The top ones were wholesome apps and games you bought once for like $3-$5. I remember WolframAlpha and Osmos, or like a copy of the Bible or a funny camera or something.
My glasses are not rose tinted: oh was there crap, but it was proper crap. It wasn’t 1000 high budget, heavily marketed SEO clone apps flooding the top of searches and promoted to the top by the store system itself like it is now. It legitimately feels like Apple and Google are in on all these scams because it makes a little short term profit.
Back then you could also just browse the store / categories or search for generic terms like launcher or adventure game or something like that.
Today, if you don’t know the exact name of the app you want to install you’re out of luck. And even if you do, you need to actively avoid the “sponsored” apps trying to mislead you.
Remember when the App Store was nice?
The top ones were wholesome apps and games you bought once for like $3-$5. I remember WolframAlpha and Osmos, or like a copy of the Bible or a funny camera or something.
My glasses are not rose tinted: oh was there crap, but it was proper crap. It wasn’t 1000 high budget, heavily marketed SEO clone apps flooding the top of searches and promoted to the top by the store system itself like it is now. It legitimately feels like Apple and Google are in on all these scams because it makes a little short term profit.
Back then you could also just browse the store / categories or search for generic terms like launcher or adventure game or something like that.
Today, if you don’t know the exact name of the app you want to install you’re out of luck. And even if you do, you need to actively avoid the “sponsored” apps trying to mislead you.
Not much of a store experience anymore…
Like Steam!
Policing one’s own store so it isn’t a predatory dump? Imagine that.
All app development after the app that looked like you were drinking a beer was purely superfluous.
I just find it mind blowing that ad bloated obvious shovelware has hundreds of millions of downloads.
To be fair, tons of that is bots. Or sweatshop marketing agencies.
It’s literally an expected ‘marketing’ tactic now.