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8 People Buy "I Am Rich" iPhone App For $1,000
Posted by
kdawson
on Fri Aug 08, 2008 10:02 AM
from the more-money-than-good-sense dept.
from the more-money-than-good-sense dept.
FsG writes "In the first 24 hours that it was available, eight people bought a completely useless iPhone app for $1,000 a pop. This app does nothing except alert onlookers that you have a lot of money. The developer priced it at $999.99, which is the most you can charge on Apple's store. Apple has since yanked the app (without explanation as usual), while the inventive programmer walked away with $5,600."
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Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because (Score:5, Informative)
Conspicuous Consumption [wikipedia.org]
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Re:Because (Score:5, Funny)
I tended to prefer Asshole [wikipedia.org] to describe that practice....
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Re:Because (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Because (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
You would be surprised at the lengths fools and their money will go to set themselves apart as having more money to burn than everyone else.
Just look at any rap star. Some stupid hick from the ghetto gets a 2-album contract and immediately spends it all on a gold plated house.
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
depends on your definition of "high."
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah... AND? So they're compensating and we're laughing all the way to the bank... everyone's happy!
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
They need to show they are rich they are compensating. It is a well known fact that the amount you spend on expensive, extravagant, utterly useless stuff is inversely proportionate to the size of your penis.
As your spending approaches zero what does penis size approach?
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
Could not resist, sorry - It collapses into a black ho{|}e.
CC.
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
It is a well known fact that the amount you spend on expensive, extravagant, utterly useless stuff is inversely proportionate to the size of your penis.
Well, no wonder my wife buys so many shoes.
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
Didn't you read the email I sent you? You have to take pills for that. They're cheap and guaranteed to work!
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/07/poor_man_buys_i_am_rich_app/ [theregister.co.uk]
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
If they get a refund that education is wasted - they end up learning the wrong thing.
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why doesn't Apple have a refund policy for the App Store? The upshot of the DRM on the apps is that they can relatively easily yank the device from your phone once you get your refund. I feel for the guy who clicked it and didn't realize '1-click purchase' was enabled. It was a legitimate mistake - why not let him have a refund?
To avoid scammers who want to use something until they get tired of it or it outlives its usefulness, just institute a 10-day refund policy. If I can return it and it's not defective, why not give me a refund? Most brick and mortar stores will do this for you.
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Re:Reason why? (Score:5, Funny)
Just my $999.02 cents...
Does not compute.
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A wise investment (Score:5, Funny)
well. (Score:5, Funny)
One Guy Bought it Accidentally (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone here buy it? (Score:5, Funny)
If so, I'll give you $2000 for your iPhone. Email me your bank account info and I'll transfer the money asap.
Some people will buy anything (Score:5, Interesting)
The more expensive the device, the more likely you will encounter these wasteful consumers. I guess it is good if you are an ISV, and hats off to this developer for marketing a totally useless application to totally useless users.
CounterApp (Score:5, Funny)
Next To Come (Score:5, Funny)
An "I've Got A Really Big Penis" app that user must purchase from the App Store without using their hands and standing 12" away from their iPhone.
If one person does this, others will follow (Score:5, Interesting)
I guess that the problem Apple has with this is that when one person starts doing it, then others will follow.
Before you know it, the entire store is full of useless apps selling for ridiculous prices. This of course makes the entire store look ridiculous, thus lowering the value of the store in total.
Signaling wealth = 10% of biology (Score:5, Insightful)
This app does nothing except alert onlookers that you have a lot of money.
And substance is nothing but the opposite of the void. Talk about understatement!
"Signaling wealth" is a major part of sexual selection [wikipedia.org], in which a common strategy is to show that you're so wealthy that you can afford various things (the "handicap principle"). It generalizes to other species, for example, how peacocks flash their extravagant feathers to show how fit they are in being able to survive despite being burdened by such ornamentation.
Signaling wealth is also vital in interspecies signaling, such as how gazelles demonstrate their "wealth" by stotting [wikipedia.org], i.e. showing how capable they are of fleeing predators.
It's also been argued to form the basis for some altruism, in that people show how much they give to the poor to show how wealthy they are.
So yes, signaling your wealth IS a useful product function. The problem with the app is not that it "merely" signals wealth, but that it ... doesn't, because it could easily be faked.
Re:Signaling wealth = 10% of biology (Score:5, Insightful)
To borrow from Eliezer Yudkowsky, organisms are adaptation executors, not fitness maximizers. They have the desires to do the things they were selected for, even and especially if they don't understand why the desire exists, or have its evolutionary justification in their conscious mind.
People have desires to signal wealth because evolution selected for that. This does not mean people signal their wealth with the conscious intent of finding a mate. It does not mean you "should" look for mates by deliberately signaling wealth. Rather, people will be drawn to things that have the effect of showing wealth.
Likewise, people do not deliberately think about the impact of giving to the poor on their ability to find a mate; nevertheless, they have a desire to engage in one-way altruism because in the environment of evolutionary adaptation, that strategy worked in signaling fitness, even though today they might rationalize it some other way.
Just the same, men have a higher tendency to pursue status, whether or not they recognize the connection to access to mates, and women tend to be more attracted to higher-status males, whether or not they recognize that their attraction is due to his high status.
Your second example, interspecies signaling, confuses me
Doesn't surprise me.
For gazelles, ability to run quickly is a form of wealth. By stotting, they signal to predators that they have that wealth and so the predator might as well not waste resources pursuing them. If gazelles ever attained human level self-awareness and intelligence, they would *still* enjoy stotting around those same predators, even though they could identify that it's no longer necessary (because of technological defense measures or whatnot).
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what would be *really* valuable (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I agree that paying huge amounts for clothing, shoes, etc doesn't generally get you something that's hugely better quality, paying very little does generally get you something that's poor quality. Somewhere in the middle is the sweet spot, just as with most things.
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Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Interesting)
Now if only I can figure out how to get in on the luxury app market...
I can't find the source, but I remember hearing a story about NYC fashion design student whose senior thesis involved her buying expensive name brand clothing and then clothing from Target or Walmart and then swapping the tags that are sewn into the necklines.
She went to a consignment shop and asked more (of course) for the cheap clothes with luxury tags on the cheap clothing and less for the luxury items with the cheap tags on it.
As it turned out the clothes original from Wal Mart/Target sold quickly while the luxury items (even though priced cheaper) did not sell because of the tags.
Of course this could be an urban myth.
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Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a lesson here for small application vendors.
You don't make money maximizing the value of the things you sell. You make money maximizing your net margin over all your sales. Of course, everyone knows this, but they don't act like they know it. Salemen running companies are the most prone to thinking gross instead of net.
I once worked for a guy who was really frustrated that people were making money on trivial apps -- ring tones were his pet peeve -- while he was making good apps that did really important things for people, and constantly scrambling to keep his head above water. Well, that's not a coincidence. If you spent $1.99 for a ring tone, you aren't going to call for tech support. If you spent $100,000 for a piece of mission critical software, you jolly well are.
So the real determinant of whether you make money with software that does important things is whether you can turn a profit on support. It's better to forgo new sales than to add features to your product that reduce the profitability of support. It can be counterintuitive in a competitive sales environment to let the other guy pick up sales. The instinct is to match him feature for feature in a death match for who will capture the most sales, but if your product has significant support costs, you have to think of the business more like a consultancy. Efficiency and sustainability matter.
So, if you're looking to make money selling software you develop, you've either got to plan to sell your business to somebody it's more to than the cash flow, or you've got to plan to make money on support.
That's probably why the open source business model has been more successful than people thought it could possibly be. In the end a sustainable software business (leaving aside novelty apps) has to be built around profitable support. Of course sales do matter, but they're only step 1.
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Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Insightful)
While the "I Am Rich" app is laughable, a lot of this thread is an exercise in relative perceptions.
Having two pairs of shoes is an extravagance to someone struggling for food and drinkable water. I would probably never spend more than $8,000 on a car - and would probably never spend less than $100 on shoes (and I do have shoes that are worth a lot more.) For myself, there are two "luxuries" that actually really are worth the money you spend on them: shoes and beds. (Kitchenware is up there, too.)
There are people on this thread who have modified their computers to look like the Death Star, who think themselves superior to people who buy designer clothes.
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Re:Hilarious. (Score:5, Insightful)
Out of curiosity, what makes expensive shoes better than cheap shoes? I don't think I've ever spent more than $30-40 on a pair of shoes, and I tend to wear them at least a couple years before they wear out. I do a lot of walking too, so if my shoes were not up to the task I think I'd notice. What do you get for your extra $100?
Now a good pair of leather hiking boots can save your life in the right circumstance, so that I can see. But for every day shoes, you get into diminishing returns really quickly. As far as I can tell, expensive shoes just get you a label.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Why would you have to agree with Apple yanking it?
If the market will bare it, it should be allowed. The iPhone was once an exclusive item, so Apple did this same thing just with hardware.
This is just Apple being selfish and trying to remove something that mocks them. Stupid if you ask me, let the free market do it's thing.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Why would you have to agree with Apple yanking it?
Money laundering.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
While Apple has an "ask me first option", they should have the option to set specific spending limits. For example, my DVR is set so that the spending limit for the kids is $0.00 without a code. My monthly spending limit is a little higher. Once that spending limit is reached, even I have to enter a code. Best case would a monthly limit and a single purchase limit (example: no more than $5 per purchase and no more than $50 per month without entering a code). And since the App store can install stuff, there could easily be a "trial" period.
Layne
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
"but you have to agree with apple for yanking it.."
Why? If the developer fully and honestly explained what his app did and did not do, and if fully informed people were willing to buy it, why should it be yanked? Merely because you would not buy it? If that's the standard then nearly all the apps should be yanked.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you come up with an actual, i.e., not a made up reason, why this specific app and only this specific app should be pulled? I won't be holding my breath.
Because it makes the Apple brand look bad. People spending $1000 on an app that does nothing but be expensive underscores the idea that the iPhone is a useless toy for people to show off extravagance. A $1000 app that does nothing thumbs it's nose at this idea (while cashing out on it at the same time)
While I think the above is true, and find it extremely amusing that people actually BOUGHT this app, it's not too hard to understand why Apple chose not to associate themselves with this application. Apple doesn't want to be a brand of over-indulgence.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, I applaud this. There are a million ways the rich suck money out of the lower and middle classes. It is nice to see the reverse happen. The amusing part is that the lower and middle classes usually get their money sucked dry through neccesities like gas, water, food, etc. The rich tend to get their money sucked away through frivolous crap like this.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Funny)
The next time I create an awkward social moment where I hesitate to shake the hand of a Libertarian, I'm blaming you.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Funny)
but you have to agree with apple for yanking it..
What if you're a Libertarian?
It's got nothing to do with libertarian principles, it's just Apple defending their market niche. They can't exactly let just anyone start charging a huge markup for trendy, stylish crap.
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Re:Well, you gotta hand it to the guy... (Score:5, Interesting)
If you mom has issue with buying overpriced things online then she shouldn't be allowed to shop online.
The app, imo, is totally valid as long as it does what it claimed even if it's over priced because no one forced you to buy it. Apple should reinstate it.
I've not used an iphone but I find it highly unlikely that, when you buy things, with one click nothing is said and you're automatically charged so no one has an excuse if they've purchased it.
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Re:if I could, I would (Score:5, Funny)
Looking at the economics of enjoyment, if you get the same amount of enjoyment, relative, from your coffee as you do from an application that doesn't do a damned thing, you need to improve the quality of your coffee.
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Re:One click buy (Score:5, Funny)
Is it a good thing that you can buy something literally with one click? I find it reassuring that I have to enter my credit card details, then the little code on the back, and finally the long password that is only stored in my head.
I prefer the one click purchase. I find it horribly inconvenient to enter all of my credit card information and password. Besides, I never click any buttons acci
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Re:What did you expect? (Score:5, Funny)
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