FU Apple Results In Huge Sales, Then Quickly Banished – Camera+ Pulled From App Store

Now here’s an interesting sales technique … submit application update for approval – Apple rejects update – release the update anyways by hiding it from Apple. The result? $$ HUGE $$ SALES $$ AND $$ PROFIT $$ !

If you haven’t heard … TapTapTap, developers of the wildly popular camera application Camera+, submitted to Apple a cool feature that would let users take pictures by pressing the iPhone’s volume button. The feature was called VolumeSnap and it was immediately rejected by Apple. For complete details, check out TapTapTap’s blog

Camera-Plus-VolumeSnap

Ok, so whatever … VolumeSnap rejected, life goes on … NOT!

TapTapTap decided to take matters in their own hands. They sent out an encrypted message on Twitter (later deleting the tweet after 30 minutes) which translated into a cheat code. In Mobile Safari, type the URL – camplus://enablevolumesnap – and the rejected VolumeSnap feature is enabled (to switch it off, enter – camplus://disablevolumesnap).

volumesnap

Well obviously on the Internet nothing stays a secret, hidden or undetected. Every website and their mother published the news about the VolumeSnap enabling code … stating, “get Camera+ while you still can – it probably won’t last long.” Hmmm … clear call to action, strong sense of urgency … a perfect sales pitch. And that it was!

Prior to the VolumeSnap issue, Camera+ sales were on a decline. After previously reaching the #6 overall paid app, Camera+ slipped to #23. But at the time of this writing, Camera+ is currently at their all-time high of #3 overall.

Camera+ is also at their current all-time high for top grossing apps, #2 overall … up from their #30 pre-VolumeSnap position.

ranking-top  ranking-gross

Which is exactly the point of our article. Camera+ is an extremely successful application, with reported net sales well over a half a million dollars. So why the f**k would TapTapTap risk having their extremely profitable application pulled and thus halting an important source of revenue? Sure they received a HUGE boost in sales, but at what price? Perhaps TapTapTap decided they would no longer support Camera+ and this was their final “sales promotion”? Hopefully there’s a method to TapTapTap’s madness because guess what …

UPDATE – As we were writing this article and verifying the latest rankings for Camera+ … Apple pulled the app. But it’s not like we (or the developer) knew this wasn’t coming. So the question still remains … WTF was TapTapTap thinking?!?

Camera-Plus-Banned

Comments

  • Didn't they build this app along with Lisa Bettany? I assume she was getting a cut of profits…wonder how she feels about this whole situation!

  • yes indeed … taptaptap was commissioned by Lisa to publish Camera+ … really strange circumstances, thinking taptaptap has something up their sleeve & this will not be the last we hear about Camera+