mitchinator

It’s been announced that a new version of the incredibly popular Twitter app, Tweetie is on it’s way into the App Store with a load of new features set to make THE iPhone Twitter App once more. Rebuilt completely from the ground up, this is a completely new app and will be launched as such; Tweetie 2.

Tweetie is dead… Long live Tweetie 2…!

Well, not quite…

Since the announcement, there has been an increasing amount of both critisism and support for the decision to release this app as a ‘new’ app, and not an ‘upgrade’. Some suggesting it’s a slap in the face to Tweetie’s users, it’s supporters, who have bought the app and feel that being forced to pay full price is simply not cool. Surely an application upgrade is just that and those who have paid and supported the app should get just that?

Well, if I’m honest, I can see both sides of the coin in this debate but think the main point is being missed. Thanks to a gentle push (Thanks @GaryPacitti) I should get off the fence and join in with the debate… So here goes:

Every single person on this planet deserves to get paid for their work and effort. Tweetie 2 is the culmination of 6 months development and it’s developer deserves the right to be paid for his efforts.

I paid for Tweetie shortly after it’s release and think it’s an excellent app. Yes, it’s in desperate need of an update as there are more feature rich apps out there, but I paid for Tweetie and I got Tweetie. It was supported, bugs were fixed and features were added and for this, I paid the sum of £1.79… Bargain!

Now, there’s a new version on it’s way. Not only has it got a lot more features, but it’s been completely rebuilt. If I want this, I pay £1.79. If it turns out to be the app I hope it is… Bargain!

For a small fee, a developer gets paid for his work and I have access to great app which I am sure will be supported as required.

What about the other side of the coin?

Firstly, I want to make it clear I DO NOT think that Tweetie 2 should be a FREE upgrade to exisiting customers. In fact, I think a lot of the sound minded individuals arguing FOR a Tweetie upgrade are prepared to pay.

The problem seems to be the principal of not being offered the choice to upgrade and instead being left in the cold as a ‘new customer’ tastes a touch bitter. And who can blame them, it’s the world we live in where new sofware releases usually come with an upgrade path for existing users as a thank you for their support and relatively reduced fee to upgrade their software experience to the latest version and CONTINUE to support the product and devs. Sounds great, a win, win concept.

There’s one small problem with this, a paid upgrade is NOT available to App Store developers. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the choice is simple in the App Store – Free Upgrade or New App.

In this situation, there’s seems like no winner. Once again, the App Store shows itself not to be in the interest of developers or customers with devs being made to make tough decisions once again. I think we will see a lot of this in the near future as developers seek ways to maintain an income for the work they are doing in developing their apps.

I don’t suggest this is the position or attitude of the Tweetie dev, but faced with those options, I don’t blame him for releasing a new app. I would too…

Instead, we should divert attention to the broken app store and that once again it isn’t supporting developers and customers fairly.