Quote:
Originally Posted by ghost
I gave reimbursed (via PayPal) AppStoreApps.com for a review of two apps. That was Sept 12th. He promised he'd do the review soon, and set it hsould be up that weekend. It wasn't. This has been repeating and the review has yet to be uploaded  |
Just wanted to talk about what's going on behind the scenes at AppStoreApps.com(the website I own/run).
First let me say I am very sorry about the delay in the review. obviously a month after is way beyond my ETA for reviews.
When I started AppStoreApps.com, I knew that until the ad revenue began coming in. . .that I was going to rely on an outside source of income. If I could afford it, I would(and will when the revenue from the ads builds up). I thought the way to go about this would be by getting donations from the visitors themselves. I even used a Skribit widget to get the most requested reviews done first.
I was then contacted by the developer of eWallet, and he offered to compensate the cost of the application to get an honest review on the website. I accepted and did just that. After a few weeks I noticed that the visitors weren't able to donate at the frequency that would be best for the website. If I only used visitors donations I would be able to get maybe 4-5 reviews in per month. If you look now, I might miss a day here or there, but I normally post about 5 per day(lately I've been doing 6). The more time I get to put toward the website, the more I will be able to do per day.
This rate would not keep the traffic flowing and growth would be stagnant. I thought that if 1 developer was willing to reimburse the cost then why wouldn't others. Which is why I started contacting developers.
There are a few of reasons why I haven't been able to get to some of the reviews.
1 - I still work a 'real job'. Though I have been able to take more time off from that job, I am still stretched for time.
2 - Sooooo many applications. There are between 75-100 new applications released every day. The more traffic AppStoreApps.com gets(we broke 2,100 uniques yesterday), the more developers are wanting to get their reviews on thew website(so more are responding).
3 - Technical issues.
3a - The first one was the 'too many applications bug'. At that time I was not 'logging' the applications that were being reimbursed. There weren't that many applications coming out each day so I was able to keep up(though starting to get behind). I got about 10-150 applications deep on my iPod Touch, and the iPod crashed(from the bug). This put me 2-3 more days behind because it happened 2 more times.
3b - I just had to format. I was getting a BSoD when using this new RAM that I bought(just upgraded to 4GB). I put the other back in and backed up my data then upgraded to Vista 64-bit. . .or so I thought. Come to find out I missed the videos section(only backed up my screenshots), so not only did I lose 100 or so reviews that I hadn't had a chance to back(but where already published). . .but I also lost 67 reviews that I hadn't published yet. I was so pissed when I found this.
The reviews being posted now were ones that were half uploaded(only to Revver), I upload them to YouTube right before I publish them(which as you can see there is no YouTube icon under the Revver video for a while.
I know there is no excuse when you paid for something. Sadly the reviews lost(that weren't published yet) are gone, and I don't have a log of them. The only thing I can do is wait for the developer to email me saying 'hey, where's my review', then I can ask which app and make sure it's in the list of applications to review.
Yes there is an ongoing list right now. It was backed up(except for the videos that were lost). Yes I am behind. Like I said, the more traffic the website does, the more developers respond. Currently the list is about 175 applications deep(I said I was behind. . .and the format didn't help).
Again, I apologize to any developer that hasn't seen their review in the time frame they thought. You are being put in the list in the order that you respond to me.
If anyone has any questions about where their application is in the list, don't hesitate to contact me. My email is
contact@appstoreapps.com
