The exploration and transformation of the failure behind the App.net open free account

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[Core Tip] App.net allows the creation of free accounts through invitations to join in order to crack down on the scarcity of users and maintain the normal functioning of the ecosystem.

We have learned more about App.net's original intention and initial ideas. However, like all new Internet services, it is also constantly adjusting its own ideas, last night App.net founder Dalton Cardwell posted a blog, announced App.net began to provide a free account.

Prior to this, App.net was a paid service, and its users had to pay 50 dollars a year (later to 36 dollars) to use the service, in exchange for the entire station without advertising and API interface permanent full open commitment.

Now, compared to paid accounts, App.net's free account has the following limitations:

Must have the current paying user's invitation to be free to join

Up to 40 other users, no limit for paid users

Initially only 500MB of file storage space (paid users have 10GB)

If the added user can invite other users to join, and the following conditions are true, the inviter and the invitees each get 100MB file storage space.

More than five other users who have been invited to join

The invitees authorize at least one third party client

The app.net has been very cautious in its official blog post announcing the decision, stressing that such a "pay-for-value" model was first planned. But such a decision, and a series of other recent moves, still highlight the obstacles app.net has encountered as an idealistic product in its operations, and the friction with developers.

Developers: There are benefits, only the application of quality

At the beginning of the establishment of app.net, there was a "chicken egg, egg and chicken" problem: We had no third party application at that time. And now the problem has been solved: we now have more than 100 third-party applications across a wide platform.

This is App.net's official statement. But the reality is far less rosy. App.net's third-party applications are mostly amateur amateurs of low quality, and a few of the few applications that are of good quality are hastily modified from existing Twitter apps. For example, the most famous Netbot is the Tweetbot version of the direct revision.

In App.net, a developer account needs 100 dollars, and if you don't get enough revenue and don't even return 100 dollars, there's no obvious incentive to provide high-quality Third-party clients.

So, App.net's third-party developers get enough? The answer is No.

App.net Income Account

In App.net's ecology, developer revenue comes mainly from two areas:

Selling clients in a variety of application stores

The official incentive scheme from App.net is divided into

App.net user, the famous blogger David Smith, gave the developer an account:

If the price is sold to the client ...

At present, there are 32,000 users in the app.net, of which the most active users with status updates every day are about 2,300, even if the status of users only accounted for 10% of all active users, then app.net in total only 23,000 may have to purchase Third-party client demand for active users.

In the best and most optimistic scenario, even if 23,000 users each purchased a 3 dollar Third-party client from the app Store, the amount of money that would eventually arrive at the developer's hands would be about 48000 dollars. It is impossible to maintain a high-quality application development team for a mere 48000 dollars.

So what about the developer Incentive Plan ...

App.net has a developer incentive plan, and the current situation is that every month the authorities will give out 20000 dollars to distribute and feed back to the Third-party application developers with a specific algorithm.

If a Third-party client developer wants to make 48000 dollars from this incentive plan within a year, so this year he has to get 20% of all the money every month, and it's hard to maintain a business unless a development team is particularly strong and gets a large percentage of bonuses every month.

App.net: The exploration and transformation of failure

The App.net team should also be aware of the developer's ecological dilemma, so even though the earliest app.net is similar to a fee-based Twitter version, we can see that app.net is now in some direction exploring and transforming, trying to provide users with some unique value, To solve the problem of the developer's low enthusiasm. Unfortunately, in the current limited number of users, such an attempt has largely failed.

You may have noticed that a big limitation of app.net to free users is limited file storage space. It is true that over the past one months or so, App.net is investing in the development of the file storage function, pushing developers to accept and use the file storage API interface. Also try to find a niche market in this way to get more users.

However, such measures do not have much effect, but because the promotion is too malicious caused some developers dissatisfaction: the user registration app.net, the initial purpose is to treat it as a social network, rather than a file storage space. In this regard, the expression of Marco Arment, founder of Instapaper and the Magazine, is representative:

If I really want to add file storage functionality to my app, I should also use Dropbox,dropbox more than app.net users, providing free and paid users more storage space than app.net, and after three years app.net probably no longer exist.

Workaround:

In this case, if the developer is to get enough revenue, then app.net must quickly expand the user base, allowing more and more users to join in, because the only way:

To get more sales from Third-party clients.

will give developers incentive plans to have more money to distribute

File storage and other differentiated efforts to be truly valuable

Will allow the old paid users to stay after their first year of payment expires.

This is why app.net this free user invitation to join features--no user, nothing. Allowing more and more users to join the system free of charge will make it possible to get more paid subscribers and to keep the entire ecosystem running.

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