Do you think Apps Stores have a place in the open source community?

I guess one of the main changes since the last OSiM in Berlin has been the absolute explosion within the industry of apps stores. It is without doubt that it is now all about apps and that a company, be it operator or OEM could now live or die by their apps as consumers become more and more savvy and demanding about what their phone can or must do.
   However, and this is the sticking point, where should apps stores sit in the open source community? Is there a difference between an operator/foundation/oem store and do they all have the same business model? One thing for sure is that apps stores have given developers a load of choice on who they develop for and how they monetize their app but do they now have too much choice? Are we risking alienating developers because they have so much choice and fragmentation is now worse than it was 12 months ago? If we keep going like this are we going to push developers over to the other side? I guess that’s one of the reasons that Apple have become so successful isn’t it. With them you make one version of your app, they market it and you get the money (ok yes you are gonna have to wait a long time to get it). Whereas for all things open, you have to make dozens of different versions just in the hope of raising revenue. With this structure there’s no wonder developers in open source are falling and closed are rising.
   So where am I going? Are we going round and round in circles and will this endless operator/oem birth of app store after app store lead us anywhere but back to the beginning?
   

 

Contact: Adam Shaw

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