For reference, for the people saying I shouldn't raise my price:
Pocket Casts: $40/year
The Podcast App: $37/year
Castbox: $35/year
Castro: $25/year
…
Overcast: $10/year
I have no problem telling everyone this now: I'm raising my price in the near future.
I've only waited this long because I wanted to give you some new stuff at the same time!
@glennf @marcoarment The "keeps working" is paramount and many apps/services need to continuously demonstrate that revenue fuels reliability.
Marco spending years rebuilding the foundation of Overcast to keep up with iOS UI evolution is exactly that.
A developper focusing on unneeded AI or enterprise features will make me feel like I'm funding their venture into a market I'm not part of.
@danielinoa @HanBrolo Call it whatever you like.
iOS apps need ongoing maintenance to keep up with the platform and customer expectations.
In Overcast’s 11th year, I don’t need to prove this to anyone. It’s a free app with ads, or a subscription.
@marcoarment @danielinoa Every app needs maintenance. That's just software.
Subscriptions are just so tiring. As a consumer I want to be 'one and done' until new stuff comes around that I want then I buy that version.
@HanBrolo @marcoarment @danielinoa It's not possible on iOS, but you could have that with 'traditional' desktop software. Then your choice is not to update your OS in order to not break old apps for which you don't want to pay again.
Not sure if we'd all enjoy a future where Apple would change fewer things year over year in their OS's. I certainly would. :)
@HanBrolo @marcoarment @danielinoa the issue you are running into is what Apple allows. Apple doesn't let developers do "version" pricing like you want. They also don't let you submit multiple versions of your app to the store. So the only options developers have are:
- do a "lifetime" price (which is not sustainable from the developers perspective)
- do a monthly sub
@HanBrolo @marcoarment The App Store does not allow you to sell a single version of an app and then charge a discounted fee for major updates.
By design the App Store require you to commit to free updates forever. You can’t just charge for updates for OS/hardware support.
Complain to Apple. They made this situation. (or your government to force apple to allow alternative stores with different terms)
@marcoarment You just missed all of us who have been subscribed since day 1. Would have a been a nice uplift for you.
(Yes, more than happy to pay more as I use OC *a lot* with over 1054h saved…)
@marcoarment I completely understand and support your change.
My question: is an ad supported version still required? Or to put it another way… what is the monetization delta between an ad-supported user and [future] subscription price?
The higher you can price your app (with customers supporting that increase), the less relevant the ad version is.
@marcoarment I use Overcast almost every day and it’s been rock solid for years (even the updated version has been pretty smooth for me).
Totally understand the need to charge a reasonable price for Overcast and I just wanted to say I appreciate all the effort you put into the app!
@marcoarment Good for you!
You’d already be over $13 just to match inflation.
You more than deserve it. Bring it on, happy to pay.
I’m in the camp of those who have no problem praying $40-50/y if that’s what you decide. I get a lot of use out of Overcast and I had no problem with the new version. I actually quite enjoyed some of the changes it brought.
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