Anyone else getting annoyed that apps come out as "Lumia" exclusives?

[Squatting Hen]

When I had my Titan II, I was upset. What I felt that Nokia should do, and should still do, is charge more for the apps on non Nokia devices until the exclusive period runs out. For example, if a game is $2.99 for a Nokia Phone, make it $4.99 for a non Nokia until the exlcusive period is over. As an HTC owner at the time, I would have been fine with that. Nokia is putting money into getting these apps out there, they should benefit in some way. I just don't agree that keeping them from other WP8 or WP7X devices is the right way to do it. Heck, they could make some additional cash this way.

 

[sravanv]

When I had my Titan II, I was upset. What I felt that Nokia should do, and should still do, is charge more for the apps on non Nokia devices until the exclusive period runs out. For example, if a game is $2.99 for a Nokia Phone, make it $4.99 for a non Nokia until the exlcusive period is over. As an HTC owner at the time, I would have been fine with that. Nokia is putting money into getting these apps out there, they should benefit in some way. I just don't agree that keeping them from other WP8 or WP7X devices is the right way to do it. Heck, they could make some additional cash this way.

It might be an issue of testing the devices. There's an internal cost to that and I don't believe their ultimate goal is to make money off of their apps. Rather, I think it's trying to convince people to purchase their handsets. It would be interesting to see whether they significantly profit off of their paid apps and if it's worth releasing those to non-Nokia phones early vs. the cost of having to test those apps on non-Nokia phones.

 

[vormison]

The way you got to view it is that you wouldn't be getting these things even if Nokia didn't exist. I'd vent your frustration to MS and Nokia seems to be attempting to fill the void with regular improvements, updates, and game releases.

 

[jlangner]

I would not have a problem with it if you could buy the 920 from all carriers...instead of just A$$ in US.

 

[cj-m]

Just curious, how many "nokia exclusives apps" are there compared to all the other Win 7.8/Win 8 apps?

 

[realwarder]

I'm not sure that exclusivity is helping Nokia... more generating resentment as the OP implies.

Users who don't have a WP do not find out in the store that Nokia have exclusives until they get home, at which point they're kind of annoyed.

It is good that Nokia are assisting vendors in getting games on the platform - not sure how much financially this is and how much is a promotional incentive, but I think it is in their best interest to release them for all phones so the platform as a whole grows... they are already have the lead phones and their own apps promote their platform well.

We need WP to grow more than just Nokia. Nokia will grow out of that. Nokia alone won't make it succeed as a platform.

 

[Residing]

I'm on board with sniffs and nbktonic (posts #1 and #6); manufacturer exclusive apps are not good for the ecosystem as a whole.

There's a lot of love for Nokia on this forum. I've seen several reasons backing up Nokia's stance: Nokia is doing it to promote their brand, Nokia is offering customers support beyond day-one purchase, other manufacturers are not supporting Windows as much, Nokia's funding is bringing some apps to WP sooner than independent developers could, Nokia is seemingly doing more for the WP app store than Microsoft itself, etc. All of these are strong, valid arguments. HOWEVER, the over-looked issue at play is that it is creating a fragmented experience that weakens the overall WP experience. EauRouge said it best:



Nokia's exclusivities are creating a two-tiered app store that inhibits WP from growing as a cohesive brand. Would I be buying a Lumia-phone, or a Windows phone? You don't see other manufactureres doing this. Apple would never offer iPhone 5 exclusive apps (beyond a technical requirement from the phone); you don't hear Samsung-only apps on the Google Play store; even BlackBerry says "if the phone can run it, you can have the app". As a company, Nokia may well live-or-die based on WP taking off. Especially considering the shrinking market share available after iOS/Android, WP needs more to create customer/brand-awareness, and a failing BlackBerry standpoint won't be enough for WP to carve out market share. As it is, WP is barely recognized in my neck of the woods, and Nokia-exclusive apps do little to promote WP. (Full Disclosure: I am a recent Samsung ATIV S purchaser who lives in BlackBerry's back yard (Waterloo, ON, Can.))

There are roughly 160 Xbox Live titles for WP, of which only 12 are Xbox Live games that Nokia funded, thus the Nokia exclusivity. Not sure how this ratio translates to a two tiered app store.

HTC and Samsung users have already received a HUGE gift from Nokia - Nokia Drive+, at no additional cost; yet, I really don't see, nor am I hearing much gratitude for receiving this gift. Without it, those services would have to be paid for (regardless of the amount) by HTC/Samsung users.

Really, the gripe should be towards other oems, and Microsoft. Leave Nokia alone!

 

[omniusovermind]

@sravanv
1. Dude. It IS fragmentation. Portico arrived months apart with different devices and different carriers all getting different update releases. That's not speculation. It happened. I have no idea how you are under the impression it didn't, but you obviously missed it

2. Your post, referring to your trust that all will be gold and nobody will ever release buggy apps and all their apps will be good and useful...man. Seriously? Either you're one incredibly easy going guy or you have no idea how quickly and easily every tech company around F's things up. It not only could happen, it does happen, all the time. Where have you been?

I'm not sure that exclusivity is helping Nokia... more generating resentment as the OP implies.

Users who don't have a WP do not find out in the store that Nokia have exclusives until they get home, at which point they're kind of annoyed.

Somebody give this man a prize because he just nailed it on the head. I can tell you right now how I would (may still) deal with this:

1. Go pick up an 8x or Ativ (because of BS exclusivity arrangements. Hassle #1)

2. Play with it for a while, see the lack of apps, find out about some lack of functions available on the big 2 find out about the bugs/defects etc etc but being forgiving say "ok no biggie, I knew this was new so I'll give it a chance."

3. Discover that Nokia has perk after perk, and get pissed off. Inevitably I know not only what MY reaction is going to be, but likely a lot of others:

4. F this. Return the device, go grab either an iPhone like every other average non-techie user usually does (hi marketshare, I'm waving to you), or if I am a tech-head, scoop up one of the mega-spec Androids that just came out and nerdgasm.

5. Snicker dismissively at the clever boy a few posts above who never managed to rebuttal my question next time I'm at the coffee shop about his 100k copycat apps and rapidly increasing irrelevancy. Maybe take a picture of his plight on Instagram. The two guys in those Rogers Mobility commercials over the last year comes to mind. (sorry, I couldn't resist the dig. He does deserve it though :grincry: ).

If you think that's not how it's going to pan out then suggest you revisit this thread in Q4 if they don't get their act together and do something about it. You know what the difference is between WP8 fragmented carrier updates and Android ones? You can get around carriers on Android by installing the most recent version yourself.

For the record, I'm not really upset with Nokia. I'm annoyed not only by MS for this state of affairs getting to be an issue (hello get a solid turn by turn nav app standalone it's 2013). But I'm pretty disgusted with some of the responses here. The best analogy I can think of is that It's like a certain few Nokia owners in this thread would get off on watching the entire house burn down just to spite their roommates if the smug and taunting remarks are any indication. Unbelievable. I've never seen that kind of behaviour on any platform. I don't know where you're getting this elitist attitude from boys, but I think you're in need of a delusion-stopping wakeup call regarding your placement in marketshare...

 

[falconrap]

I so seriously don't get the animosity towards Nokia over these apps. You get them in three months if you have a different manufacturer's phone. It's not like you don't ever get them. You folks can hem and haw about it all you want...but most of these would not be coming to your phones at all if not for Nokia throwing dollars and programmers at these developers. Eventually, WP will get enough users that they won't be pulling in many exclusives, if any, in the future, save their own in-house apps.

Why some of you don't understand this concept is beyond me.

 

[Olerius]

There are roughly 160 Xbox Live titles for WP, of which only 12 are Xbox Live games that Nokia funded, thus the Nokia exclusivity. Not sure how this ratio translates to a two tiered app store.

HTC and Samsung users have already received a HUGE gift from Nokia - Nokia Drive+, at no additional cost; yet, I really don't see, nor am I hearing much gratitude for receiving this gift. Without it, those services would have to be paid for (regardless of the amount) by HTC/Samsung users.

Really, the gripe should be towards other oems, and Microsoft. Leave Nokia alone!

"Two-tier" may be too strong of a description, but there is a definite have/have-not system in play.

My personal experience with Nokia exclusivity comes from things other than games; Nokia Transit, City Lens, etc. They're not blockbuster apps like Netflix or Facebook, but still apps of quality over and above most of the other independant-developer apps.These are programs that largely turned me onto Windows; I was expecting these apps to be available on all WP devices (though admittedly, calling a program Nokia "X" should have raised some flags). The difference between this and the aforementioned Andriod skins is that the skins do so little to differentiate the experience (and every manufacturuer has their own spin on it anyway) that they are near indistinguishable. (I was unaware of the gaming (non-)disparity, but thank you for bringing that up.)

I am NOT out to demonize Nokia. To their credit, they are doing more to enhance the WP app store significantly more than any other manufacturer, MS included. In my opinion, it would help the overall WP ecosystem to make their apps free (or at least discounted) to Lumia users, and charge a (small but fair) premium to other WP users (as an example). At least this way, non-Lumia users are aware of these services, rather than the "WP doesn't do that" or "I didn't know this was available until after I bought something else".

 

[mafu6]

My Lumia has frozen on me a few times but no where near as much my Nexus phones. It's a rare occasion, mainly when i have alot of apps running. Nokia are paying for these exclusive apps. They aren't exclusives for long, Samsung and HTC need to do the same. Nokia is a business that wants to make money. If by doing this exclusivity it helps them sell phones then they don't care who it offends. I totally agree it would be better to help battle Android and iOS but Nokia don't care about other OEM sales of WP8 as long as there products are bringing in the money.
Sent from my RM-821_eu_euro1_342 using Board Express

 

[Residing]

"Two-tier" may be too strong of a description, but there is a definite have/have-not system in play.

My personal experience with Nokia exclusivity comes from things other than games; Nokia Transit, City Lens, etc. They're not blockbuster apps like Netflix or Facebook, but still apps of quality over and above most of the other independant-developer apps.These are programs that largely turned me onto Windows; I was expecting these apps to be available on all WP devices (though admittedly, calling a program Nokia "X" should have raised some flags). The difference between this and the aforementioned Andriod skins is that the skins do so little to differentiate the experience (and every manufacturuer has their own spin on it anyway) that they are near indistinguishable. (I was unaware of the gaming (non-)disparity, but thank you for bringing that up.)

I am NOT out to demonize Nokia. To their credit, they are doing more to enhance the WP app store significantly more than any other manufacturer, MS included. In my opinion, it would help the overall WP ecosystem to make their apps free (or at least discounted) to Lumia users, and charge a (small but fair) premium to other WP users (as an example). At least this way, non-Lumia users are aware of these services, rather than the "WP doesn't do that" or "I didn't know this was available until after I bought something else".

But the apps you mentioned - Nokia City Lens, Nokia Transit - these were created by Nokia; not just for Nokia Lumia, but Nokia's Symbian and Meego Harmattan devices as well.

HTC and Samsung have apps that they've created and developed as well - the HTC Weather App (I don't know the formal name for it), for example. Obviously, creating unique apps is not beyond the scope for HTC or Samsung given that they have their own app hubs on their devices. Why they don't create more, is beyond me; still, it puzzles me why Nokia gets 'the bad rap' for innovating and taking initiative for creating apps and services for Nokia customer (and not competitors customers).

At the end of the day, Nokia should not be expected to give their apps to HTC/Samsung users - at cost or free; just as it is not expected that HTC or Samsung give their apps to other oems.

 

[omniusovermind]

My Lumia has frozen on me a few times but no where near as much my Nexus phones. It's a rare occasion, mainly when i have alot of apps running. Nokia are paying for these exclusive apps. They aren't exclusives for long, Samsung and HTC need to do the same. Nokia is a business that wants to make money. If by doing this exclusivity it helps them sell phones then they don't care who it offends. I totally agree it would be better to help battle Android and iOS but Nokia don't care about other OEM sales of WP8 as long as there products are bringing in the money.
Sent from my RM-821_eu_euro1_342 using Board Express

Yup very true. And also very short sighted. If Nokia made all of those apps available in the Store it would give impetus to wp8 in general. Considering that Nokia is a one horse show with this OS now... You can connect the dots for yourself.

 

[sravanv]

@sravanv
1. Dude. It IS fragmentation. Portico arrived months apart with different devices and different carriers all getting different update releases. That's not speculation. It happened. I have no idea how you are under the impression it didn't, but you obviously missed it

2. Your post, referring to your trust that all will be gold and nobody will ever release buggy apps and all their apps will be good and useful...man. Seriously? Either you're one incredibly easy going guy or you have no idea how quickly and easily every tech company around F's things up. It not only could happen, it does happen, all the time. Where have you been?

1. Is that because of Nokia's exclusive apps? You seemed to allude to the fact that what minimal fragmentation is occurring because of Nokia's exclusive apps. That's what this whole thread is about right? Re-read my post. I didn't say anything about fragmentation NOT occurring. I simply said it doesn't occur because of Nokia's exclusive apps lol. If you truly think that's the case then you're sorely mistaken. Portico came out for HTC 8x on T-Mo first and was followed by Lumia 920 and 820 on ATT. Sooo....yeah I don't see why you even brought up fragmentation in the first place.

2. As for Nokia's exclusive apps, you seemed to miss my point...again. You were essentially stating that Nokia would develop sub par apps and everyone would freak. My point was that if that's the case, EVERYONE does that. Is there any evidence that Nokia does it more? Should it stop anybody from ever developing apps ever? You act as if it's exclusive for companies to mess up on apps. Newsflash, everyone does and all companies do.

 

[KoukiFC3S]

Had the Lumia 920 before my 8X. I don't really miss any of the exclusive apps.

 

[omniusovermind]

1. Is that because of Nokia's exclusive apps? You seemed to allude to the fact that what minimal fragmentation is occurring because of Nokia's exclusive apps. That's what this whole thread is about right? Re-read my post. I didn't say anything about fragmentation NOT occurring. I simply said it doesn't occur because of Nokia's exclusive apps lol. If you truly think that's the case then you're sorely mistaken. Portico came out for HTC 8x on T-Mo first and was followed by Lumia 920 and 820 on ATT. Sooo....yeah I don't see why you even brought up fragmentation in the first place.

2. As for Nokia's exclusive apps, you seemed to miss my point...again. You were essentially stating that Nokia would develop sub par apps and everyone would freak. My point was that if that's the case, EVERYONE does that. Is there any evidence that Nokia does it more? Should it stop anybody from ever developing apps ever? You act as if it's exclusive for companies to mess up on apps. Newsflash, everyone does and all companies do.

Not sure if cereal..

 

[sravanv]

Not sure if cereal..

Good overused comeback. I'll go ahead and assume that you don't have anything of value to say, just like the rest of your posts on this thread.

 

[TechnoJoe]

People complaining about App exclusivity don't know the first thing about running a business. These are the same folks crying about Carrier exclusivity, and how much it is hurting the platform. All in all, these complaints are from a small group of malcontents basically jealous of the phones/apps they don't have. The fact of the matter is, the biggest ding on WP8 is the lack of apps. Nokia has stepped up to do even more than Microsoft regarding this issue and if they want to leverage that into short term exclusivity then that is a SMART business move. If it hadn't been for Nokia's efforts in the app space, (not to mention the hardware space) we may already have a dead platform. They aren't hurting the platform, they are helping it, while other OEMs have simply put windows phones in android bodies, while devoting very little time, money, or efforts into improving the biggest downfall of the platform.

 

[Huime]

1. Is that because of Nokia's exclusive apps? You seemed to allude to the fact that what minimal fragmentation is occurring because of Nokia's exclusive apps. That's what this whole thread is about right? Re-read my post. I didn't say anything about fragmentation NOT occurring. I simply said it doesn't occur because of Nokia's exclusive apps lol. If you truly think that's the case then you're sorely mistaken. Portico came out for HTC 8x on T-Mo first and was followed by Lumia 920 and 820 on ATT. Sooo....yeah I don't see why you even brought up fragmentation in the first place.

2. As for Nokia's exclusive apps, you seemed to miss my point...again. You were essentially stating that Nokia would develop sub par apps and everyone would freak. My point was that if that's the case, EVERYONE does that. Is there any evidence that Nokia does it more? Should it stop anybody from ever developing apps ever? You act as if it's exclusive for companies to mess up on apps. Newsflash, everyone does and all companies do.

Why it is so hard for people to understand OS and drivers are two things? And the so called portico update is actually a convenient package of OS+drivers?
Looking back at HTC One's launch how hard is to understand that HTC got their hands full right after the launch of 8XS? You can blame HTC for sloppy resource distribution strategy, but blaming Nokia really makes no sense at all.

 

[falconrap]

Just to put some additional perspective on this, Nokia is the reason I became drawn to Windows Phone in the first place. I had a couple of Nokia phones when I was with Aerial (pre-T-Mobile buyout) and those phones were built like tanks and were great. Better than the two Moto phones I had when I switched to Alltel, and on par with the BB 8330 I had just before the merger with Verizon. Too me the WP7 interface was too boring and I didn't care for the gap to the right on the start screen (yes...I know its purpose). But the Lumia 900 was enough to turn my head and get me interested. Being on webOS since early 2010 has made it kind of hard to want to go to Android or iOS. The new flexibility in WP8 changed that, but my interest still would have been "meh?" without Nokia.

To put it bluntly, as others have noted, this platform would probably be dead if Nokia hadn't jumped on board when they did. Nokia made a lot of converts with their designs. I like the HTC 8X, but I don't like the narrow aspect screen, nor the very muted colors on the display (at least the ones I have seen - may be some adjustment makes it better). The 920 hooked me fully, but even the 822 will be able to get my business when my upgrade comes in in a few more weeks. Being able to get developers to develop apps that likely would not have come to this platform has been a huge added bonus. Nokia is working hard to make this platform succeed. Will they become the Samsung of Windows Phone? Probably. But there are still others making phones for Android, so competition is still there. I don't see HTC leaving WP anytime soon, so be happy that you will get these exclusive apps in 3 months instead of a year or two, or never.