Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Nokia has all the information they need. Just by reading the comments of the ovi users, they should be aware of the problem. Peter where are you?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

This is outrageous.

From the "OVI STORE PUBLISHER REGISTRATION AND DISTRIBUTION AGREEMENT" on publish.ovi.com:

"By accepting this Agreement, You certify that You are of the legal age of majority in the jurisdiction in which You reside, and You represent and warrant that You are legally permitted to participate in the Program.

If You are agreeing to be bound by this Agreement on behalf of Your employer or other entity, You represent and warrant that You have full legal authority to bind Your employer or such entity to this Agreement."

no mention whatsoever of incorporation as requirement.

also, NOWHERE is there mention of VAT registration as a requirement.

"Any VAT, sales tax, service tax, business tax, turnover tax, IVA, ISS or any similar tax levied on You in the country where You are registered for tax purposes is solely Your responsibility."


more and more i get the feeling that OVI is really really flawed on so many levels, that it's very hard to imagine it being a success any time soon... rather the opposite.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

First up, let me say, I fully agree. Something does need sorting out here, as I've said earlier on.

Second - lord almighty.

Peter is a person, that he is also an employee of Nokia is a tangent to this which you shouldn't hold first and foremost in your mind - but while we're on that topic, he is in the marketing department for Maemo. I hardly think that he's going to be the best qualified to make a statement on this.

What I'm trying to say is - the issue is out in the open, hopefully one of the employees (Quim, Peter or other) brings this to the attention of the Ovi people, and the ball will start rolling.

Specifically naming names all the time (especially in areas of which people probably aren't the best qualified) is hardly going to make them feel more encouraged to post here, so that they get jumped on by every single poster, no? :)

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Luckily, here in the US it only costs a couple hundred bucks (and somewhere between $0 and $150 a year in most states) to form an LLC.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Costs are obvious: we understand that Nokia actually needs to put people to work to do the validation and all the checking.
But a fair price that a single developer can afford.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

I've just had a quick scan of the Ovi Publishers agreement. I am far from a lawyer, but it seems very generic to me.

I was specifically looking for any clause that would prevent a consortium. I couldn't find one, but that doesn't mean it wasn't there. There was one clause that might cause problems:
I can imagine providing support could be worked around somehow, but I could see Nokia terminating the agreement under that clause if they sense something is afoot.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

How about this? Instead of the sign up fee and 70% revenue, have an option for a smaller sign up free and a larger cut going to Nokia?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

There are registrars in places like Nevada that will form a US corporation for anyone (even if they do not live there). US corporations can do business world wide. The cost for this is low -- maybe less than $100.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Perhaps, but the administrative burden associated with maintaining a LLC - separate books, licensing and compliance filings (depending on the state) , and taxes can be a real pain in the a**.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Yes if the app you submit is crap and doesn't sell. Because if it does you just have shot yourself in the foot ;)

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Yes, but if it is the only way you can distribute your app, it gets you started. Make money off your first app, then become more serious and establish a business entity.

I know it's not a brilliant idea, I'm just throwing suggestions in the air.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Hi, I'm about to jump on a plane to Maemo Developer Days @ Copenhagen. Short answer and see you later. :)

https://publish.ovi.com/login

See the link "Publishing to Ovi discussion board on Forum Nokia". If you want to give direct feedback to Ovi as a developer that is the official channel for you. maemo.org is about community development, Forum Nokia concentrates in commercial developers.

"VAT / Tax ID" is a compulsory field in the registration form. What information did you put there?

Having a VAT / Tax ID is generally a good idea when doing business. In most countries it's cheap and easy to get one. And in most places the accounting gets complicated as your revenues grow, having to do basically nothing complicated for low incomes.

Some people are opposing "freelance" to "corporation". Let's not get lost in language and translation. Individuals can get a VAT / Tax ID and form a single person company. I have been a self-employed before joining Nokia, and it's not rocket science if you make your living out of it.

Now, in many places you simply can't start selling limonade inside a mall. The problem is less about accounting (if you make 1M you will have to justify that income no matter what) than about liabilities: what if you sell fake Fanta as genuine Fanta? what if you actually are making limonade out of industrial soap poisoning your customers? The mall wants to make sure that it won't be them having to cover your liabilities because you can't yourself. A VAT code implies a legal framework about your commercial activity.

The Maemo Devices team is discussing with the Ovi team about ways to accelerate the acceptance of individuals but, to be honest, our primary case are open source developers distributing free (as in beer and as in speech) software with liabilities defined in the license ("... AT YOUR OWN RISK", says the GPL and others).

I'm happy discussing here further about how to connect OSS developers to Ovi, now and in the future. If you want to lobby for a lower filter for low income commercial developers then Forum Nokia is the right place to propose and discuss.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Fair enough, Quim, and many thanks for taking time to respond. Enjoy Copenhagen!

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

@qgil
Right, it's as I thought, and it makes perfect sense.

It's also about being legal and paying income tax I suppose. At least here in Finland you need to have a VAT / Tax ID to charge for your services legally. If you just want to distribute your product, and not make money, you can use maemo.org to distribute instead. Not VAT ID needed for that :)

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Firstly thank you all for your replies - they've been very interesting and have continued to address - and echo, many of the concerns and sentiments I've seen.

My point of contention is not with the fact that Nokia is asking for a Tax ID, it is that in many other countries, having a Tax ID is not a mandatory component for doing business.

Apple has been able to offer this service to all developers, corporation or not, without requiring them to be a corporation. Even the comparatively small company I work for pays out thousands of dollars to individuals around the world every month without this requirement. Why this is a problem for a company as large as Nokia I do not understand.

The vast majority of developers aren't going to have a clue about how to register a business. Similarly, most developers aren't going to take on the annual risks and responsibilities of managing a small company unless they're damn sure that they'll be making enough to be worthwhile. Getting your foot in the door is a minimum $200 (Ovi registration + business incorporation).

I'm fortunate enough to have had many years of business in my background of development. Today I started the arduous process of registering a corporation. Once my business name request gets approved (time), I can then prepare my articles of corporation and shareholder assignments, etc, etc, ad nauseam. The vast majority of developers looking to get paid for their work are going to say '**** that' and that will be the extent of their Maemo Development.

Since Quim has made it clear that this policy is here to say, all I can stay is that I'm deeply saddened by Nokia's inability to keep up with it's competitors.

Evidently it's time to call it a day.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

The way it looks to me right now, this is less about our inability to do business through Ovi than about Ovi not becoming a viable channel for app distribution, ever. As a developer, I will find a way to sell my applications, even by providing a private link to .install file. As an ecosystem manager though, Nokia is going to lose my business.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

As said, this is work in progress and you can get probably frsher and more direct news from Forum Nokia.

Ovi operates in +100 countries and I guess some base legal framework needs to be found first. I believe your feedback about specific problems with specific countries will help them fine tuning the business model

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

I agree. That's indeed the problem here.
How Apple (and Google Android) do and why Nokia can't do the same?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

don't forget to pay Christiania a visit ;)

sad to hear that single developers aren't on the Ovi Publisher's radar. i hope the maemo team at nokia manages to change this soon.
otherwise i expect many "one app" repositories for maemo, fragmenting the whole ecosystem, and making this OS less and less enduser friendly.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Seems like you did not read comment 52 in this thread.
Please go up there and read it.
Thanks.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Nokia is a big corporation, and it's clear that some parts of it are inflexible. Even though Nokia seems to be changing in the right direction, it might take years to get to where we want to be, by which time the battle for developers will be lost.

So let me propose something completely different, starting from these assumptions:

• 1. There are talented Maemo developers who have written great software that is commercially viable.
  
• 2. There are plenty more talented Maemo developers who would write such software if they had a simple way to sell it.
  
• 3. Due to our background in Open Source, we tend to have different values and interests from mainstream software companies.
  
• 4. Most of us would be (at best) small-time developers. So we need a commercial framework that's very simple and has a very low barrier to entry.

Here's what I suggest.

We operate a service (which I'll call "Premium Maemo Apps", just for the sake of this discussion). It's a subscription service - let's say $25 per year, the same amount as a Flickr Pro account.

In return for the subscription fee, the customer gets unlimited access to the "Premium Maemo Apps" repository, and to a set of support forums.

The Premium Maemo Apps repository is filled with open source apps. There's no DRM. Personalization of the apps is allowed (e.g. the title bar could say who bought it) but because it's open source there's nothing stopping people removing that.

The service comes with a Premium Apps Manifesto which is a list of things that make the apps trustworthy: open development, no trojans, no spyware etc. This is the unique selling point of the service.

Of course not just any open source Maemo app would be accepted into the service, so there would need to be a review process.

And where do the subscription fees go? Some is used to operate the service, and the rest goes to the developers. How is it split up? Obviously some algorithm must be worked out, which should be kept simple and transparent so that people spend their time developing and supporting their software (and therefore growing the size of the monetary pie) rather than arguing endlessly about who gets what share of a smaller pie.

Regards,
Roger

PS: This is not just empty waffle. I operate uclue.com, a paid Q&A/research service which aggregates the services of individual researchers and pays them 50% to 70% of what the customer pays to Uclue. I can see many analogies to how a Premium Maemo Apps service could operate, paying a proportion of the subscription fee to the app developers.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

If you're posting free software, what stops someone simply pulling the software from your 'premium' repo and reposting it in maemo-extras?

In fact, other than charging 25 USD a year, how does this proposal differ from maemo-extras?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

if i read this correctly from a UK perspective:

I am registered self-employed and thus have a tax ID i believe.

I could also apply for and receive VAT registration from HMRC.

Having both of these things I would be able to sign up to Ovi, and commercially sell my aplications through the Ovi Store.

If that is the case, then that is entirely reasonable.

If being registered self-employed and VAT registered is not enough, then that is a pile of pants.

Have i read this correctly?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

i thought i did?
this sentence suggests that single developers trying to publish commercial software are not a priority...

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

I agree completely. I'm very curious how it really is though. Do you know how it is Quim?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Note: This is more a bit playing devil's advocate, I sincerely do hope that there will be many great open source applications for maemo. But there might be people who do not want to go that road (yeah, Apple spoiled everyone with their app store and the "promise" to get rich on apps". But I still think there needs to be a way to get software on the phone if you are "just a person" and want to see some reimbursement for the time you put in.

So I'm this guy who is employed. In my spare time I'm developing some applications for the N900. [Okay, this isn't true, I didn't take non-free into account: As I am not into OpenSource, I cannot put those through Maemo Extras (or what it is called now)]

But I'd like to offer them for - say - EUR 0.99 somewhere - that's where the ovi store comes in.

Quim said that the Tax ID is used to make sure, that the person somehow is trustworthy. Guess what: In Germany every person has a Tax ID which doesn't change during the lifetime of that person.

Or does it have to be a VAT ID? That means that I would have to incorporate myself besides already being employed by someone, which adds a nice overhead when doing your taxes.

Sorry, in my view that still is broken, even if I can understand, that Nokia doesn't want to take liability for breaches through software in the ovi store.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Can you only submit open source stuff to extras? I didn't know that.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Ah, I'm sorry, there also is a non free repository.

So yes, parts of my post above are moot. Thanks!

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Absolutely nothing! That's how free software works.

What stops people pulling the Creative Commons music from Magnatune.com and reposting it elsewhere? Absolutely nothing. But Magnatune appears to still be in business.

What's to stop people getting water from a tap instead of buying it in a bottle from the store? Absolutely nothing. But somehow the supermarket shelves have a profitable "bottled water" section.

1. The assurance of the Premium Apps brand. People will get to know that apps from the Premium Apps store don't expire, don't spy on you, etc.

2. Access to the support forum, where customers will get knowledgeable support, often from the developers themselves.

And finally, there are actually some people who think that paid-for software must be better than free-of-cost software. Strange but true.

Regards,
Roger

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

@eiffel
I like the idea and your points are very good. I still hope that ovi store would be sorted and usable for maemo developers. I think the "maemo premium apps" idea could be hard to get to the end users without direct support from nokia (like having the link or app or whatever is needed included in the firmware)

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Am I understanding correctly this is almost exactly Solution #2 in Brainstorm ? People downvoted it like hell without any meaningful comments.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Let me insist: https://publish.ovi.com/login has a link to http://discussion.forum.nokia.com/fo...play.php?f=202 where you get directly in front of Forum Nokia and Ovi guys.

PS: another reminder, I'm in charge of open source activities in the Maemo Devices team.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

It should be the other way round. Extras IS the premium repo here, as it's the one with the infrastructure, QA, promotion and all. 25/yr is a bit steep, it should be a micropayment. Like 1$/month. Then you can say Apple folks I get access to X thousand apps for 1$ a month, and I get to keep all of them if I decide to quit ! If you're a geek and into coding you can get the sources and make your own repo/version stuff, but that one has no 'seal of approval' nor does it reward the actual developers, so it's bound to be less popular. If you're not a developer and you don't care about that then you're not that much different than folks who get warez, in which case, again, nothing lost (and at least there won't be embarrassing legal followups).

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

I agree in principle, but there's no efficient way to collect $1/month without the costs being excessive.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

AIUI Ovi can do efficient micropayments by simply charging them to the user's phone bill. Which (I believe) is also how the iPhone store does it.

However, I don't think there's much point trying to charge people for free software.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Hello,

Jan Bonnevier has been just talking about Ovi Store and was asked specifically about opening the publishing process for the individuals. The reply was: I don't dare to comment on those plans. He also stated that he is aware of the problem and freelancers wanting to publish, but this problem is still not addressed yet.

So the discussion is open.


[edit] I had a chance to talk to Jan and he elaborated a bit on the subject of requirements for the publisher. In general, it just needs to be a registered company, doesn't matter if it is 50 people or one person. He promised to send me some materials about this, I'll let you know if there is anything new/interesting in there.

He also said that they (Ovi people) are aware of the gap between free repositories and Ovi Store being only for companies. He also said that he sees a place for $1 applications that are used once and then forgot, if that's what people want/like.

No specifics about this, they are still thinking how to address this issues.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

You're not charging them for software, not any more than paying for the electricity that runs a Linux box is considered payment for free software.

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

http://n900blog.wordpress.com/2009/1...y-open-source/

the site get a reply to your query from Chanse Arrington and Anidel

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

If half the content on Ovi Store really is malicious (which I still find hard to believe), then why does any consumer use it at all, and why would anyone want to publish there?

Re: Left high-and-dry by Nokia/Ovi store :(
 

Out of interest, do we have any idea how many people are developing for the N900 Ovi store? Would be amusing if I was the only person with apps on it...

I'm starting to see the silver lining ;)

(business name approved today! woots)