Why I Stay Away From the Apple App Store

 Why I Stay Away From the Apple App Store

And why perhaps you should too



In a recent post at Medium about Apple Notes, Will Murphy said, “I would rather not make that investment unless I can be certain the note-taking system will be there for the long haul.” 

He was referring to his preference for Notes over third party note taking apps. That’s exactly how I feel about all the “mission critical” apps I use every day. While third party apps sometimes promise entrancing features, I stick with Apple’s built in apps for almost everything I do, and the “almost” disappears when the work is important.

Like Will, Apple Notes is my filing system and I have written a number of posts here explaining why:

I have sometimes been tempted by third party apps, but I’ve always been somewhat wary of them as well. I blame Google for that because they arbitratily killed several of their products where I had heavily invested my time. But killing or abandoning apps is unfortunately quite common, especially with small developers. Apple too has dropped some of their own products and apps, though they don’t begin to be as bad as Google. So some time ago, I decided that if I could use the stock Apple app, I would, even when other apps shiny features tempted me.

I make exceptions, of course, but the exceptions are for things where I can easily recover the main function should the app disappear. For example, I use Overcast as my podcast app because its features far exceed anything the Apple Podcast app can do. But more important to me is that if I lost Overcast, I will still be able to listen to my favorite podcasts with Apple. I will lose the features, but I will not lose the process, the meat, the goal. 

For everything important, I stick with Apple: Safari, Reminders, Notes, Numbers, Photos, Music, Shortcuts, Fitness+. These are the apps I use daily. I also use iCloud and Apple iCloud Keychain to manage my passwords and pay for the Premium Apple One subscription. Part of my loyalty is what I mentioned above, that I do not want to be orphaned as I was by Google and some small developers. But there are other reasons as well.

Apple Continuity ties together my apps across my iPhone, iPad, and Mac. It’s more than just sharing data and it regularly gets better.

As I’ve said in several posts, with Apple, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. With everyone else, not so much. Apple apps work together. You really can’t began to appreciate the value of the Apple ecosystem if you are using this and that from the App Store. 

So, I don’t visit the App Store often. You might want to think about why.

Read Will’s post here: Three Years Later, I’ve Analysed Over 2,500 Articles Using Apple Notes. Here’s What’s I’ve Learned

  • You might think that writing here means big money. Actually, it usually gets me only a dollar or so a day. That is why donations, one time or monthly, are always appreciated. See https://ko-fi.com/pcunix
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