Shulou(Shulou.com)05/31 Report--

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­[abstract] users do not understand developers, developers break away from users from time to time, and one-way comment mechanism makes users lose the enthusiasm of feedback.

­(original title: starting from the change of iOS 10.3 App Store evaluation system)

­Ecological perfection of development

At ­WWDC 2008, Apple released the official version of developer SDK, followed by the official launch of iPhone 3G, pre-installed with iPhone OS 2.0 and App Store. From March 2008, Apple released SDK Beta, inviting software companies and teams to participate in the construction and development of App. On March 28, 2017, Apple released the official version of iOS 10.3. Developers in iTunes Connect can directly respond to user comments and display them within 24 hours. Apple's development ecology is improving step by step, and it is now in the process of improvement.

­according to the official description of the Apple developer blog, the change in App Store comments made by iOS 10.3 lies in two features in the new StoreKit API:

­as a developer, you should know how to use this new feature that is good for you. After logging in to iTunes Connect, click "my App", select the App you want to operate, click "activity", "rating and comment", and you can see that there is a "reply" button under each comment.

In addition, developers can filter by comment star, version number, region, or sort by publication time, making it easier to monitor user comments without spending too much time on it.

­after replying, you can see that the word "developer reply (pending)" appears. Click the question mark button next to it to prompt "this reply may take up to 24 hours to be displayed in App Store." In fact, this does not require content review, but the normal cache effective time. After replying, Apple will send a reminder email to the original commentator.

­if the developer feels that the reply is inappropriate, you can click the "Edit reply" button to modify it.

­developer responsibility to communicate with users

Any responsible developer wants the App Store to have a way to answer users' questions. App Store's long-term lack of this feature makes many App suffer losses due to non-substantive defects, such as installation flashbacks due to system reasons, functions that must be gradually opened, such as language support is not yet in place, and some detailed features cannot be explained in the tutorials, etc., due to the failure to make recommendations to users with usage problems in a timely manner, a lot of App has been innocently become "shoddy".

However, in the face of these problems, developers can not even make an explanation. They can only indicate their email address or contact information on the App Store page, or wait for the version update to modify the introduction, which is very passive.

­Open developer review is a major improvement that reassures responsible programmers and changes the dilemma of being skeptical about iOS applications.

­from the user's point of view, in order to support sincere developers, in a sense of responsibility, most users will seriously leave comments after downloading App. Before that, our comments on Apple's App Store were basically like "sinking into the sea"-did anyone see the BUG that I feedback, will the developers fix it or not? Who can answer some of the functions I can't find? We even wonder deeply who will read these comments and whether anyone cares about them.

­over time, this one-way comment mechanism makes users lose the enthusiasm of feedback: feedback, do not know whether there is a response; comment, do not know whether it is valuable. This is undoubtedly a blow to the vitality of App Store's platform. This is not a bad influence, the worst effect is that it loses the most direct and effective communication chain between iOS developers and users.

As a result, users do not understand developers, and developers break away from users from time to time. For example, the problem that an online mobile game does not work properly after it is put on the shelves may be due to the server or the version matching problem, and then it has received a lot of bad reviews. In fact, as long as the developers come out to explain the reasons and appease the players' emotions, this situation will be avoided.

­for example, for a software that has not been added in the initial version, the developer originally intended to add it soon in the next version; App, which does not support the Chinese language for the time being, is actually actively being localized by the developer. Replying in the comments at this time can also bring confidence to users.

Of course, after opening up developer comments, the contradiction is not easily resolved, in any case, to promote mutual understanding and sincere communication between the two sides is its real significance. In addition to games and e-commerce App, the vast majority of free App actually do not survive well, there is no lower limit to increase the size of advertising to survive App, but more conscientious developers in the heart of the product, pay attentively. I hope you will give more encouragement and support to developers unless there are particularly poor product problems, and do not give developers a direct one-star treatment because of a small problem.

­from store to community

­App Store makes developers love and "hate", and one of the "hates" is the lack of community atmosphere. Unlike Steam, which has the perfect function of both store and community, nor the more humane recommendation and evaluation system of Google Pay, Apple's "editor-led" model is still the basis of App Store operation in the era of digital platform in which "user-led" is gaining the upper hand (represented by Steam and TapTap).

For this reason, App Store has always appeared as an "app store" and does not attach importance to its own community functions. Users and developers should be the two main bodies of the ecology, especially iOS users, who can never really reflect the value of being a subject on this platform.

The future direction of ­App Store should be to turn a store into a community. Communalization is a guarantee of vitality, user viscosity and richer platform functions. This community is different from that of other digital platforms. After all, the relatively closed environment of iOS may be difficult to get rid of the influence of "editor-led" mode in a short time, but the decisive role of user orientation and the impact of user orientation on App recommendation mechanism will certainly change the traditional store pattern of App Store.

The communication channel between developers and users is the most basic point of communalization. When we expect that the communalization of App Store will not stop at this point, as the platform becomes more open, users may also be able to respond to developers' responses and open forums where users can further post topics and communicate with other users.

More in-depth results, if Apple is willing to do, and even hope to use the community to promote the functional improvement of App, using the community to help App localization, App pre-sale, development crowdfunding, developer research and other functions can be achieved through the community.

­again, most of the changes that have taken place on App Store are quiet and uneye-catching, but their influence must be good. People who pay attention to this aspect must be full of interest, and what efforts Apple will invest in this software service platform is worth looking forward to. (responsible Editor: miyaliu)

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