MacUpdate and MacHeist

Or just a load of heist...

By the time I post this, MacUpdate will have finished their latest MUPromo bundle: 11 best-selling Mac applications for $49, instead of $441.82. So why didn’t I post this earlier so you could have saved some money?

Well, this is where it all gets confusing: MacHeist apparently got so upset that MacUpdate were doing something similar to their original MacHeist that they jumped in with yet another heist, matching the apps in the MUPromo bundle and adding in a couple more. I say ‘apparently’ because when I first read their site I couldn’t work out if they were genuinely hacked off, or whether they were really working with MUPromo, or whether it was all a big joke — there were too many references to hacking in to other companies’ websites and references to pirates and planks for me to follow it all. Anyway, once again, by the time I post this their promotion will have expired.

So why am I posting this now when you could have saved lots of money if only I’d told you about these bundles earlier? Well, I’m just not convinced I like these bundles. They’re definitely good value if you are looking to buy those applications, and if those applications are full versions, and if you can upgrade them to newer versions when they come out without being penalized for buying them initially in such a bundle. From a developer’s point of view they’re either good (Wil Shipley) or bad (John Gruber, Gus Mueller, Rory Prior), depending on who you listen to.

I just think that these bundles are bad news for the independent Mac software market as a whole, and that is because the last three times I have recommended independent software to Mac users I was met with the response, “Sounds like a neat piece of software, but I’ll just wait until it is in a heist.”

Now it may just have been coincidence; it may just have been due to the recent publicity about MUPromo and MacHeist; it may just have been because the people I spoke to were Scottish; but the response was the same: “I'll wait until it is in a heist.” Now this wasn’t because I was recommending the latest version of Adobe Photoshop Ultimate Kitchen Sink CS Bundle at some extortionate price (even more extortionate in the UK than in the US). No, this was when I was recommending independent software applications at $14.99 and $29.95: “Sounds like a neat piece of software, but I’ll just wait until it is in a heist.”

So my opinion of MacHeist and similar promo bundles is that they could be doing a long-term disservice to the independent Mac software community. Do we really want to get to a situation where people think that $14.99 and $29.95 is just too expensive for software, and the only time they’ll buy is if they’re included in some bundle, preferably accompanied with some target to unlock other mysterious applications because eleven applications for $49 isn't good value enough, but fourteen is?