Embracing a new distribution channel
Ever since 2Do made its debut on the Mac, it has been exclusively available on the Mac App Store – after all, we were all there to witness the success of the iOS App Store. Handling licensing, distribution and all the nuisances that come with it was a thing of the past. This was it. This was the future.
Fast forward to 2017 and we’re constantly facing friction from the App Store in general. Times have changed, apps are plenty and there’s growing costs involved in keeping it all afloat. I’ve expressed my dislike for the subscription model in the past, as both a consumer and a supplier. It was disappointing to learn that nothing new was on the table for this year’s WWDC, that instead of allowing developers to occasionally charge for new, major updates, we’re being encouraged to start charging users monthly instead; a recurring subscription model. I’ll say this again: this is not for every one. Rogue developers could start charging monthly and choose to never improve the app one bit. It doesn’t solve anything. What it does is annoy users and disappoint developers when they see a raging crowd of angry users leaving terrible reviews in order to bring the app down.
Obviously, subscription isn’t all that bad as long as it’s some service, constantly evolving, improving, paying recurring expenses itself for the service it needs to render etc. An offline Task Manager, however, does not fall into that category.
So moving forward, 2Do will no longer remain exclusively available on the Mac App Store. There are no plans of changing the existing pricing model either – I’m not losing hope, maybe, just maybe Apple may have a solution for the rest of us next year. For now there’s a new service in town and we’ve embraced it wholeheartedly: Setapp. It’s a single subscription service where you pay a fixed fee, and in return you get to download and use many, many apps – a lot more economical than paying for each of these apps separately.
Starting today, 2Do is available as part of the numerous other quality apps on Setapp. You should check it out.
Aug 16, 2017