Paying The Price On Android

Myke Hurley has an interesting take at why people don’t buy Android apps:

If apps are generally crappy looking or functioning, should users be more accustomed to paying little to nothing?

There certainly are an abundance of crappy apps. That doesn’t stop me from buying good apps.

Many people point to this blog post about Papermill, which is a nicely designed Android app for Instapaper. It says that since it didn’t sell well, Android users don’t want to pay for good apps. That’s not why I didn’t buy it. I didn’t because it didn’t strike me as a good app. It looks nicely designed, but it’s lacking many features from Instapaper. Instead, I spent my money on ReadItLater, back when it was a paid app. It does more, and looked good to boot.

I’d say the reason is a bit of a catch-22. Users don’t buy apps on Android, because developers don’t make good, featured apps. In turn, the apps aren’t developed because users don’t apps. Android users will spend their money on excellent apps.