[chrisco255]

And author would merely need to give 30% of income to said app store. And fight through an approval process and risk being banned at Apple/Microsoft's whim. Truth is, all the major desktop OSes have app stores these days, but going through iTunes is a mess. Apple once forced me to use 2FA through my iPod Touch I had registered...yet didn't have on me (I'm assuming they presumed I was an iOS user).

Paint.NET could easily charge for their app (or go with freemium model), but they decided along time ago to be freeware.

[scarface74]

It’s a simple math equation. Could they make 42% more revenue (slightly less they would have to pay transaction costs either way) by going through a trusted source where people could buy with less friction? If there were no friction to get people to pay for products on your own website, why do people sell through Amazon? It’s trivial to setup a website using something like squarespace to sell your product on your own.

The “fight through the approval process” is exaggerated. Millions of apps get through the App Store every year. How much of an issue would it be to get a paint app on an App Store?

Truth is, all the major desktop OSes have app stores these days, but going through iTunes is a mess. Apple once forced me to use 2FA through my iPod Touch I had registered...yet didn't have on me (I'm assuming they presumed I was an iOS user).

Yet and still thousands of app developers do it everyday.

If you aren’t forced to use 2FA, what’s the purpose of having it? I’ve had to call home to get my son to read off my 2FA code on my iPhone that I forgot to sign in to AWS. If you aren’t an iOS user, there is an option on iCloud to send it via SMS.

Paint.NET could easily charge for their app (or go with freemium model), but they decided along time ago to be freeware.

People are much more likely to pay for something the less friction there is. I’m much more likely to buy something from Amazon/Apple/Steam/Microsoft where my payment information is already on file than I am $random website as are millions of others.