Developers weigh in on the Mac App Store
The Mac App Store is the biggest thing to happen to Mac software distribution since the Internet itself—some might say that the store is even bigger. Many users haven't bothered with boxes and CDs of software for some time …
Context & Ripple Effects
Three days after Apple opened the Mac App Store for business, Macworld polls developers on what the storefront means for them — and the reactions are split along lines Marco Arment drew back in his October argument that the store isn't built for today's Mac developers: cheap discovery and impulse buying for some, sandboxing anxiety and pricing pressure for others.
The syndicated pickup from Evernote's own blog gives the story its hardest number — the company says the store more than doubled its new users — which turns an abstract debate about distribution into early evidence that App Store placement alone moves the needle. Early listings catalogued in December's first sightings from the store already showed Apple favoring apps that fit its model.
First-order effects
- Developers must choose between the store's discovery engine and direct sales' margins and control; Evernote's claim of doubled new users makes listing look near-mandatory for consumer Mac software.
- Apps priced like utilities face immediate downward pressure, since the iOS-trained one-click purchase habit meets a catalog where comparable tools sit a click away.
Second-order effects
- Boxed Mac software's remaining retail channel loses relevance faster, pushing publishers who stayed with physical distribution to plan digital-only releases.
- Rival platforms and large publishers have a template to copy — or to counter with their own storefronts — once the store proves it can double a known product's user intake.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Mac software distribution consolidates around Apple's curated storefront the way mobile did, with review guidelines becoming de facto platform rules rather than suggestions — the governance question Arment raised in October becomes structural.
- Discovery-by-storefront could marginalize independent Mac shareware economics, shifting developer leverage from customers they own to rankings Apple controls.
The trend: Apple is porting the iOS curation-and-discovery model to the desktop, and developer reaction this week marks the moment the Mac's open-distribution era starts closing.