Windows Phone 7 development: Microsoft, help us, we need a cuddle

This post if for people who develop on Windows Phone 7 as a hobby or for small fee. It's not intended to the big development shops, I am quite sure they have all Microsoft tenderness.

I am angry at Microsoft attitude towards the developers community on the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Don't waste your personal time just yet. Things have to be fixed fast if MS want to keep up with the mobile market.

The Marketplace situation is abysmally bad. I spend a lot of my personal time developing apps for Windows Phone 7 because I am a believer and I think Microsoft has done a great job on the user side to provide a fantastic experience.

On the developer side, it’s another story. Take the app hub and the sales reports. Thanks god I am not doing this for money!

I have two apps on the market at the moment, one free and one available for the modest sum of 0.99 euros.

Shocking results! The free app, according to the reports is doing quite well, about 300 downloads and wait… the other one fotoIreland 2 downloads??? After a month and an half??

I installed before releasing the apps a tracking code and know at any time roughly how many people have downloaded the app, and for fotoIreland, we are talking about more than 500 downloads!

What the heck is going on. So I contacted immediately the support and this is the stupid and laconic answer I got one day after:

Thank you for contacting Windows Phone Developer Support.
Please note that the reports on the Dashboard were just released, and they may not be up to date with the latest changes. Please follow up on this in the upcoming weeks.
Thanks,
The Windows Phone Marketplace Support Team

I have to say this is really bad communication!

Now different theories are emerging. I was told yesterday that it was probably a mistake and it should be a daily figures which I could accept. Still waiting for an official reply on this option.

Another more sinister possibility exist and I might open a can of worms but I think it’s time we do something. It is likely possible that some windows phone users have a mean of bypassing the purchase system and download apps for free. Even better, using a direct link from the Microsoft Marketplace.

It's really easy, and I did it for my own app! I managed to download my own application without paying a cent! I think it is time that Microsoft took security a tad more seriously and stopped this lame schoolboy-level marketplace software development. A touch of https, encryption, hell j LiveId security would be useful. As for the lame naming convention of CurrentVersion.xap, that's a joke, or I hope it is? Why not call it fadde56281dea.~ap, anything to make it slightly harder.

A thread has been opened on the app hub forums. Please consider venting your anger in the thread and if there is enough heat perhaps they will do something before it is too late. Try it, google CurrentVersion.xap and see by yourself. It won't take you too long to find this Russian website giving listings of apps and meta XML containing their direct download links.

Microsoft should be ashamed of this mess!

Guys you have a fantastic new platform, you have worked hard to get developers on board, and now you are screwing up things big time.

What we want is a better Marketplace, better and more accurate stats, and better communication channels. Don’t cheat with us.

Another annoying thing also is the paperwork required for pay out. I sent the required form to the IRS department in US about 12 weeks ago. Still waiting! You should provide some help on the matter for all non US developers, I believe I am not the only one in this situation. I am tired to see on the app hub every day the same silly message telling me that I can’t be paid because I didn’t provided the right documentation, etc…

Come on guys, we need a cuddle!

 

2 Comments

  • I agree that the apphub and marketplace has some serious problems that I'm crossing my fingers will get addressed soon.

    Regarding the comparison of your own stats to those on the dashboard. How are you tracking your own downloads? # of unique users that run your app? Also, I noticed that the download chart in the apphub appears to be one week old (according to the dates in the chart), so make sure you're taking that into account. So far my stats seem realistic based on a comparison of totals with the number of unique names in my highscores database.

    Regarding the IRS stuff, Microsoft has stated that payments will begin in late January. So I wouldn't sweat the delay with the IRS because we aren't going to get paid until then anyway. A better message in the app hub would be nice though. I for one was very confused by how it could be taking so long when I first read the message.

  • Hi Tim I don't have unique visitors on my tracking device but because the app is based on services, and available only for WP7, it's quite easy to get the usage.
    Add also that I am have another app fotoBank which doing very well and the stats seems to match what I found.
    Then another thing puzzle me. Logically if Microsoft is right, my app being currently at half position on the top downloaded apps on the Marketplace, it would means that all the apps below this one have been downloaded once or twice! That doesn't make any sense!
    Regarding the IRS, maybe another approach for Microsoft could be making payments through a service like Paypal for example, with a ceiling obviously.

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