Productivity Apps and Subscription Pricing

Day One, the best diary app for iOS and Mac is transitioning to a subscription model and they are taking a beating for it. Gabe Weatherhead wrote a post about this and I agree with every word.

I spoke with a developer friend that makes legal-related apps. He explained the transition of his app to a subscription model as a last resort to keep the lights on but also “the worst two months of my life”. This new app economy has been particularly rough on quality productivity apps. Those apps take a lot of time and attention to do right while at the same time consumers are not used to paying subscriptions for them. Nevertheless, that is probably the best model available to them at this point.

My fear, as someone who really likes quality productivity apps is that all this will end up driving productivity apps out of business.

Being friends with (and representing) app developers for years, I can tell you this also has had a chilling effect on productivity app development. I know several app developers that had a great idea for a productivity app but didn’t pursue it because it’s “too hard to make money” in that space.

The traditional model for productivity apps was the upgrade price, where developers released a new version every year or so and everyone paid a reduced fee upgrade price. I know the App Store has made improvements over the last few years but, having zero inside knowledge, I can’t help but feel we will never see upgrade pricing in the App Store. In the meantime expect more quality apps to go to the subscription model and, if they are apps you love (or even like), I’d encourage you to support them through the transition.

Forces of Destiny Focuses on Girl Power in Star Wars

Starting this week Lucasfilm is releasing Star Wars Forces of Destiny, a 2D animated web series by Lucasfilm Animation series getting distributed on YouTube. The first episode is below. The series centers on female characters across multiple eras and installments of the franchise. Episodes are two to three minutes each and eight will be released in July 2017 with an additional eight will be released in fall 2017.

There are some heavy hitters behind this series starting with developer Dave Filoni, who has led Lucasfilm Animation for years. The original actresses from the movies will voice their characters in the series including Ashley Eckstein, Felicity Jones, Vanessa Marshall, Daisy Ridley and more. The series narrator will be Oscar winner (and voice of Maz Kanata) Lupita Nyong’o. Having a daughter that loves Star Wars, I’m really happy Lucasfilm is giving her more stories from her favorite Star Wars characters.

Manage Email Attachments with SaneBox (Sponsor)




This week MacSparky is sponsored by SaneBox, the powerful email tool that can help you conquer your inbox. I’ve written before about SaneBox filtering, which is awesome. However, SaneBox smart filtering is just the beginning. SaneBox can also sort your inbox, keep track of reminders and snoozed emails, rescue email from your spam folder, upload attachments your cloud, and more.

It’s that attachment part that I’d like to focus on today. SaneAttachments allow you to say goodbye to bulky attachments and hello to automatic uploads to the cloud. With SaneAttachments enabled, SaneBox will monitor your inbox. When someone sends you a large attachment, SaneBox will save it automatically to your destination of choice. (I use Dropbox.) This allows you to keep the size of your email database down and gives you a reliable place to go find large attachment. If you like to automate, this gives you another avenue into Hazel. For instance, I have Hazel monitor the Dropbox folder where SaneBox puts attachments. If it sees something land there that matches a Hazel rule, Hazel will automatically rename and file it. This is all very powerful and just one more feature you get with the SaneBox account.

SaneBox is a great service that I use every day to manage my email. You should too. To learn more and over to SaneBox.com and check it out. MacSparky readers even get a discount.

See Me at the CMD-D Conference




When Sal Soghoian left Apple I explained to friends that I was sad to see such a great advocate leave Apple but also happy to know we’d get more of Sal’s feedback and help in the community. We can already see the effects of his collaboration with the Omni Group.

If that’s not enough, Sal’s also organizing a conference on Mac and iOS automation, CMD-D, to be held on August 9, 2017 in Santa Clara. 

Today’s news is that I’ll be one of the speakers. Specifically, I’ll be covering iOS Automation, focussing primarily on Workflow for iOS. I think this conference will be a lot of fun. If you’re planning on attending, please look me up.

 

10 Years with iPhone


I did some traveling this week and that gave me an opportunity to observe a lot of people making their way through airports. Travel is just one more thing that has been revolutionized by the iPhone. When Apple released a touch screen computer that fits in your pocket, they changed the world.

I think a bit of this story that people miss is that it really took Apple to make this work. Apple’s engineering talent and user interface designers built a transformative bit of electronic gadgetry that I don’t think anyone else could have made and changed … well … everything.

I went back and read my comically bad review of the original iPhone from 2007. Most interesting for me was that I’d forgotten about several of my problems with the original iPhone. The device was limited and missing a lot of the features in phones of the day. I think the reason I didn’t remember so many of those original problems is because the iPhone was so good at the limited features it had. I vividly remember sliding to unlock, sending emails and viewing attachments on that screen, looking at maps on my phone, and … best of all … using Safari. If you’d ever attempted to access the Internet with any mobile phone made before the iPhone, you’d understand exactly how special the original iPhone was.

I don’t know if Apple will ever have another world-changing product like the iPhone. Indeed, I don’t know if any consumer electronic company will make something that changes the wold as much as the iPhone did. 10 years can feel like a lot of time. It also can feel like the blink of an eye. The iPhone has come so far in the past 10 years. Can you imagine what it will be like 10 years from now?

iPhone JD’s 12.9″ iPad Review

I enjoyed reading Jeff Richardson’s iPad review.

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“The second generation iPad Pro is better than the first generation iPad Pro in the ways that matter most for attorneys using an iPad to get work done — how the screen looks, how fast and responsive the system is, and how it works with the Apple Pencil.”
— Jeff Richardson, iPhone JD

I’ve been using the new 10.5 inch iPad exclusively since I received it but I have occasionally missed the big one, which is particularly good for contract reviews and sheet music. I’m going to continue using the small one exclusively for a few weeks to see exactly how much I miss the big one. Right now I’m leaning toward keeping (but not upgrading) my 12.9 inch iPad for those special times where it makes sense and working primarily from my 10.5.

SummerFest Software Discounts


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Every summer, several of the premier Mac App Developers pull together with sales of their products, called SummerFest. This year’s SummerFest lineup is impressive including, among others, Tinderbox, Nisus Writer, Scrivener, PDFpen, DEVONthink, and HoudahSpot. There’s even more and they all are 25% off. The whole thing ends in a few days so if you’re interested, now’s the time.

MPU 383 – Teddy Svoronos Is Back




MPU Episode 383 is up. This week Harvard lecturer Teddy Svoronos comes back and there is lots of nerdy goodness in this one. Harvard Lecturer Teddy Svronos returns to talk about how he’s using his Mac and iOS devices for giving presentations, some very clever iOS automation techniques, and academic writing. Finally, we fall into the music rabit hole at the end and share some of our favorite apps for making music.

Here’s Teddy’s Number’s Sheet Mentioned in the Show

 

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  • Sanebox Stop drowning in email!
  • The Omni Group We’re passionate about productivity for Mac, iPhone and iPad.