To the fine folks at Google

[mikedj72]

I'd like to suggest a program to add a little urgency or speed to those developing apps for Honeycomb. I'm sure a couple million is a drop in the bucket, so those are the dollars I'm playing with. If you want these tablets flying off the shelves, get us the damn apps.

June 2011 - The Amazing $2.5 Million developers race.

1.) Any app submitted May 25th through June 30th qualifies, but they must sign your rules document.
2.) Payouts as follows: 1st = $500K, 2nd = $250K, 3rd = $150K, 4th = $100K, 5th-10th = $50K, 11th-58th = $25K
3.) The top 10 prizes are to bring out the major players with major app houses. Those size prizes actually register, they are large companies that might be able to put out some powerful and deep apps, and they actually think they'll win a top prize pretty easily. But we don't want to keep the average coder out who might actually have a great app. Having that many $25K prizes will bring them off the sidelines if they're writing for other platforms and waiting on more market share for Honeycomb.
4.) Voting could take place the first two weeks of July. I really don't have a clue how to go about this. Maybe it's through the comment system? Those with the highest rating on July 15th? Maybe there is chance for fraud there? Maybe a voting system on the front page of Google.com? Maybe in the Market? Maybe you write an app just for the vote?

We really need a program in the short-term to get a rush of programs. Your early adopters are starving for some great apps to show off the platform.

 

[Major]

It wouldn't surprise me if Google already has some sort of incentive program for developers, although it's doubtful they involve actual cash payouts.

 

[siscim23]

You won't get any quality apps in a month. You're going to get a million half-assed apps released just for prize money.

The Market will start to look like the App Store, with so many useless/stupid apps.

 

[Smokexz]

This seems good and it makes sense, Google has stated that developing for Android was fast, and porting from tablet to phone or vice versa is extremely fast and simple. That doesn't mean the app will be of high quality. When you do something too fast you tend to make mistakes and just be sloppy. Still, it sounds nice... to get the devs rolling.... still only see about 70 apps for tablets, so this could be a great idea. I guess after the thing is over developers could start improving from the app or maybe just making more apps.

Sent from my Xoom

 

[weave majjik]

Financial motivation exists without a contest. Assuming around 500,000 xooms have sold, if you make a good app that's useful it will sell. Xoom owners spent either $800 or $600 on their novelty electronic item. Its safe to assume those folks have some disposable income to drop to further justify the initial purchase. Personally I have purchased numerous apps, kids ebooks, and nook magazine subscriptions just to find an excuse to use the xoom. The kids books keep the old lady from protesting to loudly about time spent on the xoom. So you have a market desparately wanting to give you their money and no one is stepping up to take it.

 

[Newton1221]

It would probably be more effective for Google to take that 2.5 million and just hire people to make apps for android. Having a contest isn't going to increase the quality, only the quantity. I don't want a bunch of POS apps, I want a handful of good apps.

 

[Smokexz]

It would probably be more effective for Google to take that 2.5 million and just hire people to make apps for android. Having a contest isn't going to increase the quality, only the quantity. I don't want a bunch of POS apps, I want a handful of good apps.

Developer count is not the problem, it's the amount of applications.... so yes in this case we care about quantity. I believe this could be good, as developers can always update the apps to improve quality. There are thousands of Android devs already developing for phones, any single one of them can develop for Honeycomb.

Sent from my Xoom