Microsoft unveils Windows Marketplace fees, splits, hopes, and dreams

Microsoft has begun laying out plans for its version of the App Store -- dubbed the Windows Marketplace -- with some familiar numbers, and a few unfamiliar tweaks. According to Ina Fried, the company will charge developers an annual fee of $99 to become part of the ecosystem, and an additional $99 for every app they submit (though throughout 2009, they'll have a chance to submit five apps at no cost). A rep from the big M states that the fee is "an acceptable cost of doing business for [software developers] looking to get in front of millions of customers," and justifies the charge on the grounds that Microsoft will "run a rigorous certification process to ensure that the end user's experience is optimal, and that the device and network resources aren't used in a malicious way."

Additionally, the company maintains that the process will offer "complete transparency throughout the application submission process," which indicates the folks in Redmond wouldn't mind courting devs who've been burned by Apple's opaque, confusing, and sometimes unfair system of approval. Besides the flat rates, Microsoft will take 30 percent of earnings from sales just as Apple and Google do -- the lone standout being RIM, who's generously offering 80 percent to devs (though hasn't exactly been blowing doors off hinges with its movement on fostering development). Microsoft's Marketplace will debut with the launch of Windows Mobile 6.5 in Q4 2009, though developers can apparently register come Spring, and start submitting this Summer.

[fourthletter Posted Mar 11th 2009 11:52AM]

Anyone else noticed that Apple did not invent the online software store, they have existed for many years.

[Templarian Posted Mar 11th 2009 12:42PM]

It has been mentioned numerous times above you.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 11th 2009 3:39PM]

"and justifies the charge on the grounds that Microsoft will 'run a rigorous certification process to ensure that the end user's experience is optimal, ..."

I'd hope that this is a better process than the way they tested Windows Vista, which are hardly ideal for the optimal end user experience.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 11th 2009 12:20PM]

Go for it MS

[norseman Posted Mar 11th 2009 1:01PM]

I say Microsoft should market it as "Quality over Quantity". Sure Apple can boast they have 10000 applications but if 9999 of them are fart gag apps, who gives a fiddler's fuck?

Give me a phone and not a 1980s sound box key chain.

Thanks.

[retarded commenter Posted Mar 11th 2009 3:22PM]

If this keeps out fart apps, I can endorse this pricing scheme

[Wevenhuis Posted Mar 11th 2009 4:32PM]

I wonder which business plan microsoft would have adopted if the financial crisis wasn't a fact.

The business plan sounds like microsoft is yet again showing a golden formula for profits. I wonder what the American court will say about this, as they already have experience with microsofts previous monopoly.

Personally, I wouldn't be too bad, as long as there is a "true customer support and service". One thing I regret though is that business models in practice always fail to show adequate service on many levels. If they plan for the $99 dollar model, they should have a very good service with a lot of client centered non-side profit service and no cases of referal management systems as is currently. If they fail to provide these conditions, you very well know where microsoft is at.

They started out good cleaning up vista to the current windows 7. It started going wrong with regard to customer trust in microsoft when the introduced a business plan of yet again different packets of windows 7.

[ogwilson Posted Mar 11th 2009 7:40PM]

I'm not going to lie, I bet the Windows Marketplace would be a lot less flooded with crapps (crap apps) than some of the more open ones seen on the iPhone and especially the Android, but if they think some of the most creative developers (the guys in the basement hacking up code all day) is going to pay that much money annually on it with no real guarantee of profit return, they're insane.