Just to emphasize your point, 30% take is relatively small in the retail world. A store like Amazon or Walmart or Target or Best Buy generally wants a cut of 40-50%, if not more. And that doesn’t include the cut many distributors want to take for being the middle person.
(Source: I’ve been on the executive team at startups with products sold in retail stores)
Then I'm sure you'd agree monopsonies due to increasing centralisation and clout in the past few decades aren't all that nice for the consumer and smaller players like startups.
Yup. And that excludes the fee many brands pay supermarkets to be in the eye level spot on the shelves. New entrants have to spend money just to be visible in the racks, regardless of whether their product is being sold.
> Just to emphasize your point, 30% take is relatively small in the retail world.
The internet already provides a nearly free distribution medium for software application - so even paying a 5% markup to an unnecessary middleman is just outrageous. The app store only exists so that Apple (and others) can gauge even more money from developers, who ultimately pass on the cost to us customers.
The web also allows any producer of physical products to distribute directly to consumers, doesn't it? So why is it OK for Amazon to get a fee, or any physical retailer? Aren't they unnecessary middle men too?
> So why is it OK for Amazon to get a fee, or any physical retailer? Aren't they unnecessary middle men too?
Amazon or Walmart or any other online or offline super market doesn't prevent either the manufacturer to sell directly to the consumer, or me as a consumer to directly buy from the producer / manufacturer.
Apple does precisely that with its restrictive app store on ios (and soon will on the macOS too), denying the buyer the right to buy an app directly from the developer and avoid the unnecessary burden of the Apple Tax. Due to this same restriction it is also able to charge the developer an annual recurring fee, again unnecessarily raising the total cost of an application for the user.
And how does that dispute anything I said? I wasn’t making a claim that the AppStore commission is warranted or not, I was speaking to what retail stores charge. I get it, you think Apple is out of line, but maybe reply to someone who is claiming it’s justified rather than pointing your vitriol towards me?
Wouldn’t you say your post is “bitter criticism” of Apple/the AppStore? If so, then welcome to learning the definition of vitriol! If not, then other help than I can provide is needed.
It's not even a valid comparison and disingenuous because software products now don't need to be sold through any retail outlet, and can be sold directly to the customer through the internet. There is absolutely no need of any app store as a middle man here.
There are plenty of companies who sell their products directly to consumers. So physical products don't need to be sold through third party retailers either.
And some brands have started doing just that. But that's not the point - Amazon or Walmart doesn't prevent me from buying the products directly from the producers / manufacturers or from some other third-party. Apple does precisely that with its app store and ios platform (and soon will do with macOS).
(Source: I’ve been on the executive team at startups with products sold in retail stores)