| This is a good devil's advocate summary, except feasibility of remote development with a GUI. I don't agree with a few of these points though. "Someone who has either invested or going to invested 100's of hours to properly learn the iOS/Mac frameworks" I think a lot of people will just want to experiment with something, or see some app, in my case I need to fix a bug in a desktop app I use. The kind of bug that I think just requires running a build and then searching forums, etc. for the error. I think the 100s of hours would have been wasted setting up virtualization and the toolchain but I can pay 20-50 a month to have that done for me. "someone who is either unable to afford an older mac mini ($200-300 as noted in other comments) OR someone who has no cheap way to deliver older mac hardware to his home country." A lot of people will want to try things out. There is a huge convenience value to just paying a monthly fee and logging in to a virtual system that is already setup versus the hassle of buying a mac mini, connecting it all up, setting up a virtualization, installing all the junk you need for development, etc. Not to mention the upfront cost of buying a mac mini will most likely be more than experimenting for 2-3 months. I'll need to update the software on it regularly, etc. And lastly, it is just another thing to take up space on my desk that I don't use that often that: collecting dust, taking up plug space, needing to not spill coffee on, etc. The real question I have is developing in a GUI over remote access even feasible? How good does your inet connection really have to be? How much can be done via non-GUI ? |
Re: your other comments - sure, I totally see who the service will appeal to some customers. The market is certainly there.
What I'm concerned about is the market _size_: I still believe that any current/future iOS/Mac developers will buy a Mac eventually, and there may be not many people like who only need a Mac to fix an occasional bug in an open-source Mac app, which by itself requires a significant skill.