Comment by nozzlegear
1 day ago
It's worth considering (IMO, anyway) that users don't want to use apps that use third party billing, too. That's my own preference, I avoid them and look for something that lets me pay via the App Store instead. In the cases where I can't do that (Disney, Netflix), I just leave a bad review and send feedback on their website asking to pay in the app.
Among even non-tech people I know, it's now common knowledge to check on the web if you can get a discount without the Apple tax before doing an in-app purchase. I think most people care more about saving 10-30% on their purchases than the convenience.
Interesting, I haven't heard of people doing that. I just asked my non-tech sisters and neither of them do it, but they do pay for the big media apps outside of Apple since there's no choice there.
For me, I much prefer the convenience of having all my subscriptions centrally located in the App Store, and, more importantly, being able to cancel them with one click there too.
For me there's definitely a trust factor for random app developers and an indifference for non-subscriptions where the one-time fee is irrelevant, but I wouldn't pay an extra $20 - $100 a year in fees to avoid a company like Netflix or Disney managing subscriptions it's just not that hard to do and they're adequate at it.
There may be one or two good examples of companies who do not depend on dark patterns to keep subscriptions, but plenty of the big names are associated with absolute horror stories of numerous hour long phone calls fighting retention specialists to get a service canceled.
For me the ease of seeing what subscriptions I have in one place with easy cancellation options avoids the stress of trusting companies with PII and credit card info and ever needing to deal with anything over the phone.
That said… making it impossible to sell your product with less than a 30% margin does not seem in line with today’s software and streaming economics. I am not sure the model Apple should adopt, but the current one lacks artistry.