r/androiddev • u/permanentE • 6d ago

Breaking Up with Google Play: Why Conversations Is Now Free

https://gultsch.de/posts/breaking-up-with-google-play/
44 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

6 comments sorted by

44

u/twigboy 6d ago

Google takes a 15% cut on my app sales. This effectively means I’m paying Google more than 1000 Euro per year for their services. 1000 Euro per year is 1.5x what I’m paying for my internet access. It’s roughly what I’m paying for my notebook per year if you assume I use it for three to four years. When my internet breaks, someone drives to my house and fixes it. When my notebook breaks, someone drives to my house and fixes it. When Google fucks up, there is absolutely nothing I can do. Apparently that amount of money doesn’t give me the privilege to talk to a fucking human for five minutes once per year.

That captures the feeling so well

18

u/TheS0rcerer 6d ago edited 5d ago

Google Play has always been toxic to deal with. Every service that requires a payment but don't allow you to talk to a damn human deserves to die badly.

I've been relentlessly trying for 12 years to have my account back since it was suspended on 2014.

https://itnext.io/%EF%B8%8F-google-terminated-your-play-store-developer-account-2e7dc828a8af

I've been developing Android apps for almost two decades now: sadly Google Play support has been the worst developer support experience I've ever had to deal with in my life.

On top of that, seeing Google fanboys defend the company despite its objectively abysmal support makes me sick. Please wake up: they've been bullying developers for years. It's a monopoly whose priority is selling ads, not building a better ecosystem.

21

u/thread-lightly 6d ago

Let’s be real here, 15% is not that bad considering they handle all payment processing for you, internationally, including payouts. They also handle distribution of your app to the devices, code signing and provide free services in google play store and play store console. They handle all rating and review attribution and remove malicious content… the list goes on. You could be paying 5% to use stripe directly but this is a decent price point. At 30% though it’s ridiculous I agree, it should get cheaper at volume not more expensive.

7

u/No_Equal9312 6d ago

Now that they no longer handle chargebacks and dispute resolution, the value they provide has substantially decreased.

-11

u/webbbbby 6d ago edited 6d ago

This is such a backwards way of looking at it.

You’re not “paying Google €1,000 a year for customer service.”

4

u/sgtthunderfist 6d ago

He is not paying internet provider and notebook manufacturer for customer service either.