[Mindwipe]

The likelihood is that there are less than five stores.

The amount of extra work is trivial.

They would receive substantial extra revenue - stores wouldn't have to race to the bottom with IAP revenue, could do things like upgrade pricing, and the margins would fall to a fraction of what they are today. They could make their user experience better than the current mess of having to go to the web to purchase things and then come back to the app, boosting purchases. App stores would have to compete in providing useful toolsets for developers. Developers could attract new userbases of topics frequently censored by Apple, of which there are many.

Independent developers are being choked by the iOS app store and there would be a financial bonanza for them with more stores.

[zepto]

Stores would of course race to the bottom, because they would be competing for customers, not developers. If you think a store with higher prices for the same Apps is going to attract customers, I respectfully think you are wrong.

Developers would have to support any store with customers. New stores would not be developer friendly. They would belong to people with the reach to get the stores to be downloaded.

Guess whose stores those would be - Google’s and Amazons.

There will be no bonanza. No amazing indie stores. It will just be 3 bad stores racing to the bottom, and making things harder for people.