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Wow! 10M Pirated iPhone Apps Downloaded!
- Thread starter Zippher
- Start date
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Some more thoughts
A few of the comments I'd like to respond to:
"100 other websites will popup", "...these people wouldn't have paid for the apps anyway"
There is the old saying, "locks keep out honest people". The issue here is that the crooks will find a way to get the apps for free. If you don't put ANY "locks" in place, the rest of the market will follow.
There are only five effective tools available:
1) Add code to prevent your app from being hacked
2) Go thru the legal system
3) Ask Apple to flex their muscle
4) Work with the ISP's to shut these guys down
5) Create some malicious solutions that will throw a wrench in their system
Each has their pros and cons. I think the easiest method is #5.
For item #1: this guy has a solution- http://thwart-ipa-cracks.blogspot.com
A few of the comments I'd like to respond to:
"100 other websites will popup", "...these people wouldn't have paid for the apps anyway"
There is the old saying, "locks keep out honest people". The issue here is that the crooks will find a way to get the apps for free. If you don't put ANY "locks" in place, the rest of the market will follow.
There are only five effective tools available:
1) Add code to prevent your app from being hacked
2) Go thru the legal system
3) Ask Apple to flex their muscle
4) Work with the ISP's to shut these guys down
5) Create some malicious solutions that will throw a wrench in their system
Each has their pros and cons. I think the easiest method is #5.
For item #1: this guy has a solution- http://thwart-ipa-cracks.blogspot.com
Actually I think the best is #1. There are several apps in the app store that call home to make sure that they are legitimately purchased. Of course there are also hacks for those apps as well but nevertheless it adds an additional layer.
BTW may I ask what app you developed?
This cracks me up. Some say its ok to rip movies because they studios have more money but its not ok to use cracked apps.
I have used cracked apps before and if I found the app to be adequate it was purchased.
Cracked apps are not my primary way of doing business but neither is giving someone money for junk.
As the ole saying goes, you can't judge abook by its cover. Nor can you judge an app on a screen shot and a sales pitch
I have used cracked apps before and if I found the app to be adequate it was purchased.
Cracked apps are not my primary way of doing business but neither is giving someone money for junk.
As the ole saying goes, you can't judge abook by its cover. Nor can you judge an app on a screen shot and a sales pitch
It would be nice if Apple would introduce a return period for purchases. An hour would be sufficient.
Does anyone know how this works in the Android store? What prevents someone from buying the app, using it when they need it and then simply returning it?
1,000,000,000 apps sold in the AppStore.
10,000,000 apps pirated.
1% of iPhone apps in use are pirated? OMG ONOZ!
10,000,000 apps pirated.
1% of iPhone apps in use are pirated? OMG ONOZ!
analogies of the physical world used to compare things dealt with in the digital world are foolish.
chicken analogy is ridiculous, the buyer COULD give back the chicken, although probably not in the most sanitary fashion
and it would be very easy to implement a "refund function" in the apps. The same way you would delete an app, it would be removed, you have the choice to rate it, and a choice to either delete, or ask for a refund. Provided this was done within 24 hours of said purchase. No harm, no foul. There are plenty of apps I would love to test before I buy, but the loss of money (we don't all have that much disposable income) in regards to the risk of a sucky app is too great IMHO (maybe not IYHO).
It's been said that many "gems" are lost in the many garbage apps that are released almost daily. Without the "complementary demo" that some apps don't offer, there has to be some alternative for users to "try before you buy" or at least lower the risk of losing your money to an app you were sure to be a "gem". If you HAVE to have a physical analogy of "try before you buy", just look at the customer service counter at your local Wal-Mart.
chicken analogy is ridiculous, the buyer COULD give back the chicken, although probably not in the most sanitary fashion
and it would be very easy to implement a "refund function" in the apps. The same way you would delete an app, it would be removed, you have the choice to rate it, and a choice to either delete, or ask for a refund. Provided this was done within 24 hours of said purchase. No harm, no foul. There are plenty of apps I would love to test before I buy, but the loss of money (we don't all have that much disposable income) in regards to the risk of a sucky app is too great IMHO (maybe not IYHO).
It's been said that many "gems" are lost in the many garbage apps that are released almost daily. Without the "complementary demo" that some apps don't offer, there has to be some alternative for users to "try before you buy" or at least lower the risk of losing your money to an app you were sure to be a "gem". If you HAVE to have a physical analogy of "try before you buy", just look at the customer service counter at your local Wal-Mart.
analogies of the physical world used to compare things dealt with in the digital world are foolish.
chicken analogy is ridiculous, the buyer COULD give back the chicken, although probably not in the most sanitary fashion
and it would be very easy to implement a "refund function" in the apps. The same way you would delete an app, it would be removed, you have the choice to rate it, and a choice to either delete, or ask for a refund. Provided this was done within 24 hours of said purchase. No harm, no foul. There are plenty of apps I would love to test before I buy, but the loss of money (we don't all have that much disposable income) in regards to the risk of a sucky app is too great IMHO (maybe not IYHO).
It's been said that many "gems" are lost in the many garbage apps that are released almost daily. Without the "complementary demo" that some apps don't offer, there has to be some alternative for users to "try before you buy" or at least lower the risk of losing your money to an app you were sure to be a "gem". If you HAVE to have a physical analogy of "try before you buy", just look at the customer service counter at your local Wal-Mart.
Thats called laying down the facts.
I totally agree with you and I will continue to pirate apps until there is no need to anymore. Regardless of a number of people using things for free it doesn't affect the bigger picture.
I do agree that there should be a refund policy but to be totally honest this would fuel piracy, as the people who crack the IPAs would be able to get them more easily and distribute them more quickly.
Realistically I'd love to see refunding for this reason
There doesn't have to be. There are plenty of apps that offer light demo versions. Buy those instead. Vote with your wallet, don't steal.
It would be nice if Apple gave vendors the choice to be able to create demos, but this doesn't justify taking things without permission or paying for them in any way.
If you HAVE to have a physical analogy of "try before you buy", just look at the customer service counter at your local Wal-Mart.
More importantly look at the fact a smaller shop doesn't have a customer service counter might mean you shop at Wal-Mart instead. It doesn't give you the right to shoplift from the smaller shop.
Phazer
Didn't know about cracked apps. Do they work 100% ? Like software updates etc ?
I don't see the point in pirating app store apps. They're cheap!
I don't see the point in pirating app store apps. They're cheap!
Most cracked apps do work 100% as a purchased one might. I have yet to come across one that doesn't work like a purchased app.
It's not a matter of how cheap they are. If you bought an app for 99c and it was basically crap and didn't work properly or wasn't what you had expected you would feel better if you could get a refund and get another similar app or just another app in general.
If you add up the amount of people that buy apps because they're cheap and then work out how many of those apps end up not being used or getting deleted you'd probably save yourself a lot of money by not buying them in the first place.
I'm all up for supporting the dev community and paying for apps that are worth it, but when someone releases an app that basically doesn't do what you had expected and you have no way to get your money back I simply refuse to even both purchasing any.
Where did you get that a billion apps was sold. A billion apps was downloaded not sold.
They work 100%. I came across someone with pirated apps at my soccer game. He had every good app. I did not believe when he told me, till I tried to delete them and the x didnt show at the corner. He had that tiger woods game, good game by the way.
Another thing you might be able to do is just to bug the heck out of him, try shutdown the blog. Isn't blogspot hosted in the USA if you email there abuse people they may be willing just to delete the blog as it discusses illegal activity.
A false sense of security is worse than no security.
Phoning home is a worthless form of DRM. It doesn't work to prevent piracy, but it does piss off legitimate users (as well as waste their bandwidth/time). To make matters worse, it'll be stripped out of the pirated version, thereby making the pirated copy superior to the legitimate copy. That's not a good thing.
All I can say is this: because stuff is digital/virtual, there is no way, you can 100% stop people not to copy/crack etc. your stuff.
If someone wants to stole something, he will.
Most people today don't see any material value in software/movie/music/photos/images (yes, all these stuff today is mostly digital) at all.
The material value for them is: a car, a house, or even a cup of coffee for 1 $... these are thing, you can't simply copy. Do you understand?
If someone wants to stole something, he will.
Most people today don't see any material value in software/movie/music/photos/images (yes, all these stuff today is mostly digital) at all.
The material value for them is: a car, a house, or even a cup of coffee for 1 $... these are thing, you can't simply copy. Do you understand?
I'd imagine that its this sort of cavalier attitude that helped lead to the creation of this site, so pick your poison.
Even Itunes lets me sample 30 second clips of songs before I buy them.
As for the restaurant argument, its flawed. If I go to a restaurant and order chicken, I expect it to be quality chicken I enjoy. The difference is, I don't have to pay for the chicken until I've consumed it. If I take a couple bites of the chicken and it tastes vile, I have the option of requesting something else, or just asking the restaurant to take it off of my bill and I can eat something else or go somewhere else. The trade-off is that I'm still hungry if I choose to not eat the food.
In the App store, the assumption is that with the purchase of an application, you're completely happy with it. I can tell you from personal experience that I sincerely dislike purchasing apps because of this. I have several applications I've purchased and promptly deleted, with literally no recourse.
In my opinion, there should be a disclaimer that pops up on the app store each time you enter it "AS-IS, NO WARRANTY", much like a going-out-of-business sale. A real store cares about consumers being satisfied with the products and services they offer.
I'm not condoning the pirating of applications in any way. The point I'm trying to make is that this isn't a surprising step considering the manner in which the App store currently operates.
The money isn't "gone" because many people who pirate have absolutely no intention of buying in the first place. So technically the dev is not losing out on any money because the money was never going to come their way.
It is also possible that the person who had no intention of buying the app but pirates it enjoys it, tells their friends, they buy it when they would have otherwise not even looked at it.
Disclaimer: I do not pirate my apps, but I am capable of thinking critically. This is not supporting those who crack/steal apps.
Fine by me. ...and here's how it plays out beyond that.
I bought three audio apps at $10+ each because they were supposed to have a simple midi sequencer in them. Paid the $, downloaded, opened app, no midi sequencer, closed app, deleted. Cost to find out that nobody makes a decent midi sequencer for the iphone: about $40. And then I've got digidrummer, which is so crashy it hasn't even successfully opened in two update periods.
Did I complain? No, I just stopped buying apps from the appstore. So now it's developers turn to lose.
I went back to a jailbroken phone instead, got a little extra truly useful functionality from utilities on Cydia, and now my phone does exactly everything it did a year ago, and does it well. I'll stick with firmware updates for added functionality. No need to piss more money away on missing functionality & bad programming on those out to make a quick buck.
But, now that I know about pirating, I might reconsider. I could download pirate apps to try them out, before buying them and getting a decent, clean install. If you've done a good enough job, that site may result in you selling me an app. If not, you don't deserve my money anyway, or as you put it, **** out of luck.
hahahahah what? what are you like 10 years old? software piracy has ALWAYS been huge.
Looking at the number of jailbroken phones to the number of unjailbroken phones I would beg to differ.
But, let's say you are right. So now a friend who had no intention of ever paying for the app gets it for free. And so do 4 of his friends, and eventually 2 other friends actually buy it.
Now there are 8 people using the application; giving it good reviews, publicity, etc that would have never touched the application otherwise. Two of the eight even paid, developer gets exposure + income and at what cost? Nothing.