The developers of the UI design tool Sketch have announced their decision to exit the Mac App Store, following in the footsteps of many other software makers, such as Panic.
The company cited a number of factors that contributed to this decision, including strict limitations placed on apps sold through the digital storefront—the same reason Panic gave for Coda’s removal.
So as not to leave its customers hanging without the ability to update, Sketch will allow App Store customers to move to the direct-sale version of the app.
Sketch owners who want to continue receiving updates will need to download a copy of the app from the company’s website and use a new built-in tool to transition their App Store license to the new version of the software. A new license number will be emailed to the user to allow them to run the app on any other computers they want.
While some iCloud features are reserved solely for App Store apps, iCloud documents for Sketch are stored in iCloud Drive, so they’re accessible to any Mac app, including the direct-sale version.
This move probably won’t come as a big shock to many people, given how little Apple appears to value the Mac App Store over the mobile version. Many problems have plagued the store, most recently a certificate bug that completely broke many apps for some users.
Another issue highlighted by Sketch as having affected their final decision is the review process employed in both of Apple’s software distribution outlets. App review can last up to a week (or longer in some cases) before a piece of software becomes available to download. This greatly hampers developers’ ability to push out rapid bug fixes and leads to a slow pace of development from the users’ perspective.
While some developers will always have concerns about sandboxing or other potentially limiting safety features, it’s not likely Apple will make changes in that area to accommodate app makers at the expense of security.
Where Apple can make changes, it just doesn’t seem interested in doing so. Developers have waited since iOS 9 was announced at WWDC this year for App Bundles to arrive on the Mac App Store, but Apple has made no indication that this feature will ever arrive.
Other features, like paid upgrades or temporary demo versions, have been called for on both Mac and iOS, but so far Apple hasn’t obliged, leaving developers to get creative with their upgrade pricing schemes instead.
While iOS developers don’t have a choice in how they distribute their apps, Mac developers do, and it’s not surprising to see more and more of them taking the route that allows them to skip paying Cupertino’s 30% cut while simultaneously gaining the ability to charge for upgrades, offer app trials, and operate outside the sandbox while pushing updates as often as they want with no week-long review process. Don’t expect Sketch to be the last app to do so.
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It’s just so weird how a company with so much money and resources iterates at a pretty break-neck pace (iOS / iPhone) and completely neglects it’s other technologies (Airplay, Mac App Store, Airport / Express, etc…)
Understandable you need to put money and resources where profits are – and that’s at iOS / iPhone – but sales can be increased by showing the rest of the family some love also.
Cool — hey Sketch, partner with MacUpdate to sell your app on our upcoming store platform. promo@macupdate.com
So that you can distribute malware? I hope they won’t agree to that.
LOL I hope they don’t. No one wants your garbage adware installers.
I really like being able to get all my apps and updates in one place, but already half the apps I use have left the app store. Most of the other half never went to the App Store, and there are just three left that I still use on the App store (other than Apple’s apps). The other issue is that downloads from the App Store are very buggy. This is really confusing for me because it seems like one of the more important Mac OS X features for most users. Maybe Apple is just going to eventually abandon the Mac for the iPad, but that seems a long ways off.
Not really surprised. I understand that they want to keep their OS safe from outside sources to ward off malware, but they can’t even maintain the Mac App store correctly.
When the Mac App Store was first announced, I sought out MAS versions of every app. Now I do the opposite, since for the most part independently distributed versions are superior. Apple has long neglected its app store and have made little effort to communicate their plans to improve the situation. The Mac App Store deserves to die at this point and Apple has e only themselves to blame.
Good for them, The only thing good about the App Store is the ability to restore all your apps from one place, other than than that it reeks. I won’t buy from the App store because of the limitations the place on the developers and software.
A blittle birdie told that Apple does have something up their sleeve. Exactly what and how will we know at WWDC.
I really hope you’re right! Because this and many other little things spread out over Apple’s portfolio of products and services are mounting up to a shit storm of dissatisfaction by many Apple users and developers in recent years. I wish Apple would stop being so arrogant and slow to acknowledge all this and start listening to these people! They’re starting to remind me of how IBM and Microsoft were back in the bad old days!
I agree. There’s a slight taint of, how shall I put it, how about arrogance coming from Cupoertino. I’m seeing too many things, from the Mac App Store, to Apps, to hardware like the Mac Pro and Mac Mini, that have laid fallow for too long. It’s as if because these products were once great so Apple thinks they don’t have to pay attention to them ever again. Neglect will kill a product as fast as anything and Apple seems to be neglecting too much of its foundation in favour of shiney new things.
Yupp, and in many cases they cling to ignorance while eyes squeezed shut and fingers in ears. Arrogance? If you dont know, it aint there ;)
In many ways, radars are a prime indicator on how things are prioritized. Even really obvious bugs from as far back as iOS 7 have yet not been fixed. One example is how its impossible to delete/hide apps you don’t like from your purchases overview. Have enough examples, but more would identify me and I would be in breach of the nda.
I like this ballsy move that will cost Skitch revenue in the short-term. The PR they have already gained from making this announcement is considerable and will make up for some of that.
This is Sketch, not Skitch. They’re actually two different apps.
Guess I won’t ever update/buy Sketch again. This is an app where I see no need to go outside of the App Store for. I get Panic and Rogue Amoeba and some others. But I really can’t see why Sketch needs to do this.
They outlined their reasons pretty well. Long review times holding up releases, bugs like the one that recently broke all Mac App Store apps for a lot of users, upgrade pricing, limitations on what they can do, etc. These are all great reasons to ditch the MAS, not to mention the boost in profit without changing the price of the app. Apple was collecting about $30 per sale before. Now that money can go to supporting Sketch.
I like the idea of the Mac-App-Store. All in one place. I dont have to care about serials and so on. The sucsess of the Mac-App-Store will raise and fall with the qualitiy of apps. Apple have to listen to their developers.
I hope Apple will make a big step to solve this problem. We will see it at WWDC 2016.
I had a good app in the app store called hueShow and Apple made me change the name of my app when I tried to push an update!!! and for no good apparent reasons other than the fact the Philips has a product called hue and supposedly complained. To my knowledge one can’t trade mark common words… So I ended up calling it uSho since I had to push bug fix to my loyal users. Not cool Apple.
Well, the market is free, so good luck…
As a costumer, I really hope they will be able to deliver the same performance as Apple, with guaranteed returns, international sales, etc…
Sandbox limitations have nothing to do with that. I can understand that sandboxing can be a problem for an app like Coda, but not for Sketch.
I think this move is more about “we want to charge people for updates” and “we don’t want to share 30% with Apple”.
Exactly this has everything to do with trying to get more money. All you have to do is look to what they have done in the resent past, which includes increasing the price of their app. I wish them luck but I don’t think this move will help.
Stupid. Attention Developers: Mac App Store is about Discovery. If your App isn’t up there, I ain’t finding it.
You’re missing out on lots of great software, then. But that’s your loss.
I really think the Mac has been relegated to red headed step child status. Apple is so big now that turf wars almost certainly have to exist within the organization. Remember when the Macintosh development team went off and isolated itself from the rest of the company. Jobs even raised a pirate flag on the building as I recall. It doesn’t help that Tim Cook recently asked the question as to why anyone would buy a PC anymore when the iPad Pro was released.
“Other features, like paid upgrades and…” Ingenious way to hide the bitter truth in plain sight.
Having used the Mac App Store to make a name for themselves among users, it’s time to bite the hand that feeds by “cutting out the middleman” and get down to the business of gouging the user directly.
Will end badly, as barely-disguised greed and self-interest often do…
I doubt it. There are a lot of valid complaints about the Mac App Store. Paid upgrades are important to make sure developers keep making money from their work and are able to support themselves so development can continue. Currently that means charging everyone full price for the app every time through the App Store. By rolling their own web store, they can give loyal users a discount on new versions. The only reason they want to cut out the middleman is because the middleman sucks at his job of distributing their software.
I think this will end well for them. Their target audience is developers, who understand the struggle of dealing with the limits of the Mac App Store, sympathize with the Sketch devs, and will keep using the product.
It seems to me lately that Apple has become a big and fat chubby bully on the corner.
If everything keeps getting neglected by Apple other than iOS & iOS devices ofcourse, why would I want to invest my money, buying a top-spec MacBook and a 27″ iMac.
And that means, the prayer for a 17″ MacBook pro is a further cry being neglected but Apple would make large screen iPhones, iPhones with Samsung OLED screens, iPhones with inductive-charging…
I’m sorry…but a 17″ macbook pro is really not that portable and is crazily big… it’s like when sony and some other companies came out with 19″ table top tablets…
It is cheaper to buy a smaller laptop and just plug into a large monitor for the screen size… there are not enough people who want a 17″ laptop because they are just not that practical.
You see, there is almost like 1″ wide bezels at both the sides. By having bezels as those at the sides of the iPhone, screen size can be achieved in the sams form factor.
they can keep their bug ridden software for themself on their little webpage. Serving user often useless Versions who are barely working and then asking for paid updates is a bad joke. Not having a proper bug free version in the first place is the sad part. This is like buying a brand new car with flat tires and being asked to pay additional money to have each tire inflated. Good riddance, bye bye.. there is better software on the appstore and software like Pixelmator and Affinity Designer showed how you do proper updates and handle your paying customers. Buggy software with loosing userbase is leaving the appstore to earn more money by luring customers to their website.. hehe.. nice try.
Personally I feel buying on the Mac App store makes things easier because i already have an account with them…i can check real reviews, get updates, and easily re-download if i change macs or buy an additional machine… I am also kinda guaranteed that it is compatible with my device.
I am always careful going to external site – you never know if the reviews are real, it also could be a copy site, you have to submit your card details to yet another company – but the worst thing is by going with an external site is that they are forever flooding you with offers etc…and often updates are not free.
I can see why some companies want too… but I dont think it’s a great move – they kinda need to keep kicking apple up the ass to improve stuff…
Begging Apple for improvements isn’t going to do much if developers keep using the App Store as it exists now. Until people bail out of the store and tell Apple to fix it or risk losing what’s left of their business, Apple’s not going to care.