Ahhh controversy…it is the grease that keeps the blogs and twitter running smoothly.
If you have been paying attention to the twitterverse in the last couple of days you will notice that the company Brighthouse Labs is mentioned quite a bit…often with the word BAN nearby.
So who areBrighthouse Labs? Well, according to their website, they are simply an app developer who makes a wide array of applications for the iPhone and webOS. If you look at their product list you see that they have 6 products (Movie Times, iFlood, Fortune Teller, Buddha Quotes, Sports Fan, iGuide). They actually have several more on the iPhone, but on webOS they have four: Quotes, Sports Fan, iLanguage, and Recipes.
So what is all the brouhaha about? Well…take a visit to the App Catalog and search for “Brighhouse” and you will see what people are upset about. As of right this moment there are 780 apps on the Catalog. 132 of those apps are from Brighthouse. That means that 17% of all apps on the catalog have come from this one company.
Now how do 4 apps turn into 132? Simple…they split them up and make the same app localized and then put it up on the catalog. Take, for example, Sports Fan. Sounds like a cool app if you are into sports right? Think you could download it to your phone and get all the information about the teams you love? Not quite…
So they start off with one app, then split it up into several sports…hockey, football, basketball, soccer, etc. That makes sense because most people aren’t a fan of all sports. Next, they split the same app based on teams. So in the end, you don’t just have a football fan app. Nope, you have a football fan app for every…single…team. Same goes for every other sport. So if you are a fan of two teams ya gotta buy two apps for $.99 each.
They do the same for recipes (tex-mex, swiss, southwestern…) and quotes (Ted Kennedy has his own app). The end result is an absolute glut of apps. Now, to be fair, their stated goal is to cater to niches that would otherwise be ignored. That sounds nobel, but is there really a Ted Kennedy niche? Do the poor, lonely fans of the Dallas Cowboys feel as though they are being neglected? Come on…
They have mentioned in a recent twitter post that they are looking into condensed apps for the Pre, but I am a bit skeptical myself because this is obviously the modus operandi. On the iPhone, for instance, Brighthouse has (at last count) published 3,649 apps. Now think about that for a second. The iPhone has over 100,000 apps, and this one company constitutes about 3% of ALL the programs on that massive catalog. This is how they do business, and I do not believe that some complaining (ok…a lot of complaining) is actually going to change their ways.
So what can be done? Well, the only entity that can actually stop them is Palm, but I believe at this stage of the game Palm is a fan of Brighthouse. Why? Because the app store game is all about numbers. The perception is that the more apps you have in your catalog, the better of a store you have. Anyone with an iPhone knows that over 90% of the apps on that system are total crap, but the marketing speak is all about 100,000 apps!! Palm is desperately trying to get as many apps on the catalog as possible, and companies like Brighthouse aid them in that struggle by pushing out tons and tons of apps.
Truth be told, Brighthouse is not doing anything wrong or against the TOS…we as the consumers just don’t like the bloat, and I believe that is a rightful complaint. The only recourse we as the consumer have is with our wallets. If you do not approve of their way of doing business, then don’t buy their apps. If Brighthouse finds that there aren’t very many buyers of their apps, maybe they will change their tune.
I am an advocate for the developer. Most of the developers on this platform are creating one, two, or maybe five apps that they hope will make them some money (or a lot of money), and better the community in some way. To me, Brighthouse Labs, strikes me as a bit heavy handed, and I don’t think their tactics are good for the platform because their apps crowd out other developers. If another company wants to make a sports app, then consumers will have a much tougher time finding their app on the Catalog because the Sports category is bloated with Brighthouse stuff. So, for this reason, until Brighthouse Labs change their tactics, I will not be reviewing any of their apps.
Thank you for writing this article. It saddens me to think of the people that run this company viewing their actions as “just fine”. It’s also bad that Palm let this happen. I thought I had read early on that they were going to enforce quality standards. That clearly went out the window.
Hey Ryan, thanks for the comment.
I feel for Palm in this situation. They need the catalog to have as many apps in it as possible so all of their competitors don’t snicker at them in their ads and presentations.
At the same time, I think both the devs and the community would give Palm serious props if they stood against this tactic on principle.
If a dev company was massive and could crank out legitimate apps this quickly, then God bless ‘em. What makes Brighthouse Labs seem shady is that it really is the same app just split 100 different ways.
David
I haven’t thought about this from Palm’s angle before, and while higher numbers are better for marketing, I would hope that they would realize that customer satisfaction is ultimately more important.
Yeah, and as I mentioned on Twitter, the real irony here is that I’d be willing to bet if they actually made a 1-app-per-sport suite of content aggregation apps (assuming the content is even any good), they’d stand to make more money. As it stands, they are a blight on the community. (obvious pun: Blighthouse Labs).
David, I agree that customer satisfaction is key, but honestly, from Palm’s perspective, they just want to sell you the phone.
The numbers in the app catalog are a great selling point. If I am deciding between iPhone, Droid, or Pre, the app catalog has to be a factor. Numbers would matter in this case because you have no other way to compare.
It is a tricky situation and one that Brighthouse is happy to exploit.
Chuq, the head of developer relations weighed in on his views of this type of business model. He has some great points.
http://bit.ly/6lzXjL
David
Hi, I found your blog on yahoo. I’m pretty glad to have found your website because I think it is informative! I will definitely come back! Great resource for my students. Youproblog
Personally, I think the problem is not Brighthouse, but the app stores themselves. They do not provide consumers with an effective way to browse a catalog and discover new and good applications. App stores quickly turned into a mess that’s impossible to navigate. I understand developers’ and cosumer anger at Brighthouse and the like – but I do not share it and believe that it is misguided. Instead of bitching about so called spammers, how about you guys concentrate on trying to push Palm/Apple/whoever else into developing a better application distribution model?
Would you go into a grocery store and complain that products of some particular brand are in every damn corner? Most likely no, and if you will, no one will care. I’m not trying to say that App Store should be more like a grocery store, but it is a market before anything else. Markets are flooded with products for people to choose from, that’s what they were created for. Developing BETTER markets – that’s what should be in best interest of consumers, and not cutting down on the amount of products, as people here seem to be suggesting.
I wonder if “Brighthouse Networks” (cable/phone/ip) is aware of the use of their use of the name?
I definitely think the market should speak… however I wish there was a way to “try before you buy” or to get a refund if the app turns out to be horrible… say a 24 hr refund policy (even a 1hr would be helpful, basically download, open, try it, play around a little then decide if it really is what you were looking for). It would also be nice to be able to rate the developer & to see those ratings with the app rating, to give the buyer a better view of what they are about to spend their money on. We definitely need a better method for sorting through apps, especially as the app store grows. A way to give variety, but to also cut through the clutter.
I understand that people may want an app with a picture of their team on it and will buy that app because that’s what a good fan does (although they don’t even do that). Would I personally buy any of this company’s apps, no. I would rather an app that is more versital. However if someone only wants 1 team, then they should have the right to buy an app that deals only with that one team. Hopefully the market will speak.
Brighthouse Labs, I want my Money Back!!