OS and Software > All Things Macintosh > How Apple Gets All the Good Apps (Mossberg)

How Apple Gets All the Good Apps (Mossberg)

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How Apple Gets All the Good Apps
Published on March 12, 2013
by Walt Mossberg

Apple tightly controls its software and hardware, and is fiercely competitive in battling its rivals, especially in the mobile market. And yet, while the company never creates apps for anyone else’s mobile system or device, each of its major mobile-platform foes — Google, Amazon and Microsoft — make many of their apps available for Apple devices. That makes those devices the sort of Switzerlands of the mobile world.

If you buy an iPhone or iPad, you get Apple-written mobile apps and services like Siri, iMessage, iWork, iPhoto and FaceTime, which aren’t available on other phones and tablets. But you can get first-class versions of competitors’ official apps.

While there are no versions of Apple apps for other mobile platforms, its iOS platform draws many apps from rivals.
So, iPhone and iPad users who prefer apps from other big mobile-platform makers don’t have to switch to an Android or Windows Phone or an Amazon tablet. They have access right on their Apple devices to major apps from these competing platforms. But people with non-Apple mobile devices can’t get Apple’s mobile apps and services.

This is obviously a lopsided situation in Apple’s favor. But it stems from the different business models of the big rivals. Google, Microsoft and Amazon are primarily software and services companies, though each makes some mobile hardware (Google through its Motorola subsidiary). But Apple, while famous for making good software, sells that software almost entirely through iconic and expensive hardware, from which it makes the vast majority of its money...

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TLDR version - author never says anything about it

reply to haroldo
Apple got all the good apps for years for the same reason Nintendo had all the best games during the Nes and Snes era and Sony had the best games for the ps1 and ps2: Marketshare.

And that is changing now, pretty much all of the best apps can be found on android and ios. The author needs to learn econ 101, and stop making apple puff pieces that praise apple while never telling you why Apple gets the apps.

reply to haroldo
So I can get Google Sky Map for iPhone now,.......?

reply to haroldo
Yup, you get Siri

reply to haroldo
For me I can usually find an app that does some Task A on both platforms but on Android the app will suck and be a crash happy mess while the iOS app is more likely to be polished. Of course there are many exceptions to this...I've see plenty of clunkers on iOS too but simply not the nearly the same percentage as I've seen with Android. Thankfully Google Play's refund policy is stellar so if you buy a crap Android app, who cares, claim your refund and try the next crash happy app. Get a clunker on iOS and you are pretty much screwed out of your money.

reply to haroldo
Actually the real reason is that every single Apple device is exactly the same.

An IP4 is no different than an IP5 when one gets down to how the apps work.

Windows Phone technically should be the same way as I doubt MS allows the device makers to alter the code.

The key issue with Android is that the device makers are allowed to compile their own thing. This is effectively its blessing and its curse. The blessing being that Android can be found in many places and its installed base is leaps and bounds ahead of iOS. The curse being that not every device is the same nor is its install.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports

reply to J E F F

Frankly, I prefer Star Walk over skymap.

I installed a sky map app. I looked at, it was cool. I closed the app and never opened it since. Do people really regularly (that is, more than once) look at these maps?