John August

Bronson

Bronson Watermarker, rebooted

Apps, Bronson

We have a new app out today: [Bronson Watermarker PDF](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/bronson/).

Bronson Watermarker PDF screenshot

It’s in the Mac App Store, and [50% off through Sunday, June 8th](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker-pdf/id881629098?mt=12).

The new Bronson features a stripped-down UI that indicates where we think Mac app design is headed. Many buttons have lost their edges, relying on color and context to indicate their clickability. Title bars are integrated into the window. Animations take the place of progress bars. ((WWDC is Monday, so we’ll know soon which of our guesses were correct.))

You can see more [screenshots here](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker-pdf/id881629098?mt=12).

The changes are more than cosmetic. Bronson has new features to protect screenplays and other documents, including password encryption and invisible watermarks.

Bronson Watermarker was our first Mac app, [released January 2012](http://johnaugust.com/2012/introducing-bronson-watermarker). It was deliberately minimalist: one list field, five watermark styles, one checkbox. Over time, we added a button to change the font and opacity, but the app remained essentially unchanged.

It also remained kind of ugly.

Of all our apps, Bronson was starting to feel like the odd duck. It sold well, and we got appreciative emails from people who used it daily. But we weren’t proud of it.

So we took two weeks to remake it. From pixels to code, it’s an entirely new app, with almost nothing carried over from the original. We added in the features users wanted most (passwords, saved lists, better customization) and removed things that never fit quite right (image watermarking, line burn).

Removing features is a tough thing. You end up with a better, more-focused app, but users can argue that it’s a downgrade. The Mac App Store makes it especially difficult, because it replaces the original app with the new version. For almost everyone, the new Bronson is a much better app — unless you really liked what we used to do with JPGs. ((It’s easy to see this conundrum with word processors and screenwriting software, which get bloated with rarely-used features. Most users wouldn’t know if you removed these vestigial bits — but some users rely on them. When was the last time you used Mail Merge? For most people, never. For some, three times since lunch.))

In the end, we decided to make a clean break, shipping the new version as a new app and appending PDF to the name. This let us increase the minimum OS requirements and move it from the Productivity category to Business, where it really belongs. It also means users of the old Bronson can keep their app, or choose to switch to the new one.

Through June 8th, everyone gets the [upgrade price of $15](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker-pdf/id881629098?mt=12). After that, it’s $30.

Just to keep things even, [Highland](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12) and unlimited library for [Weekend Read](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weekend-read/id502725173?mt=8) are also 50% off through June 8th.

Me on Mac Power Users

Apps, Bronson, Weekend Read

I’m the guest on the new episode of the [Mac Power Users podcast](http://www.macpowerusers.com/2014/05/04/mac-power-users-190-workflows-with-john-august/).

I talk with David Sparks and Katie Floyd about my writing workflow, the Scriptnotes podcast, and the apps [my company](http://quoteunquoteapps.com) makes. Along the way, we discuss Bates numbering, CodeRunner, David Wain and MacWEEK.

It’s interesting being a guest on someone else’s podcast, particularly a show that’s not about writing per se. David uses [Bronson Watermarker](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/bronson/) a lot, one of our apps that appeals to users who will never open a screenplay. It’s easy to forget that I live in a bubble of 12-pt Courier Prime.

Making the App Store better

Apps, Bronson, FDX Reader, Highland, Weekend Read

Roughly this time last year, I wrote about how the App Store encourages [topping the charts and racing to the bottom](http://johnaugust.com/2013/topping-the-charts-and-racing-to-the-bottom), and how that hurts both developers and users.

David Smith has compiled a list of recommendations for [making the App Store experience better](http://david-smith.org/blog/2014/04/16/towards-a-better-app-store/). I especially agree with several of his suggestions:

> 1: Apps should be required to pass approval on an ongoing basis.

I’d go further and say that if an app has had no activity for a set number of months, it automatically gets de-listed. I suspect more than half of the apps in the store are effectively zombies, abandoned by their creators. These apps’ only function is to clutter up search results.

> 6: Make the process of applying for a refund clear and straightforward.

> Right now you go to reportaproblem.apple.com and then fill in a form. I’d love to see this integrated into the App Store app itself. Perhaps even into the Purchased Apps area.

Roughly 10% of our support emails are from people who really should just get a refund because they bought an app without really understanding what it did. We have a boilerplate email that walks them through the process of applying for a refund, but there’s no reason it needs to be so complicated.

I think prices for some apps could easily and appropriately rise if customers understood they could get their money back if unsatisfied.

> 11: Make the rating scale a rolling, weighted average rather than just current version, at least soon after updates.

We update our apps very frequently, sometimes twice a month. Each time we do, our ratings drop back to zero, effectively punishing us for improving the app.

A rolling, weighted average would better reflect not only how satisfied users are with the current version, but with the product overall.

In the iOS App Store, our products are [Weekend Read](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weekend-read/id502725173?mt=8) and [FDX Reader](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/fdx-reader/id437362569?mt=8). FDX Reader is old — it hasn’t been updated in a year — but we’re keeping it around until the iPad version of Weekend Read.

By my criteria, should FDX Reader be dropped from the store? I don’t know. It still sells, and we haven’t gotten a support email for it in months, so users are apparently satisfied with it. But if we got a warning email from Apple saying it needed to be updated or face de-listing, we’d pay attention. More than anything, that’s what a regular review process would achieve: making developers take another look at their old apps.

For iOS, we also have the [Scriptnotes](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/scriptnotes/id739117984?mt=8) app, but it’s made by [Wizzard Media](https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/wizzard-media/id318848960?mt=8). We release it under the Quote-Unquote label only so we can track downloads.

In the Mac App Store, our products are [Highland](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12) and [Bronson Watermarker](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bronson-watermarker/id481867513?mt=12). If you look at the current Bronson reviews, there’s a one-star review from a customer who couldn’t figure out the app. He didn’t write us for support; he didn’t check any online documentation. He’s exactly the kind of user who should have been able to click a button and get a refund.

I hope at this year’s WWDC, we’ll see Apple taking some of Smith’s suggestions to make the App Store experience better.

Topping the charts and racing to the bottom

Apps, Bronson, FDX Reader, Fountain, Highland

Next week is WWDC, the annual developers’ conference at which Apple reveals all the shiny new goodness they have planned for app makers. Like everyone, I’m anticipating new looks and new APIs. What I’m not expecting is what I’d really like to see: some major changes to the App Store.

As someone who sells apps, I’d love near-real-time sales reports, link tracking and better management of promo codes.

But what I want most is for Apple to get rid of the charts.

The App Store’s best-sellers lists hurt shoppers, developers and Apple. The charts create a vicious circle that encourages shitty business models and system-gaming. They’re a relic of a time when data was scarce. They should go away.

Marco Arment [thinks so too](http://www.marco.org/2013/05/10/tire-kickers):

> Abolishing the “top” lists from all App Store interfaces and exclusively showing editorially selected apps in browsing screens would do a hell of a lot more than trials to promote healthy app economics and the creation of high-quality software.

Having been through the App Store experience with [Bronson Watermarker](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/bronson/), [Highland](http://quoteunquoteapps.com/highland/), [FDX Reader](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/fdx-reader/id437362569?mt=8) and [two](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/karateka/id560927460?mt=8) [variations](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/karateka-classic/id636777828?mt=8) of Karateka, I think Arment’s on the right track. But editorial curation is only part of the solution. Apple can and should use sales data to help steer buyers towards apps they’ll like. It just has to be smarter about it.

##How charts hurt consumers

Since most people are app-buyers, let’s start there.

These lists — a sidebar in iTunes, a tab on the App Store — show what’s downloaded the most. But let’s not mistake downloads for popularity. These are apps that people may have downloaded, used once, then deleted. What you really want is a list that shows what apps that *people like you* are using and enjoying. That’s the kind of information that companies like Amazon and Netflix are terrific at leveraging.

Apple makes some attempt at this in their Genius tab, which tries to find correlations based on what other apps you have installed, but I’ve never found it useful. Just because I have one to-do app doesn’t mean I’m looking for five more. (In fact, I’m probably less likely to buy another to-do app if I have one I’m using regularly.)

Consider Netflix. Netflix will show you “What’s Popular,” but it’s not a ranked list. Rather, it shows you things you might be interested in, either because of overall popularity or its own internal algorithms that calculate your preferences. Search for flashlights on Amazon and it will show you flashlights sorted based on whatever formula their data suggests will most likely result in you buying a flashlight.

That’s not how the App Store does it. Apple shows you a list of what freemium games teenagers downloaded. It’s not showing you the best games, or the most-liked games. It’s showing you what’s at the top of the charts — and because these games are at the top of the charts, they’re likely to stay there.

##How charts hurt developers

The most popular paid apps are almost always the cheapest apps, which fosters a race to the bottom. Yes, you can set your price higher — and [maybe should](http://www.tuaw.com/2013/04/01/detailed-look-at-pricing-an-app-for-the-mac-app-store/) — but since the charts are one of the only ways to get visibility on the App Store, there’s a strong incentive to go low for exposure.

Let’s say your app is priced at $10, and you sell 100 per week. Cutting your price to $5, you discover that you sell 200 per week. Cutting your price to $1, you sell 1000 per week. ((I’m making up these numbers. In reality, I’ve found price elasticity to be all over the place with the apps I’ve sold.)) In each case, you’ve made $1000. You’re making just as much money at each price point, but the $1 app would chart much, much higher in the App Store.

For that reason alone, you might pick that price even though you now have ten times the customers to support. By pricing it for the masses, you’re dealing with the masses.

Apple has tried to address the situation by adding a third list, Top Grossing, which should in theory reward the apps that sold fewer copies at a higher price. In reality, the Top Grossing iOS apps are the games with lots of consumable in-app purchases. ((On the Mac, Top Grossing does favor more-expensive apps, although Apple’s own software dominates the top of the list.))

Partly because the top-sellers lists are public information, developers feel themselves pushed to keep lowering their prices for fear of a competitor undercutting them.

That happened to us with Bronson Watermarker. We started out priced at $9.99. Three weeks later, a near-clone entered the App Store at $4.99. Does that mean we were priced too high? Or were they priced too low?

We ultimately raised our price to $14.99, while they’ve essentially abandoned their app, so my hunch is they discovered there wasn’t enough money to be made at their price.

But what if cutting the price isn’t enough to climb the charts? Developers can use [outside services like Chartboost](http://blog.chartboost.com/post/4345825883/powerful-strategy-appstore-charts):

> However, when you combine **volume with time**, then that’s where you start cracking the secret formula. If you can get high volume of installs over a short period of time, your app gets noticed and starts climbing the charts.

Most people don’t realize there’s a whole parallel industry devoted to the App Store charts. Apple could get rid of it by removing one button.

What would go in place of that “Top Charts” button? Maybe “Favorites,” with a custom-generated list of popular and well-liked apps tailored to the user. Maybe promote the “Staff Picks” section to its own spot. Hell, let’s dump “Genius” and put in both.

Should developers get to see the best-sellers chart? I think not.

I know it sounds weird to argue for less transparency, but I’d rather have more data about how my own apps are selling than a ranked list of everyone else’s. Charts encourage developers to focus on competitors rather than customers. So get rid of ’em.

I doubt Apple will announce anything like this at next week’s WWDC. But I think developers would get more out of this change than anything Apple will introduce at the conference.