[duhi88]

Making micro-transactions more profitable would be an unfortunate course of action. There are enough of those apps in the store, and they are clearly profitable enough if they can buy Super Bowl airtime.

Subscriptions for apps should be different, but I see a challenge in drawing the line between Spotify/Netflix and a scam app like "awesome culculator" that charges $5/mo to people who don'didn't realize it was a subscription (there was an article on HN this week about apps like that, targeting kids and the elderly, of course).

If Apple has a stipulation about requiring a website, then maybe subscription-based apps can get a discount on the 30% fee if they also have a web or desktop-based version of their application that provides comparable functionality and takes payments.

[pwaivers]

> ...and they are clearly profitable enough if they can buy Super Bowl airtime.

This is not a good reason to limit how much money an app developer makes. You want to make the play field fair, regardless if there are some companies making a lot of money.

[streblo]

> There are enough of those apps in the store, and they are clearly profitable enough if they can buy Super Bowl airtime.

You're talking about the top 1% or less of micro transaction-based apps here. There are ton of indie apps that depend on micro transactions and aren't making enough to buy a Super Bowl ad.

It's unfortunate that spammy or low quality micro transaction-based apps have become commonplace, but I'd rather that be dealt with by the App Store flagging and filtering the apps with issues.

[paxy]

> and they are clearly profitable enough if they can buy Super Bowl airtime

These dollars are most certainly coming from VC funding. Most of these businesses aren't (and will never be) profitable.