Posted on July 20, 2018 by Rory Prior
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For a decade iKana and iKanji touch (yeah it’s been that long!) have generally enjoyed really good search rankings on the App Store. For pretty much any combination of relevant search terms they would show up within the top 10-20 results. For all those years my apps have enjoyed 4-5 star overall ratings and seen regular updates. Then something went wrong. I’m…
Posted on June 8, 2018 by Rory Prior
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After much deliberation, I’ve decided to make a big change to the way iKana touch is sold on the App Store with version 2.7. Before I get into that, let me give you some background. Since it first appeared on the App Store, nearly 10(!) years ago, iKana touch has used the paid up front business model. You bought the software, then…
Posted on November 11, 2016 by Rory Prior
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This has been a really busy year of coding for me so far – not that you’d be able to tell from looking at any of my own apps, which haven’t seen as much activity this year as I’d have liked. With ever declining App Store revenues, I’ve had to start spending a lot of my time doing contract work. The upside is…
Posted on January 21, 2016 by Rory Prior
1 Comment
The idea of having a mascot character for an app may seem a little strange at first, especially in the West where mascots are more usually associated with things like sports teams and fast food. But in Japan mascots are ubiquitous; most companies have their own, each prefecture has one, and even buildings like the Tokyo Skytree use them. As an important part of…
Posted on December 13, 2015 by Rory Prior
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If you’ve been keeping an eye on the Mac App Store over recent years, you will have noticed a couple of things; how little it has improved since its launch five years ago and secondly how a steady stream of big name developers from Barebones to Panic, have been forced to pull their apps due to its limitations. The most recent refugee being popular design…
Posted on October 6, 2011 by Rory Prior
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I’m sure you’ve all seen the sad news that Steve Jobs died yesterday at 56. I’ve always admired Steve and his work at Apple, NeXT and Pixar. I remember being really affected by the original Think Different ad back in the 90s. It helped get me interested in the Mac and that was a snowball that grew and grew until I quit…
Posted on February 21, 2011 by Rory Prior
2 Comments
If you follow ThinkMac on Twitter then you may have noticed about five weeks ago I tweeted “NewsLife 2 submitted to the App Store!”. Unfortunately as of the time of writing its still stuck in review. Now from what I hear from other developers the review time on the Mac App Store (MAS) is longer than on the iOS store. For that…
Posted on January 6, 2011 by Rory Prior
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As you may know the Mac App Store (MAS) is launching later today in 90 countries around the world. This is going to be a pretty major shake up for the Mac developer community. Some developers are going to be left out in the cold due to some of the restrictions Apple is laying down, but for most of us this is…
Posted on August 18, 2010 by Rory Prior
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The most obvious change in iKana 2 is the new visual appearance. After spending a lot of time working with iOS — and with all the media focus these days being on the iPhone and iPad — it’s hard to ignore its influence. Far from being a purely cosmetic change, I think this new UI significantly enhances the usability of iKana. What…
Posted on August 31, 2009 by Rory Prior
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There are a number of essential freeware and shareware apps I use all the time for both fun and business. I thought it would be a nice shout out to a lot of the other cool Mac devs out there to write a little about all of them. Adium As much as I like iChat I have a number of friends who…
ThinkMac Software
Death by Search Ranking
Posted on July 20, 2018 by Rory Prior
Leave a Comment
For a decade iKana and iKanji touch (yeah it’s been that long!) have generally enjoyed really good search rankings on the App Store. For pretty much any combination of relevant search terms they would show up within the top 10-20 results. For all those years my apps have enjoyed 4-5 star overall ratings and seen regular updates. Then something went wrong. I’m…
Category: apps, commentary, development Tags:
Going Freemium
Posted on June 8, 2018 by Rory Prior
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After much deliberation, I’ve decided to make a big change to the way iKana touch is sold on the App Store with version 2.7. Before I get into that, let me give you some background. Since it first appeared on the App Store, nearly 10(!) years ago, iKana touch has used the paid up front business model. You bought the software, then…
Category: apps, commentary, development, ipad, iphone Tags:
Coding to keep the lights on
Posted on November 11, 2016 by Rory Prior
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This has been a really busy year of coding for me so far – not that you’d be able to tell from looking at any of my own apps, which haven’t seen as much activity this year as I’d have liked. With ever declining App Store revenues, I’ve had to start spending a lot of my time doing contract work. The upside is…
Category: apps, commentary, development Tags:
iKanji touch’s mascot: Tsutsune
Posted on January 21, 2016 by Rory Prior
1 Comment
The idea of having a mascot character for an app may seem a little strange at first, especially in the West where mascots are more usually associated with things like sports teams and fast food. But in Japan mascots are ubiquitous; most companies have their own, each prefecture has one, and even buildings like the Tokyo Skytree use them. As an important part of…
Category: commentary, general, iphone Tags:
The Mac App Store and the future of indie development
Posted on December 13, 2015 by Rory Prior
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If you’ve been keeping an eye on the Mac App Store over recent years, you will have noticed a couple of things; how little it has improved since its launch five years ago and secondly how a steady stream of big name developers from Barebones to Panic, have been forced to pull their apps due to its limitations. The most recent refugee being popular design…
Category: commentary, mac Tags: app store, business, indie life, mac
Goodbye Steve Jobs
Posted on October 6, 2011 by Rory Prior
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I’m sure you’ve all seen the sad news that Steve Jobs died yesterday at 56. I’ve always admired Steve and his work at Apple, NeXT and Pixar. I remember being really affected by the original Think Different ad back in the 90s. It helped get me interested in the Mac and that was a snowball that grew and grew until I quit…
Category: commentary, news Tags:
Stuck in Review
Posted on February 21, 2011 by Rory Prior
2 Comments
If you follow ThinkMac on Twitter then you may have noticed about five weeks ago I tweeted “NewsLife 2 submitted to the App Store!”. Unfortunately as of the time of writing its still stuck in review. Now from what I hear from other developers the review time on the Mac App Store (MAS) is longer than on the iOS store. For that…
Category: apps, commentary, mac Tags:
ThinkMac and the Mac App Store
Posted on January 6, 2011 by Rory Prior
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As you may know the Mac App Store (MAS) is launching later today in 90 countries around the world. This is going to be a pretty major shake up for the Mac developer community. Some developers are going to be left out in the cold due to some of the restrictions Apple is laying down, but for most of us this is…
Category: commentary, news Tags:
Back story : how iKana 2 was designed
Posted on August 18, 2010 by Rory Prior
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The most obvious change in iKana 2 is the new visual appearance. After spending a lot of time working with iOS — and with all the media focus these days being on the iPhone and iPad — it’s hard to ignore its influence. Far from being a purely cosmetic change, I think this new UI significantly enhances the usability of iKana. What…
Category: apps, commentary, mac Tags:
Shareware I can’t live without
Posted on August 31, 2009 by Rory Prior
Leave a Comment
There are a number of essential freeware and shareware apps I use all the time for both fun and business. I thought it would be a nice shout out to a lot of the other cool Mac devs out there to write a little about all of them. Adium As much as I like iChat I have a number of friends who…
Category: commentary, ipad, iphone, mac Tags:
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