MacHeist revisited
Contrary to my previous post about MacHeist, I went ahead and participated. I got to thinking about the MacHeist model and I could start seeing why a developer would participate. The MacHeist program is a good way to get your app into the hands of potential users that may not otherwise buy the app for the full purchase price. In my case, I was thinking about buying Espresso for the PHP development I do and was always wanting to play around with Acorn to do some graphics work for the websites we maintain. To have the opportunity to get both of them was a home run for me. I now have two great apps and the developers have gained a user that is more likely to buy upgrades when future versions come along.
The main points of contention that I had around a developer being “ripped-off” for their app all but vanished when I thought about license volume. I realized that the volume of licenses that the developers are selling during MacHeist for a fraction of the price most likely brings in more money than they would see through normal sales in the same timeframe. The concerns I had about increased support all but disappeared when I bought the bundle and after a few weeks realized that I only use about 10-20% of the apps that were included in the bundle. So a majority of the developers that participated sold a license to me and have zero increased user support costs. Not too shabby.
2 years ago