Piracy of Android apps pushing devs to Wp?

[Kredrian]

I came across this article saying that because of rampant piracy of Android apps, it could lead developers to Wp. What I wonder, is piracy that prevalent with Android, or is the Wp model just superior to it, or are there just not enough apps yet to bother with pirating them?

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[Jazmac]

You don't have to pay for 80 percent of what is popular and available for android and the other 20 percent is just a google search away.

 

[Kredrian]

Wow. Its been something like a year and a half since I used an Android phone, and I did not have many apps. I just felt most were poorly done.

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[ErikWithNoC]

Piracy is actually pretty big with Windows Phone as well. If you look around enough you can actually find programs that will download any paid application from the Marketplace and sideload it onto your device. This requires your phone to be either fully unlocked or interop unlocked, but yeah, piracy is a problem with iOS, Android, and WP7.

 

[tekhna]

1995 called, they want their story back!
"This just in, software piratable"

It's huge on iOS too. Cydia is enormous, as is the number of iOS apps you find on Demonoid for jailbroken phones.

Edit: Not that Cydia=piracy, but it has something like 5 million users, which means all 5 million users could pirate apps if they wanted to.

 

[anon(5335877)]

Yeah, but isn't it easier with Android? You just need to allow apps from third parties to be installed, while iOS requires a jailbreak and WP requires an unlock?

Also, aren't Android users reluctant to pay for apps? Instead many usually settle for ad versions?

 

[ErikWithNoC]

Yeah, but isn't it easier with Android? You just need to allow apps from third parties to be installed, while iOS requires a jailbreak and WP requires an unlock?

Also, aren't Android users reluctant to pay for apps? Instead many usually settle for ad versions?

I guess you could argue that it is easier to pirate apps for Android because you don't need to jailbreak, but I would say this: If someone is set on not paying for apps jailbreaking will not prevent them from doing so. Jailbreaking takes all of about 5 mins if even and then you can pirate apps all day long. Even though you don't have to jailbreak/root your Android device to pirate apps, the common user isn't going to go find the download links/websites that host those files and go through the process of downloading them.

Where did you hear that Android users are reluctant to pay for apps? That seems like a ridiculous claim. I mean people in general don't want to pay for apps so if they want to play Angry Birds with ads rather then pay .99 cents to get rid of them then so be it, at least Android (does iOS have an ad version?) gives them that choice. Also there are many Android devices that are marketed at demographics without as much dispensable income so those people are less likely to buy apps when they have a version with ads instead.

 

[tekhna]

Yeah, but isn't it easier with Android? You just need to allow apps from third parties to be installed, while iOS requires a jailbreak and WP requires an unlock?

Also, aren't Android users reluctant to pay for apps? Instead many usually settle for ad versions?

Yeah, you just check a box in a menu. But it's not much harder on iPhone, Absinthe .4 is one-click, I believe.

 

[anon(5335877)]

I guess you could argue that it is easier to pirate apps for Android because you don't need to jailbreak, but I would say this: If someone is set on not paying for apps jailbreaking will not prevent them from doing so. Jailbreaking takes all of about 5 mins if even and then you can pirate apps all day long. Even though you don't have to jailbreak/root your Android device to pirate apps, the common user isn't going to go find the download links/websites that host those files and go through the process of downloading them.

Where did you hear that Android users are reluctant to pay for apps? That seems like a ridiculous claim. I mean people in general don't want to pay for apps so if they want to play Angry Birds with ads rather then pay .99 cents to get rid of them then so be it, at least Android (does iOS have an ad version?) gives them that choice. Also there are many Android devices that are marketed at demographics without as much dispensable income so those people are less likely to buy apps when they have a version with ads instead.

I understand that the simple process of jailbreaking will not stop users who are determined to pirate apps, but it may at least stop some people who don't understand jailbreaking and are afraid of it. Like people who think jailbreaking can brick their phone, or that Apple will find out, that jailbreaking will affect battery life, etc.

I believe I read an article that was talking about a study or something like that. I'll try to look for it.

And maybe reluctant wasn't the best word, but more like users will choose an ad version rather than buying the app and supporting the developer. You're right though, during the time I owned an iPhone, most Apple apps didn't have a "free with full functionality but has ads" alternative.

EDIT:
These are about a year old, but they were definitely around the time that I remember reading the article.

http://www.phonearena.com/news/Most-paid-apps-in-Android-Market-get-under-100-downloads_id19148
http://www.readwriteweb.com/mobile/2011/05/new-report-examines-download-volume-on-android-market.php
http://www.androidguys.com/2011/02/09/paid-apps-pay-150k-month/

The last one is a nice example though of how some paid apps can still make quite a bit of money on Android.

 

[tekhna]

I understand that the simple process of jailbreaking will not stop users who are determined to pirate apps, but it may at least stop some people who don't understand jailbreaking and are afraid of it. Like people who think jailbreaking can brick their phone, or that Apple will find out, that jailbreaking will affect battery life, etc.

Maybe, maybe not. When you check the box in Android it gives you a big huge scary warning that probably would deter a casual user. Something like 10% of US iphones and 1/3 of Chinese iphones are jailbroken, which is hardly an insignificant number.

I'd say piracy is a problem for both platforms, with the slight edge to Android.

If you check here, it appears the number of torrents is the same, but there are more seeders for Android. But there are whole huge other sites devoted exclusively iOS piracy.

Torrent list - Demonoid

Torrent list - Demonoid

 

[anon(5335877)]

Maybe, maybe not. When you check the box in Android it gives you a big huge scary warning that probably would deter a casual user. Something like 10% of US iphones and 1/3 of Chinese iphones are jailbroken, which is hardly an insignificant number.

I'd say piracy is a problem for both platforms, with the slight edge to Android.

If you check here, it appears the number of torrents is the same, but there are more seeders for Android. But there are whole huge other sites devoted exclusively iOS piracy.

Torrent list - Demonoid

Torrent list - Demonoid

Good point. Piracy is definitely a problem for both platforms.

 

[ErikWithNoC]

Good point. Piracy is definitely a problem for both platforms.

Pretty much this. Every single computing platform has piracy if you look hard enough (PS3, Xbox 360, iOS, Android, Nintendo Wii, PSP, etc etc etc). Windows Phone isn't an exception either. From what I know, that program actually works for all paid apps unless a developer codes some type of protection into their app (not quite sure where I heard this or its validity) which would be a huuuuge problem. Technically speaking, the program already is a huge problem because it doesn't require anyone to upload a file anywhere, it literally just downloads the paid version from the marketplace for free, cracks it, and sideloads it onto your device.

 

[jimski]

Piracy is actually pretty big with Windows Phone as well. If you look around enough you can actually find programs that will download any paid application from the Marketplace and sideload it onto your device. This requires your phone to be either fully unlocked or interop unlocked, but yeah, piracy is a problem with iOS, Android, and WP7.

And that's why devices not updated to Mango will no longer be able to use Marketplace as of May. New security provisions have been built in to WP apps for quite some time now and once the deadline for updating to Mango passes, Microsoft will throw the switch and no more access to their servers (which all apps need to pass through) for pirated apps. Enjoy it while you can.


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[ErikWithNoC]

And that's why devices not updated to Mango will no longer be able to use Marketplace as of May. New security provisions have been built in to WP apps for quite some time now and once the deadline for updating to Mango passes, Microsoft will throw the switch and no more access to their servers (which all apps need to pass through) for pirated apps. Enjoy it while you can.


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Cool stuff. I like how you implied I use it when I have a Nokia Lumia 900 that doesn't have the ability to be interop unlocked. Also, thats not the only method of getting apps for free. Moral of story: There are pirated apps for every platform

 

[CommonBlob]

Piracy is a problem, i sometimes check that my app isn't being pirated at a few places. I did find it on a chinese site with hundreds of people downloading it. Thankfully that was an older version and I flagged the download site with whoever was hosting it.

It will always be there for all platforms. But from my experience it is worst on Android and iPhone.

 

[jimski]

Cool stuff. I like how you implied I use it when I have a Nokia Lumia 900 that doesn't have the ability to be interop unlocked. Also, thats not the only method of getting apps for free. Moral of story: There are pirated apps for every platform

Sorry if I hurt your feelings. And I implied nothing of the sort. True, all platforms have pirated apps. But WP has fewer avenues for access, and Microsoft is working aggressively to close those roads. Devs should be comforted by that.

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[Kredrian]

1995 called, they want their story back!
"This just in, software piratable"

It's huge on iOS too. Cydia is enormous, as is the number of iOS apps you find on Demonoid for jailbroken phones.

Edit: Not that Cydia=piracy, but it has something like 5 million users, which means all 5 million users could pirate apps if they wanted to.

Yes, I am well aware, the point of my question was do you think its is bad enough that it is actually pushing Devs to Windows Phone because of it...

 

[sting7k]

I guess you could argue that it is easier to pirate apps for Android because you don't need to jailbreak, but I would say this: If someone is set on not paying for apps jailbreaking will not prevent them from doing so. Jailbreaking takes all of about 5 mins if even and then you can pirate apps all day long. Even though you don't have to jailbreak/root your Android device to pirate apps, the common user isn't going to go find the download links/websites that host those files and go through the process of downloading them.

Where did you hear that Android users are reluctant to pay for apps? That seems like a ridiculous claim. I mean people in general don't want to pay for apps so if they want to play Angry Birds with ads rather then pay .99 cents to get rid of them then so be it, at least Android (does iOS have an ad version?) gives them that choice. Also there are many Android devices that are marketed at demographics without as much dispensable income so those people are less likely to buy apps when they have a version with ads instead.

I would probably need at least a dozen hands to count all the people who have told me; "I will never pay for an app." The vast majority of the people who said that were Android users.

 

[keyboardP]

Whether or not it's due to piracy is one thing, but there's a trend that shows Android users tend not to want to download paid apps. The info was released during the Google/Oracle trial. Although it was July 2010 data, Google only generated $3.8m from paid apps and $158.9m from ad-based apps (and Google expected that gap to increase). Considering the marketshare, even in 2010, and the number of apps, it doesn't look great for paid apps in its current state. Is this because of piracy, or just users not wanting to pay? Hard to say but it might discourage some developers.