This is because there are no free trials for users who are purchasing expensive iOS apps. Also,the union expects a “more reasonable revenue cut” from Apple to survive.
Ahead of Apple’s annual developers conference, WWDC 2018, a group of Apple App Store developers have formed a union dubbed as ‘The Developers Union’ because they fear that by creating Apple iOS apps they will not be able to make a living going ahead. This is because there are no free trials for users who are purchasing expensive iOS apps. Also,the union expects a “more reasonable revenue cut” from Apple to survive.
“We believe that people who create great software should be able to make a living doing it. So we created The Developers Union to advocate for sustainability in the App Store,”
wrote The Developers Union in an open letter to Apple.
This union and the initiative has been spearheaded by Brent Simmons, the creator of MarsEdit, Vesper, and NetNewsWire; Jake Schumacher, who created ‘App: The Human Story documentary maker’; product designer Loren Morris and software designer Roger Ogden.
While this initiative is called a ‘union’, the creators have categorically stated that it is not a traditional trade union. “This is a non-union union created to bring developers and supporters together for better App Stores for all by focusing on issues that best serve those who create and use apps,” according to the website. The union initially wants to focus to two subjects- free trials of apps and negotiate on revenue sharing from iOS apps.
“Free trials of apps allow developers to show users their creation and establish value. Before iOS, Mac developers relied heavily on free trials, and they were able to make a living while making great software,” the letter said.
As of now, subscription-based apps can only offer free trials. Apps that do not have a subscription model cannot offer free trials to users. The problem with this, according to developers, is that users may not want to buy an expensive app before trying. The union aims to persuade Apple to offer free trials to all apps.
On the other hand, this union also wants to talk money with Apple over iOS app revenue sharing. As of now, Apple gets a 30% of all revenue that iOS developers earn from the App Store. For subscription-based apps, Apple takes a 15% cut when the users subscribes to an app for more than a year.
