8/12/2023 0 Comments Instacast appI paid for those immediately and without hesitation-they make listening to podcasts so much better that I couldn’t believe I lived without them all these years. It unlocked two fantastic features-Smart Speed and Voice Boost. The app itself was free, but it included an in-app purchase which Marco valued at €4.99. This was shortly before Marco Arment debuted Overcast – his “simple” podcast player. I believe I payed €4.99 for it, happy to support a great developer. Obviously the sales weren’t enough to make it sustainable. I slowly stopped understanding exactly what I was doing in it and my playlists weren’t organised exactly how I wanted them to be. Development seemed to have slowed and its UI became a bit too complex. It was probably one of the best out there, if not the single best app in the App Store. Instacast was my first podcast player on iOS. Perhaps he would also be willing to port it to OS X? We’ll see. I also tip Marek from time to time, hoping this will help to motivate him to keep PointOut updated in the future. If you really like his app you can get him an espresso more than once of course-I really like this way of allowing users to support their favourite devs. Whichever one you get him it will automatically unlock all the features, as well as all future functions which Marek is already working on for a 1.1 update. Marek chose a slightly different route however, since he really likes his coffee-the user can buy him an espresso for €0.99, a doppio for €2.99 or a trippio for €4.99 as an in-app purchase. He really liked David Smith’s idea of a tip jar which I wrote about a few weeks ago. Three more layouts can be unlocked by buying Marek an espresso. PointOut is free to use with one layout and all the tools. Marek Moi, the man behind PointOut, followed David’s lead after my article but expanded on the idea: I can’t help but wonder how many people would tip developers of their favourite apps if they had the ability to do so? I know I would. As you can see from the above screenshot, I have being using the app for a while now. I tip David from time to time for one reason and one reason only-I hope he keeps on expanding its functionality, perhaps adding more stat summaries. This reminds me … I haven’t tipped him in June yet. Being able to tip David at any time also allows for users to rethink their first choice-I know I have. The difference between it and a typical IAP is twofold-a tip is not mandatory and the app still retains 100% of its functions without it (although it does additionally remove ads) and a user can choose how much he values the app. Its function is simple-tip the author one, two or five euros via in-app purchase. I wrote about Underscore David Smith’s tip jar a while back, which he implemented in Pedometer++ :ĭavid Smith’s Pedometer++ app is the only one that I have installed (and I have close to or slightly more than 100 apps on my iPhone and a few less on my iPad) which features a “tip jar” as he calls it. What I would prefer to focus on are two subjects that I have already mentioned here. I could probably write many words on the subject of business models and so forth, but that horse has been beaten to death in various places on the internet many times in these past few years. Benjamin Mayo of 9to5Mac reports that Instacast has been discontinued due to the simple fact that its parent company Vemedio ran out of money. Since the specifics are unknown at this time, I can only assume the main problem was lack of profitability.
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