The iPad drawing app Paper has gotten a lot of attention in the past week. One of the interesting bits about Paper is that the app is free, and gives you access to one of the 5 available drawing tools. To access the others, you have to buy them for $1.99 each. So to get the full functionality of the app, it costs $8.

This doesn’t bother me, in fact I kind of like this model. You can try out the app for free, which is nice since there are no trials on the app store, and is preferable to me than having Paper Free or Paper Lite. If you don’t use the watercolor brush, you don’t pay for it, so the app is cheaper than it would be otherwise. This all makes sense to me as a user and developer, and seems like a good approach.

But there is a reason we don’t see this model more, and it’s because most users seem to hate this. They feel like they’re being ripped off, nickel and dimed for each piece of functionality.

A post on Macdrifter sums this up nicely:

I would have simply preferred an honest version of the app with all of the tools for a single price. Yes, through IAP, I can get all of the “essential” tools for one price. It feels sneaky to me though…

Here’s the rub with IAP: I’m left wondering if cut-and-paste as well as zoom were omitted only to be added as additional purchases. When an App is dependent on IAP, I’m doubtful that much attention will be given to updating the core functionality.

It’s a valid criticism, and I can see why it would make some users uneasy. Next time they release a new tool, I may have to cough up another $2. This free app might cost $50 after a while. If you look at the app store reviews, you’ll find the majority of the negative reviews of the app are really about the business model, which is a shame.

I’m a bit torn on this, between a better experience for the user and making things sustainable for the developer. Releasing a $0.99 app and supporting it for free forever is not feasible. Maybe the solution is in-app purchases or maybe paid upgrades or maybe built-in support for free trials. Regardless, it’s good to see developers experimenting, and hopefully we’ll find a nice middle ground.

I saw a blog post by tap tap tap a while back with a way to create user friendly links for redeeming iOS app promo codes. This is so much easier for the user than sending them a code and giving them precise instructions on the way to redeem it, especially if they’ve never done it before. You can send a link and they can get a free version of your app with one-click.

I hadn’t come across a way to do the same thing for the Mac App Store until yesterday, when I was downloading the Mountain Lion preview and saw how Apple did it. You can use the following format to send out promo code links for your MAS apps:

macappstores://buy.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/redeemLandingPage?code=YOUR_PROMO_CODE

Obviously, replace YOUR_PROMO_CODE with your promo code. If you don’t include the “?code=” portion, it will just open the redeem code landing page, which is pretty handy as well. Digging a little deeper, it seems the Mac App Store has two different URL schemes: “macappstore:” and “macappstores:”. The latter—with a trailing s—is for secure URLs. If you’re trying to direct link to something in the Mac App Store, and you get a “Cannot Connect to the App Store” error, try it with “macappstores:” instead.

I’ve been thinking for a while that the app store – both Mac and iOS – might be the perfect way to make money creating open source apps. For the average user, they don’t care about the code. They don’t know what open source is, and couldn’t care if it’s written in Cocoa or Flash or Java¹. They buy an app that solves a problem, and that’s it. Other developers can dig a little deeper, and look at the source, either to learn from, or customize the app for their own purposes.

It looks like LiveReload is currently proving this model can be successful. It’s available for $9.99 in the Mac App Store, and also open source. Over the weekend, it was the #1 paid app in developer tools, and currently #3.

So, why open source it?

That’s a good question, and LiveReload’s developer, Andrey Tarantsov, gives the following reason:

Why? Because curiosity is the most basic and important quality of good developers. I believe that everyone benefits from being able to study and tinker with other people’s software.

There is no formal license attached. You are free to tinker with it and share the results with your friends, but please don’t distribute binaries publicly without my permission. I still expect every user to pay for a license, unless you have a good reason not to.

Sounds like a good enough reason to me. I would love to be able to see the source of all the apps I use. I’m sure there is a lot I could learn, and maybe there is one little thing I need the app to do, and with the source, I can make that change. Plus, purchasing the app from the store gives me a way to easily and directly support the developer.

Licensing

The only downside is licensing. It seems like there a lot of potential issues there. What if I fork the app, make some UI changes, and release under a new name, though it’s essentially LiveReload? What if I add a big feature, create a pull request, and the change gets merged into the app? Am I then entitled to some portion of the revenue?

I’m not a lawyer, so I honestly don’t know the answer. But after seeing Clear get completely ripped off before even being released. I can only imagine how many Clear clones would be out there if it was open source. Regardless, I’d like to see more of this.

¹ Assuming the app actually works well, which is a big assumption.

I noticed yesterday that Chrome no longer displays a “+” inside of the new tab button.

Above: the new tab button for the previous versions of Chrome on the left and the new tab button on the right.

At first, I thought it was a bug. I quit and restarted Chrome with the same results. I tweeted about it and quickly got a few confirmations that it’s not an issue just on my computer, but a recent change in Chrome, and a few other people thought it was a bug as well.

I’m all for continually refining and simplifying your user interface, but this change makes no sense to me. For a new user, there is no context or hints as to the purpose of the button, not even a tooltip. For existing users, it looks like something is broken. No space was saved as the button is the same size, and I don’t even think it’s a visual improvement as the button is now just leaf-like blob floating there. I can’t think of another interface where there is a button that is completely devoid of any text or icons to give some clues to its function.

Luckily, since Chrome is open-source, we can gain at least a little insight into the decision behind this change. I dug up this fairly long thread, in which almost every commenter explains they thought it was a bug or glitch. Almost everyone also preferred the old button, and wanted the change reverted. I couldn’t find a real reason the change was made, but we do get what seems like a very Google justification from someone on the Chromium team:

User experience research on our end seems to have confirmed that this change does not decrease usability and in fact can lead to an overall improvement in people’s perceptions of the UI (some participants described the change as “cleaner” or “neater”). (link)

Later on in the thread, from someone else on the Chromium team reporting user feedback:

The “+” button to open a new tab is not showing up in Chrome browser. Users are requesting to restore the plus sign as a visual aid to its purpose, which also does not have a tool-tip…

10+ reports were submitted in GoogleFeedback in last two days about this issue. (link)

I’m baffled by this change. It seems like a minor issue, but it’s also completely arbitrary, and I think it could have some real usability issues. I have a feeling we’ll see the plus sign return in a future version of Chrome.

Everyone has probably already watched the video and read about the yet to be released to do app Clear. There has been a lot of buzz for the app because of the innovative and well-considered interaction design. If you haven’t seen it already, I’ve embedded it below:

Now, I’m really interested in this app as a designer and developer of software, and I’ll write more about that in another post. But, I’m equally as intrigued as someone who has never managed to use a to do list for any length of time, and I’m hoping Clear changes that. There are few reasons for that.

No checkboxes

The one thing I’ve always hated about to do apps is also the thing that is most synonymous with a “to do” app — the checkbox. It has never made sense to me. To do lists are literally about things to be done. Once it’s done, it should no longer exist in the realm of my to do list. I don’t want to see a list of my to do items with checked box and striked through text. From the video, it looks like Clear does away with this notion. There are only tasks, and tasks can be deleted or completed. I’ll be sincerely disappointed if there is a way to see completed items or mark an item as “undone”.

Fun

To do lists are fucking boring. All work and no play. Clear adds a sense of delight to the tedium, and I think that’s what people are really responding to. How do you add a task? With a pinch, and a satisfying pop. To complete? Swipe right with a nice animation, and a friendly chime. It actually looks fun to add and remove items from your to do list.

Clear is now “Waiting for Review”, so I guess we’ll know soon enough whether or not it lives up to expectations.