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Three flavors of iPhone OS 4.x showing up in developer's analytics?
Speaking of iPhone OS 4, check this out: PixelCUBE Studios, which currently holds the #1 spot on iTunes' list of free iPhone app downloads with The Impossible Test, noticed something rather curious in its usage stats. See, PixelCUBE uses Pinch Media to dredge up analytics, and a quick check of the OS versions its users are running (pictured left) shows that not one, not two, but three distinct flavors of OS 4 have turned up: 4.0, 4.0.1, and 4.1. It's not unusual for Apple (or any major software developer, really) to have different teams working on multiple version milestones at the same time, so we don't doubt that this could be real; then again, this is easy enough to spoof in a world where enterprising devs and fun-loving miscreants are bending iPhones to their every whim with creative hacks and lightning-quick jailbreaks. Anyone up for a careful daily sweep of BART trains until we get to the bottom of this?
Mysterious iPhone model found in app usage records?
O iPhone3,1, where art thou? Last time we spotted that signature, it was buried in lines of code as part of a beta OS 3.0 firmware build. Now according to data from analytics software inside iBART, the San Francisco-centric transportation app has been host to a new visitor with the aforementioned device identification number. As MacRumors points out, iPhone2,1 was originally spotted in October 2008 and later became the iPhone 3GS about eight months later. Not that it's necessarily the case Apple will keep to the same schedule -- nor should it come as a surprise that the company's maybe-kinda-sorta looking into a successor to its prized moneymaker -- but if you happen to be in the Bay Area and see someone quietly pulling out a sleek touchscreen, it might be in your best interest to make friends.
Pinch Media sees hints of next-generation iPod touch
Where do you find yourself with respect to the rumors of a new iPod touch somewhere in the pipeline? Having a slew of case manufacturers showing products with cutouts for a camera strikes me as enticing but ultimately unconvincing; hearing from Pinch Media, however, raises the credibility level to 'high.' The App Store analytics provider has confirmed that instances of an "iPod 3,1" model have begun showing up in the usage logs from apps that have implemented Pinch's tracking tools. What could this possibly mean? Well, going back to March of this year, the BGR team sussed out a few future model IDs from a beta of the iPhone 3.0 firmware, including the iPod 3,1 listing; Pinch says that the device type first started showing up in April, and sightings picked up in May. Pinch's stats should be taken quite seriously, as the company first announced appearances of the model indicator that eventually revealed itself as the iPhone 3GS way back in January.If that timeline were to hold true again, we wouldn't expect to see the iPod touch next-gen on store shelves before the holiday shopping season... but it's likely that the engineering effort for the new touch will bootstrap off of the iPhone 3GS platform, and the QA/testing cycle for the device will probably be quite a bit shorter than it would be for a new phone. If I had to guess... perhaps a Steve-enabled press event during the last week of July? Should be lively.[As noted in the comments, Apple's track record for iPod introductions does have a consistent tick-tock rhythm to it: betting on a September launch for the new touch would be a prudent call.]Thanks Joachim!
iCombat's stats on app pirates
Miguel Sanchez-Grice, creator of the iCombat app (a remake of the old Atari game), sent us these stats on piracy of his app after writing a blog post about the same thing, and I find them fascinating. Instead of building DRM into his app, he just detected if the player was using a copy that wasn't from the App Store, and then forwarded them onto a web page that he could track. It seems like he equates unique visitors to his Pinch Media site as users (though he doesn't go into detail about exactly where those "Pinch Media New Uniques" numbers come from), and then subtracts legit app sales from those numbers to get the number of pirates. And while he says the numbers are lower than he expected, they seem pretty high to me: there is a substantial number of people out there using cracked apps.
App Store stats suggest humans have attention span of gnats
Did you put down Rolando after a mere 10 minutes of play time, never to touch it again? You're a cold, soulless person with nary a fun bone in your body, but you may not be alone. Pinch Media, whose analytics engine can be used to track the performance of participating iPhone apps, has found that merely 30 percent of people purchasing iPhone apps use them the next day, and free apps clock in at a miserable 20 percent. Over the long run, loyal users dwindle to just a single percent of downloaders -- and this is where it gets strange: free apps get used a whopping 6.6 times as often as paid apps, which may not bode well for devs looking to make a decent living off the App Store, Windows Marketplace, Ovi Store, Android Market, and the million other mobile software store initiatives coming up over the next year. It's likely a testament to the fact that your average free app is simpler (and possibly more indispensable day in and day out) than your average paid app -- which means we should all be paying $15 for tip calculators and $25 for speed dialers.
The keys to App Store success, courtesy of Pinch Media
Just about every conversation I have with an iPhone developer who's had any level of App Store success eventually (usually sooner rather than later) includes the question, "what worked for you?" I've been trying to distill some kind of pattern -- a sure-fire marketing tactic -- but there are just too many variables. There are the ones which developers can control (to some extent): the general timing of a release (give or take a month), pricing, quality, external promotion, and certain aspects of the marketing process. There are also variables beyond the developer's control, such as the review process, being featured on an App Store list, the existence and tactics of competitors, duplication and an array of shifting circumstances and bad behavior. What we need is more data, right?Pinch Media's Jesse Rohland & Greg Yardley, the gracious providers of some great App Store RSS feeds and developers of tools for iPhone app metrics, just published a slideshow (you can see it in the 2nd half of this post) which was presented at the New York iPhone Developers Meetup, sharing analysis of the data and trends they've been observing. Snazzy charts? Witty banter? Sound advice? Check, check and check. Whether you're curious about the effects of price drops, various usage stats for free versus paid apps or the mathematics of breaking even (maybe turning a profit?), statistical analysis could be your friend. I know, real friends are nicer and more helpful on moving day, but that's what you get for spending all your time writing iPhone applications in dimly-lit rooms. I kid, of course: enjoy the show ...
