How Many Pocket PC Downloads are There on Handango? [Archive]

Jason Dunn

03-13-2003, 07:30 AM

12,045 8O That's the number from Handango as of March 10th. It's amazing how far we've come in just the past year! Now those "downloads" are applications, themes, etc. But considering that Palm counts eBooks and text documents as part of their "16,000 applications" rhetoric, I think it's fair that we do the same. :wink: It's also worth noting that not all developers list with Handango. Some, like <a href="http://www.revolution.cx/">Revolution.cx</a> prefer to sell directly to consumers. Specific numbers aside, I think one thing is clear: there are boatloads of applications available for either platform, and the decision on which platform to go with can no longer be made on the "more apps" excuse. People should make the decision based on more important things

revolution.cx

03-13-2003, 07:42 AM

Actually we do sell some product on Handango but we don't actively promote it. Handango takes 40% of the purchase price and it's about to go up to 50%.

Jason Dunn

03-13-2003, 07:52 AM

Actually we do sell some product on Handango but we don't actively promote it. Handango takes 40% of the purchase price and it's about to go up to 50%.

Hmm - I searched for the keywords "Lexionary" and "ClearSpeed" and got zero hits, so I assumed your products weren't up there. If they were, I would have made at least $3 in affiliate sales by now. :wink:

40%? I thought it was 30%....? :?

royiel

03-13-2003, 07:54 AM

revolution.cx

03-13-2003, 08:01 AM

It's "Lextionary" and "Clear Speed" (2 words). Their search engine doesn't burden the user with close matches.

Sadly it's 40% if you want to participate in any of their promotions and get high placement in their search results. Once you start doing some real sales volume it goes to 50% then 60%.

I'll email you with some details about my affiliate program...

Hmm - I searched for the keywords "Lexionary" and "ClearSpeed" and got zero hits, so I assumed your products weren't up there. If they were, I would have made at least $3 in affiliate sales by now. :wink:

40%? I thought it was 30%....? :?

revolution.cx

03-13-2003, 08:11 AM

So as not to hijaak the thread (the OT deserves it's own)...

There are lots and lots of good apps out there and what irks me the most as a developer is that means there is lots and lots of competition!

Fortunately that's excellent news for you as the consumer, we developers have to work hard to make our products better and better.

I'm sure I could make some good money writing Palm versions of our software but I have far too much on my plate with Pocket PC and Smartphone development to even give it a look.

The Pocket PC market is a healthy, healthy thing that really seems to have taken off in the last 6 months.

Rok

03-13-2003, 08:17 AM

And just how many of those "apps" are actually Today skins?

I mean, get real. I like my 3970 and there's a lot of software for it to be sure, but when I got it (some three months ago), I browsed through all apps on Handango (minus the skins), and there were more like a 1,000+ of them, but nowhere near the quoted number.

What matters is the number of quality software. I don't give a good {edited} about the 10,000 "apps" if there is not a single one that meets my criteria.

Fortunately, among the (realistic) one or two thousand apps, there's plenty of excellent ones (albeit not many new ones, as someone stated in another thread).

Regards,
Rok

Edited by Ed H. on 3/15. Lets keep the foul language out, mkay?

Cracknell

03-13-2003, 08:46 AM

Handango search engine is hopelessly slow.

I would say google is still the best software resource for PPC.

Inventor

03-13-2003, 09:37 AM

....And dont forget 1,877 beans!! :lol:

Ekkie Tepsupornchai

03-13-2003, 11:08 AM

What matters is the number of quality software. I don't give a good god damn about the 10,000 "apps" if there is not a single one that meets my criteria.
That's rather true on both sides of the fence though (Palm and PPC). My experience with my Palm V back in the day was that most of the apps were only slight variants of other apps. My Palm friends will tell me "there are so many more apps..." and my response is always "show me all these apps then".

Jason's point still stands as valid, that the "number-of-apps" argument in favor of the Palm is not much of an argument anymore. IMO, it hasn't been much of an argument for quite some time.

Ekkie Tepsupornchai

03-13-2003, 11:10 AM

Actually we do sell some product on Handango but we don't actively promote it. Handango takes 40% of the purchase price and it's about to go up to 50%.
That's a shocking figure!! Hearing that makes me think twice about future purchases from Handango when the products are also available directly from the vendor.

jmarkevich

03-13-2003, 01:01 PM

There was a day when I could go to Handango and see all the 'New' and 'Updated' software. Now all you see that's 'New' or 'Updated' are themes. I realy wish they would seperate the themes from the software. It's not even worth visiting the site. :x

I totally agree. I believe a healthy 60-70% of that number is themes.

PalmGear didn't really start posting docs and such as applications until they broke over the 10,000 mark, then it all broke loose.

Paragon

03-13-2003, 02:52 PM

Jason's main point of the large number of apps now available for Pocket PC is very important. How many of use who used Palms and bought a 3600 Ipaq did so with some reservations about software avaialability. I almost didn't switch because of it. When I did buy there we a number of apps I couldn't replace on Pocket PC. I had to convince myself that software support was going to happen.

I didn't know Handango sold software!!?? I thought it was just one of those theme download sites. :roll: Now that I find out how much they take I may have to adjust my support a bit.

Dave

Vincent M Ferrari

03-13-2003, 03:21 PM

Julie Hay

03-13-2003, 03:56 PM

PocketGear charges 30%.

Dom

03-13-2003, 04:10 PM

Handango does charge the most by far and okay the developer service has dropped (mostly I am sure due to its rapid expansion) but I still feel that Handango is the best way for any small developer to make a big impact. We started off with them and without them we wouldn't still be trading today. They have fantastic partnerships in the industry and their marketing is very slick. I'd rather have a small piece of a big pie than a higher percentage of nothing ! As for themes taking over the site, I warned them about this a year ago and I guess it is their call. There is an area on their site for giving feedback so tell them what you like and dislike. Finally bear in mind that even 50% isn't all that bad based upon my experience of computer games in the 80s when the developer would get $2 out of every $40 copy of a game sold. Still, 20% sounds more appropriate given that you are only an entry in a database etc. Okay I'm waffling !

Dom

Stone

03-13-2003, 04:57 PM

Well, if themes are included, then the PocketPC Platform has well over 43,500 just on our site alone! Sheesh, that means the PocketPC has nearly 45,000 apps compared to the Palm's measly 16,000 or so!! 8)

(Sorry, I just couldn't resist that one!)

Jason Dunn

03-13-2003, 05:24 PM

Uh, guys? Let's not turn this into a Handango bashing thread (although it's already become that). :?

Rok

03-13-2003, 06:00 PM

Uh, guys? Let's not turn this into a Handango bashing thread (although it's already become that). :?
Sorry. But perhaps you could let them know that listing Today skins as new/updated applications is not a good idea - it turns many people away. And the new gag - the "updated" date of some apps is in the future, so they stay on top! Bloody annoying, to say the least.

Plus, if you look at "Updated Today", you always see the same apps, the same version numbers. Apparently, the authors submit "updated" version every day, so they get to be on the "fresh" list. I seriously believe Handango should hire someone to filter through this garbage and not let the consumer do it.

They might listen to you a bit better than they would, for instance, myself.

[/rant]

Rok

Paragon

03-13-2003, 06:14 PM

Uh, guys? Let's not turn this into a Handango bashing thread (although it's already become that). :?

Sometimes no matter how well intended the subject matter of a thread is, with dozens of people posting to it, it's bound to go where the majority of people feel is the important part of the subject.

How many people feel they can now find pretty much all the software they feel necessary on Pocket PCs? I think that question is a bit more on topic.

Dave

Jonathon Watkins

03-13-2003, 06:24 PM

Jason, that's good news. Could you please get someone to review all 12,045? :wink: :lol:

Dr. Smooth

03-13-2003, 06:49 PM

Before you start smugly patting the PocketPC developer community on the back, step back and look at things. How many quality free apps are available for PocketPC? I'd say somewhere around 15-20. The palm developer community is much more in tune with the open source/freeware movement, and you could stuff a palm device to the gills with excellent freeware. Of course, the cynics among you would say that's because of the smaller memory of the Palm. But good apps for Palm are 4-5 times smaller than a lot of similar PocketPC apps.

Not that cost is the defining factor in good software, but if you look at the utter crap that's out there being offered for sale at $19.95 for PocketPC, you have to laugh. Every developer seems to think his apps are worth at least 20 bucks. Some of those single-use tools might be worth $0.50, and they'd certainly be worth $0, but they're not even CLOSE to being worth the asking price.

So out of the 12,000 "apps", you've got 2000 themes, 2000 MediaPlayer skins, 4000 strip poker plugins, 20 great free applications, 150 apps and games that are worth the asking price, and 3,830 pieces of garbage priced between $19.99 and $39.99.

:twisted:

Jason Dunn

03-13-2003, 07:14 PM

How many quality free apps are available for PocketPC? I'd say somewhere around 15-20.
Where's your proof? this list (http://www.pocketgear.com/software_browse.asp?cat=82) looks pretty good to me as a starting point.

You seem to be big into Pocket PC developer bashing, so I'm curious, how many high-quality freeware apps have you created for the Pocket PC? It's easy to criticize the developers who make the apps, much harder to step into their shoes and see how much fun it is to spend months on an application and then give it away for free. For some people, that's not an option.

Paragon

03-13-2003, 08:14 PM

How many quality free apps are available for PocketPC? I'd say somewhere around 15-20.

You seem to be big into Pocket PC developer bashing, so

Granted, Dr. Smooth could have been a bit more "user friendly" :) I think there is a point to be made for the amount of freeware apps there are for Palm. I doubt many of us expect the professional developer to give his work away. However there are lots of amateur developers out there, and Palm has tapped into those people. Look at the cult that has built around that. It is definitely one of the reasons that Palm has, and still holds the lead in sales. The average person loves to get things for free. The average person doesn't want to have to buy a db app, and put together an application for every little thing they may find a use for. Especially when they can get it for free......I know some are jumping up and down saying there are lots for PPC as well. Yes you are right, but no where near the amount.

Myself, I've been a bit surprised that with all the complaining we have done over the fact that pocket versions of Word, and Excel are so poor we have seen ONE developer offer a better solution to that. I'm curious as to why that is.

It seems that Handango is offering tons of themes compared to all the new applications.......where are all the new applications these days?...and please don't anyone think that I'm bashing software developers. Pocket PC developers have come along ways but at the moment the market seems to be a bit stale.

Dave

agyger

03-13-2003, 09:01 PM

revolution.cx

03-13-2003, 10:34 PM

Now that I find out how much they take I may have to adjust my support a bit.

I buy lots of software from Handango, but it looks like their pillaging and plundering developers, and that, I won't tolerate. That's just ludicrous.

Is Pocketgear.com any better? And if not, where should we buy from?

I think Pocketgear is closer to 20%. My suggestion is to use Google to search for software and purchase directly from the developer.

ctmagnus

03-14-2003, 06:54 AM

Check out PocketPC Freewares:
http://ppcf.mklabs.com/index.php

The site is in french, german and portuguese. At the moment they have 589 freeware apps in 20 categories listed. The apps are rated from 1 to 10.

Adrian

"English" version here (http://216.239.35.120/translate_c?hl=en&u=http://ppcf.mklabs.com/index.php&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dpocketpc%2Bfreeware%26hl%3Den).

mmace

03-14-2003, 09:24 PM

jimski

03-15-2003, 07:30 AM

considering that Palm counts eBooks and text documents as part of their "16,000 applications" rhetoric, I think it's fair that we do the same.

Sorry I'm late getting to this thread, but your statement is not correct. The 16,000 (now 17,000) figure for Palm OS is executable apps. The total number of files, e-books, etc is probably up to an order of magnitude higher, but we've never tried to count it.

Mike
CCO, PalmSource Inc.

Whatever. Being a big supporter of PDA software titles (previously Palm and now Pocket PC) at about $1,000 in the past 12 months, I can say that while Palm may have more titles, many, many of them are simple designs lacking any real substance. And most of the freeware leaves much to be desired.

In contrast, I have found most of the PPC apps to be well designed and trouble free. I have also not had any problem find applications to meet or exceed each of my needs. While I may not find 20 titles for a particular subject, I will find 5 or 6 very well developed apps to choose from. I will take the later any day.

Ed Hansberry

03-15-2003, 07:41 PM

It's "Lextionary" and "Clear Speed" (2 words). Their search engine doesn't burden the user with close matches.
I like Handango in general, but they need to turn their search engine over to someone else. I have trouble finding apps when I know the names. There is no excuse for it not bringing up Pocket Informant when you type Pocket Informant in the search box. You get 100 hits in Pocket Pc software and on the first page, you get Handango $50+ suites and 20 hits on Pocket Casino. :? This makes the site worthless for finding apps when you don't know the names and are just browsing for a solution to your problem.

Paying to be bumped up high in the results may be good for handango but it is bad for developers AND consumers. Google gets this and is the #1 search engine. MSN and Lycos elevate hits for paid advertisers and their search engines are horrible.

Kati Compton

03-15-2003, 07:44 PM

I like Handango in general, but they need to turn their search engine over to someone else. I have trouble finding apps when I know the names. There is no excuse for it not bringing up Pocket Informant when you type Pocket Informant in the search box. You get 100 hits in Pocket Pc software and on the first page, you get Handango $50+ suites and 20 hits on Pocket Casino. :? This makes the site worthless for finding apps when you don't know the names and are just browsing for a solution to your problem.

I also don't like that it sorts in *decreasing* $ order. Makes it harder to search for freeware or "cheapware". I know their goal is to make money, but if I'm going to them for a freeware/cheapware search I'm also more likely to go to them when I want a full commercial application.