T-Mobile to open content deck with simple revenue share model
mocoNews is reporting that T-Mobile is getting ready to throw its sacred content deck wide open to all interested parties, adopting an App Store-esque model that lets Joe Developer submit his apps straight to the carrier. Once an application is approved, it'll be made available on the deck in order of popularity with no unnecessary fiddling on T-Mobile's part (good for them), and here's where it gets really interesting: the exact details of the revenue share depend on the intensity of the app's data consumption. The more bits an app gobbles up, the more money T-Mobile will take, meaning that developers will be helping to pick up the slack for its generously-priced unlimited data plans offered to subscribers. For what it's worth, devs currently testing the system say that the shares are still very generous even with the sliding scale in place -- and because the content deck will be available across T-Mobile's entire range of products regardless of platform, Java-based applets that are relatively platform independent could nab sales from nearly all segments of T-Mob's 30-plus million subscriber base. Sounds cool, but we're sure the devils are in the details; either way, it should be interesting to see what they've managed to cook up by the time it apparently kicks off this fall.
