in a number of hours) requires me to boot my laptop, start windows, start word/excel, wait until it send/receives email (unless i am in the train at a location without mobile network). Takes much longer than on my mobile phone. which inform me when it ge
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The last thing MS wants is to help iOS adoption. Balmer is fixated on his own answer, Windows 8 RT. There's no way he would undermine that with a deal like this. Plus he's also fixated on this office in the cloud bit. If you could run an nice slick interface to the cloud version of MS Office in Safari, I think that might be better for MS.
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Apple should probably pay MS to port MS Office to iOS and preinstall it on ipads. That could tilt the movement to Android back in their direction.
For infrequent office document use, Apple's Pages and Numbers mac apps seem to have good Word and Excel compatibility, at least for the basic documents and spreadsheets that I have created and/or received. The Pages and Numbers ios apps are able to share documents with their mac counterparts via iCloud, admittedly I have not done much work via an iPad, just minor edits and emailing of documents.
There are ways around it (Score:5, Insightful)
Offer the ability to create / edit documents via a free MS Office suite on the iDevice.
Offer a subscription service to be able to save/open those files off the device.
Apple isn't forcing Netflix to hand over 30% of their revenue, because they give up the App for free.
But boo hoo, MS has to pay what everyone else does to Apple for the service.
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Amazon doesn't pay anything either along with all the other enterprise software makers that have apps in the App Store that require subscriptions
You just have a login screen and can't mention anything about signing up or any links for the user to follow. Like amazon does
Amazon even sells kindle books via their iOS app with no revenue sharing with apple
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Offer the ability to create / edit documents via a free MS Office suite on the iDevice.
Offer a subscription service to be able to save/open those files off the device.
Then someone would find a little app that works around this limitation of where the files can be saved and MS would have given away a product that is really important for their overall sales. Giving discounts and freebies is really difficult to undo.
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OpenOffice/LibreOffice (Score:4, Insightful)
LibreOffice 4.0 being released this month (Score:2)
I find it incredible that anyone still feeds this monopoly when viable alternatives have existed for years; It doesn't exist on Android set to overtake windows this year; Is stupidly expensive for a piece of software with no new compelling features for years; Written documents rarely done in Word...more likely email.
Ballmer is probably right Google Docs is likely to win on the new dominant platforms, personally though I find it insane that Microsoft would intentionally hurt its Monopoly in Office Suites.
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Except for certain managers where I work. They write their plain text emails in Word, then attach the Word file to the email...
Re:MS is about to lose its Windows monopoly (Score:2)
I think it will all be over for MS of they port Office to iOS and Android.
Think 10 years from now what will be available? Clouds, managed service providers, outsourced IT, HTML 5/6 apps in browsers and applets. Where does Win32 sit in there? It doesn't. Doe the managers today want ugly Metro bulky laptops or sleek sexy IPADS?
Hell, today Citrix makes software as a browser plugin where you can run your IE 6 shit apps on a remote Windows 2k3 server just fine. It is all secured, locked, and works in many differ
Would be much less than 30% (Score:2)
Very few people would also subscribe to Office365 through an iDevice. Most will subscribe through other means and download the app for free.
I call hogwash.
Excel has been around since 1985 (Score:4, Informative)
Microsoft shipped Excel for Apple OS in 1985, a few years before shipping a version for Windows.
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Yep. PowerPoint was also first on the Mac. Word for Mac also happened in the mid-80s. Granted, calling it "Office " happened much later, but there wasn't much more to it than bundling the individual apps.
Yep, check out these 1.0 version screenshots [bink.nu] for Mac Excel, Word and PowerPoint. Note the dates. In fact, Microsoft Word was CHARACTER-BASED for FOUR YEARS after it was a GUI app on MacOS, DESPITE having two Xerox PARC engineers as it's core [wikipedia.org].
Visual BASIC (although not an "office" app) was ALSO developed as "Microsoft BASIC for Macintosh" for THREE versions before they inexplicably did NOT port it to System 7. Here is the only screenshot [macgui.com] I can find.
Then, the very next year, Visual BASIC for Windows (only
MSFT should do this..fast. But they won't (Score:2)
This is an interesting story, despite the terrible summary.
For work & family, I have to juggle documents across Linux, Windows, BBerry, Apple and Android devices.
Probably the same for many people here.
First of all, there's no need for this, since Apple (and others) already offer perfectly adequate apps for viewing, and even editing, MS Office documents on iPad and iPhone. But having tried it, I guarantee you'll only do it once. Sticking rusty nails in your eye is probably less painful.
Well, OK, at lea
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Apple's iCloud does not sync docs (why?)
iCloud will absolutely sync documents.
https://developer.apple.com/icloud/documentation/ [apple.com]
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iCloud will sync your own documents between your own devices - but it has ZERO support for collaboration/sharing with others.
So far, Apple's really dropped the ball on this one. I'm a web guy, but even I work often enough with non-computing folks to realize collaboration tools are essential in today's workplace.
It's simple.... (Score:2)
Back them Gates was struggling as well. So it was a mutual thing. Today, only MSFT has anything to gain from office on the iOS platform. On an iOS device the ONLY useful app is really powerpoint, and Apple has Keynote that is vastly superior to powerpoint in every way. Why would someone want to downgrade to powerpoint on iOS?
No sane person would want to work on spreadsheets on a tablet. Same for everything else in the MS OFFICE lineup outside of PowerPoint.
MS office is losing. It is losing slowly bu
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Office applications on tablets is down right inevitable because tablets replacing most laptops is inevitable.
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You say this but have you actually watch this in real time? I have. I watched two of our sales people try and use the microsoft tablet to work on a spreadsheet and it took them 3X longer than if they just used the laptop. Both of these guys do nothing but fight with these things, plus the intranet apps DO NOT work on the Internet Explorer that is on the MS tablet. They do work with chrome on the ipad and the android tablets.
I keep hearing from people that the tablet is the "PERFECT" platform for of
What iPhone user knows how to use Office? (Score:2)
Office is dead (Score:2)
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um no
maybe for the home user using a shaky msoffice 2003 clone is ok for grocery budgeting or the church newsletter, but it falls in the real world
for example, go and try to open a spreadsheet in libre with more than 1024 columns
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I have a data acquisition device that spits out nearly 4000 columns worth of data per unit that needs to be charted on a weekly basis for production statistics
Surface (Score:4, Insightful)
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Maybe the Surface RT. The Pro has much of what power users wanted out of the iPad, but which Cupertino has decided isn't part of their base, i.e. file access, stylus input, full applications. If MS smacked Intel around enough to get a low power / dual mode chip that let them slim the chassis down to within 10% of the iPad weight/thickness and still get 8+ hours of battery life in surfing/work processing mode, and threw in an LTE chip, people would start wondering why you even need an iPad.
Is 100% of $0 better than 70% of something? (Score:2)
So MS is forgoing revenue altogether over this cut? Seems unlikely. I think giving their own mobile offerings a market advantage and the existing competition on iOS probably have more to do with it. After all, the sell software retail and a lot more than 30% goes to retailer and distributor in that model.
There will be an uneasy and unwritten alliance... (Score:2)
My guess that will come via Office 360 or whatever the online version of MS Office will be. They'll do their best to support iOS and Windows devices at the expense of Android just has Microsoft has with their Azure platform and mobile services. As much as Apple and Microsoft may not like each other, they are both in the position of needed each other for the time being against Google & Android.
I've gotten by the past couple years just fine with what used to be called iWork for Mac and iOS. Recently th
Typical anti-establishment slashdot post (Score:2)
Re:also why other pro apps will not be in other ap (Score:4, Informative)
And what fee do you think is right for someone that has to supply unlimited bandwidth and insfratructure support to get your app to people everytime they want to reinstall it as well as free 5gb of backup space.
If that's so unreasonable then why is Microsoft taking 30%? Even Google takes 30%. Microsoft just wants special treatment and quite frankly they can suck it. That's not fair to the small developers.
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What cut do you think retail takes?
Its not retail that the Mac App Store would compete against. It the online stores of Microsoft, Adobe and other large publishers who can afford their own digital distribution channels.
The Mac App Store makes more sense when you are small and "unknown". If you have a well known and established product that people "seek out" then offering your own online store may be the better route.
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Windows Store takes 30% off the sale price of the app - not off the price of any in-app purchases, subscriptions etc. You can sell an app for free, and use in-app purchases (your own - so you'll have to handle credit card transactions etc) to enable its functionality.
Apple, on the other hand, wants 30% off Office subscription. Furthermore, they want to keep charging that 30% even after the user who purchased it has migrated away from Apple devices - just because he originally bought it on iPhone.
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Regarding the "Apple supply bandwidth, infrastructure and payment method" argument that crops up commonly in these discussions - its a facetious argument because the seller HAS NO FUCKING CHOICE IN THE MATTER even if they do have the ability to do it.
I'm sure both Adobe and Microsoft have the ability to replace Apples "contribution" completely, but they aren't allowed to by Apple. They aren't even allowed to attempt to, its completely verboten - you have to use Apples distribution service, you have to us
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Regarding the "Apple supply bandwidth, infrastructure and payment method" argument that crops up commonly in these discussions - its a facetious argument because the seller HAS NO FUCKING CHOICE IN THE MATTER even if they do have the ability to do it.
Yes, they do. They can not sell on iOS, they can simply put the app out for free and sell the services outside of the App Store from their own website.
Amazon does this very thing with their Kindle app.
I'm sure both Adobe and Microsoft have the ability to replace Apples "contribution" completely, but they aren't allowed to by Apple. They aren't even allowed to attempt to, its completely verboten - you have to use Apples distribution service, you have to use their payment gateway, you have to use their app store otherwise your app simply won't happen.
And thats the point being made. Its not about what Apple offer, its about them refusing to allow those than can equal them in capability to actually do it.
And the user is better off for it! That simplicity is part of the appeal of iOS. One login, one store to keep track of all purchases. No fear in buying an in app purchase from some random game, no having to sign up for each and every developer's personal web storefront just to use their app.
And by doing so, Ap
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And what fee do you think is right for someone that has to supply unlimited bandwidth and insfratructure support to get your app to people everytime they want to reinstall it as well as free 5gb of backup space.
You mean like Microsoft already has in place to support its customers? With its online store, and skydrive?
Why should Microsoft have to give 30% to apple to duplicate infrastructure it ALREADY has in place.
Microsoft isn't a small app developer with no brand recgonition and no infrastructure.
The ONLY
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I have no problem with people being against walled gardens. There's a good reason to be against them but Microsoft doesn't have a leg to stand on. They jus tlook like hypocrites.
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Why should Apple go through Windows store to have a tiled application on Windows 8?
Which apple application are you referring too here? An imaginary hypothetical one doesn't count. Apple doesn't sell any windows software. The only software they even distribute for windows is itunes/quicktime which is free.
Microsoft doesn't have a leg to stand on. They jus tlook like hypocrites.
They'd only be hypocrites if they refuse to negotiate with large companies that want to sell popular software that costs hundreds of
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Re:also why other pro apps will not be in other ap (Score:5, Insightful)
The mark-up for selling a bicycle and bike parts is 40 percent.
Clothing is 100 percent.
A 30% cut of the retail price is probably lower than brick-and-mortar. Do you honestly think that Microsoft gets the full $300 you pay for Windows 7 Pro from Fry's?
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BMO
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You're joking right? The retailer markup is more than enough to cover Apple's 30%. These are just cheap bastards that don't want to pay for distribution... In spite of their prices being an order of magnitude higher than when they were actually sold in stores. They all spent the last decade pulling their products from retail making users buy from their gated communities... Apple just re-invented the retail software store again, which means your products compete on a shelf with everybody else. Again that su
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When I started selling apps on the Apple App store and later Google Marketplace I knew other small individuals and small companies who balked at the idea of Apple taking 30%. They viewed they were getting ripped off.
I asked them how much it would cost for them to set up their own website and support infrastructure along with managing things like PCI compliance costs and all the joys that come from dealing with CNP transactions. And don't forget marketing. (yes you still have to do marketing outside of the
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People never needed to use the Brand X tool for this. They just bought into the hype and propaganda. Now that there's something that looks like a new platform, people are willing to challenge old ideas. The notion that you need a particular brand of Word Perfect overkill is starting to look more and more silly.
No msoffice on the new shiny shiny is allowing people to realize that perhaps they never needed it at all.
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We used to do screen sharing to accomplish this, but that limited us to only working with the documents when we both are online and only one of use being able to add to the
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What I do not understand is WHY people need to 'share' and 'edit' word processor documents or spreadsheets 'on line' anyway. Why?
For the same reason that many of these same people think they need to write their e-mail as a Word document.
Or send pictures as a presentation file.
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30% is only for in-app purchases. There are free apps that actually require payment to work. You pay on the developer's site and sign in inside the app. How does the submitter think Netflix subscriptions are paid on iOS?
Its not quite that simple. I don't think the app itself can send the user to the web site for the purchase. I believe this sort of service can only work when you have a pre-existing service outside of iOS apps, as is the case with your Netflix example. iOS apps can merely access such pre-existing paid services, not sign up for them.
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Actually, they won't do it because if they do it for one company then every company will be asking for exceptions for one reason or another.
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They don't need to make them free. They just need to follow Amazon's model with the Kindle app - don't have a purchase option in the app, require that it be handled via Microsoft's website. It's a small annoyance, and so less than optimal... but doable.
In this instance, I'm more on Microsoft's side than on Apple's. Having MS Office available on the iPad would be a boon for work - beneficial to Apple's customers, especially given that Apple basically offers zero support for collaboration with others on docum
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Just reread parent post, and realized I misread it. AC is pretty much saying what I said. Don't know that it matters whether the app itself is free, though, since the real money will be in the subscription.
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