app and price

1. Prologue [1]

[1]: Prologue is actually used on the name of a popular AAC app.

Price is more than a number about cheap or expensive. There are at least two perspectives to think of the price, one from consumers point of views, one from vendors’ and developers’ point of views. In speaking of the prices of apps, most many people think apps as free and cheap digital products. 

Recently, I came across a tweet by chance, saying that "if one has premium memberships of all these software in one's phone, including Youtube, Spotify, Netflix and Tinder. Then this person should be classified as the middle class." (「如果一個人手機裡的YouTube Spotify Netflix Tinder都有加值會員,請將他是為中產階級。」)[2] This is an interesting statement that our social and wealth status is defined by the apps we use and the memberships status we are with the apps, not by our wages, our occupations or our personal estate. To a certain degree, the apps one uses represents how one receives information and interact with society. I feel the argument was somewhat exaggerated. People have premium memberships of the above apps could be using their spare money on them, and they get other plentiful consumer products in their lives. It could also be the case that, apps and their phones are the whole worlds for some people, so they spend money on these apps as necessities. However, the argument reflects some realities and expectations of apps from the public. 

Obviously,  Youtube, Spotify, Netflix and Tinder are mainstream and extremely popular apps in recent years. (Some people may want to add PornHub into the list, but it does not have an app version, only website.) They are so popular that one knowing nothing about these apps is likely to be excluded or difficult to immerse oneself in peers' groups. One knew nothing about these apps is facing difficulties to interact with one's peers; literally, one cannot share with others or being shared by others a list of Netflix show or Spotify music. Furthermore, our expectations of apps or habits of using apps are that they should be free or cheap. Consumers do not really want to spend money on apps, either buying them or paying premium memberships. However, in most cases, apps are relatively cheap compare to we do similar things in a "conventional" way. For instance, a one-year Netflix membership costs from £5.99/month*12 = £71.88/year for a basic membership to £11.99/month*12 = £143.88/year for a premium membership, which allows up to four devices to use the Netflix at the same time. And it costs £157.50/year for a colour TV licence for a household in the UK starting from April 2020. Netflix is indeed comparatively cheap than tv licence if we ignore the cost of hardware and the internet. We seem to expect free or cheap apps and omit the cost no matter could be. This is an example of how prices reflect all these different values and expectations of products. 

Most of the app products are indeed free or relatively cheap. And their free or cheap prices come in line with the development under the logic of solutionism and microfunctionality (Duguay 2019). The development of apps is solutionism, meaning that they are developed under an "intellectual pathology that recognizes problems based on just one criterion: whether they are 'solvable' with a nice and clean technological solution at our disposal (Morozov 2013)."  And apps are described as microfunctionality for they are "single and limited purposed software that splits up and breaks down multistep activities into smaller and more focused and specific components (Duguay 2019; see also Morris and Elkins 2015)." On the other hand, the development of AAC apps shares some of the traits with most apps but does not fit exactly with solutionism and microfunctionality. 

Nonetheless, being relatively cheap of AAC apps is still an outstanding trait that frequently discussed amongst developers, users and other stakeholders. Despite there are different price levels of AAC apps, from free apps up to above a few hundred pounds for an app, they are still relatively cheaper than dedicated AAC devices, which could cost roughly thousand pounds. But is it really the case? How do we think of the price issues of AAC apps? And does the development of AAC apps share traits with other apps, or does it not; and how does it differ from the development of other apps? The following paragraphs are a preliminary descriptive analysis of my interviews centred around the topic of the prices of AAC apps. I used "price," "cheap," "expensive," "cost," "spend/spent" or "£ (the logo of British pound)" as queries to search in my interviews. 

2. A preliminary descriptive analysis of my interviews

From an AAC developer's point of view, the issue of price is complex, especially for those who develop dedicated AAC devices and AAC apps at the same time. Here is an exerpt from an interviewee who works in an AAc company as a consultant manager with a computer science background and his company develop both dedicated devices and apps.

I think they[AAC apps]'ve been very successful in raising awareness of AAC in general.  The downside and in fact this is something that I recently posted on a forum, was a therapist was asking if anybody could recommend some cheap apps to use for some clients that she had in mind for AAC and it frustrated me a little bit because I wanted, and I wrote an article which I'll try and find and share with you perhaps, and basically the reason I wrote this response was saying, okay cheap isn’t always best and assuming you need an app it's quite a sweeping generalisation and I tried to give the analogy could you imagine if your doctor only gave out paracetamol?  I mean they know you've got pain, they’re going to address it by giving you morphine and paracetamol but actually what you need is abdominal surgery but it's a lot more expensive or in fact the medication you need is a lot more expensive, so again, I find it difficult to accept there are many other places that would look for a cheaper alternative.  
 
I think about you and I, I drive and I don't know if you drive but again there are so many variations and choices of cars that we need because we all have different needs.  My car at the moment is quite a big car and it's fully loaded with equipment for a conference.  I really would like a two-seater Porche but that wouldn't be suitable and so, you know, if, and it's the same with AAC.  I know people who have been given AAC apps but actually they, they're not, the battery life isn’t long enough, the voice isn’t loud enough, it isn’t durable enough, they physically can't access it well, and they need a dedicated device.  

So, that's the other side of apps where yes, they're more affordable but actually I think they’re given to people and that's a word I like to use, they're often given and not prescribed.  I find that AAC solution ... need to be prescribed and that's something that I'm quite passionate about.

[...] We have apps as well, and remember that, you know, the apps are there to be a cheaper solution, I get that, and it does fit the, certain clients, but there are apps out there, so I have people buying apps then contacting me and going, 'Can you provide us with some training?'.  I'm like, 'of course I can, no problem.' 'What would you train me on?', and I tell them and they say, 'That's fantastic, can we choose a date?', and I give them a date and I say, 'By the way, it's £295 for that training', 'Oh were not paying for that', 'like okay well there’s no training'.

If they buy a dedicated system the training's included, the support's all included, so you simply get what you pay for and in fact, I'm going to see if I can show you a picture, I'm going to see if I can find it.  I posted a picture up on my recent post on the, it's a forum called AAC for the SLP. (interview 2019/09/06)

The interviewee took some time to share his opinions on AAC apps, mostly drawbacks of them. He thought AAC apps, which is cheaper than dedicated devices, make users look for cheaper options of AAC. He used two analogies to describe the situation, one is pain killer vs surgery; one is buying cars. The car analogy implied dedicated devices, which might heavier and less fancy but are more suitable for mnay users. These two analogies also indicated the differences between AAC apps and other free or cheap apps in that AAC apps are not used on micro or trivial functions. They are, as most assistive technologies, important living essentials or similar to medical equipment. 

In the later part of the excerpt, the interviewee explicitly expressed that his company develop AAC app and launched on digital platforms as cheaper versions of their software products equipped on their dedicated devices. And the prices of these apps does not cover the fees for training. Thus, the price of their apps are much more cheaper than their correspondent dedicated devices. It is likely that the company makes the prices of apps cheaper so that they are comparable with other apps in digital platforms. After all, users are expecting apps to be free or cheap, and digital platforms like App Store are a platform that putting all kinds of product on the same place. The cheap prices of apps actually cause crises in the AAC industry and other industries. One example is in the game industry. The growing development of mobile games with their limited profits has almost destroyed many large game companies, for they could not cover their operation with the limited profits from apps when they still develop TV games at the same time.(reference to be checked). LIkewise, it is impossible for a traditional AAC company to cover the same service as they do for dedicated devices users. (See interview 2019/12/09, and I will also discuss about it in another part.)

Another interesting point he made was that AAC apps are more affordable, but they are often given not prescribed. Here, he used the word "prescribed" to describe the distribution of AAC, which means "either ‘issue a medical prescription’ or ‘recommend with authority’, as in the doctor prescribed antibiotics (Oxford Online Dictionary 2020/0624)." So what he was trying to say was AAC devices or apps should be issued or recommended by medical or relevant experts. However, when developers launch AAC apps on platforms and make them with prices, they become a consumer product and could be easily accessed and bought via digital platforms. The same interviewee also mentioned that: 

[me]:  But since the app might be, might not be funded by the, say the health system or the education authorities and they are cheap do you think the development of app will be say detrimental to the industry?  I mean the AAC industry?

[interviewee]:  I think it would be and that's my worry is that... that's my worry is that people always want to try and go as cheap as possible and go much cheaper, people, yeah people can use apps but if companies like us sells around offering specialised equipment that would be a huge loss to many people.  People always want cheaper, I get that, but those compromises have, have implications and like I said, you know, you go back to the doctor scenario, I could just give paracetamol, we would have a lot more sick people.  The problem I think we have is that these therapists have huge caseloads and what they want to go is tick, tick, tick, tick yeah they’re all done, they’re done and we know budgets are tighter, we get that, we know that happens, we know AAC, dedicated AAC, is expensive but yeah I think it would be a huge loss if there wasn't that expertise in the field of AAC, if it was just left to Apps it would be a significant loss.  Not just for the products out there but for the experience and knowledge out there as well. (interview 2019/09/06)

Again, cheap AAC devices launched on digital platforms direct users attention away from a crucial part of using them - implementation. However, there is a fixed mode to sell app on digital platforms like App store; it is unlikely to put in the process of implementation in an app selling mode. Moreover, the issue of implementation of AAC is so crucial that I will discuss it in another part of the writing, but the issue of implementation marks a huge difference of selling mode between dedicated devices and AAC apps. There are more differences between the two in terms of prices. When the same interviewee introduced me their products and emphasized the importance of marching devices with users' abilities, he continued that:

How loud an iPad is.  Is it loud enough for, in their classroom?  You know, does it need a, and that's the other thing is, people say okay it's cheaper but actually if I look through here now, if I say, for example, I'm going to get an app, it's £150 cost it's cheaper but actually I also need a specialised case that gives me robustness and durability and a keyguard and I also need [...]  yet they have to go out and buy an iPad as well so by the time I've bought an iPad, and I could be spending, I don't know, £1200 on an app, an iPad and a case.  Not, not so cheap now.  

And then who’s going to fund it because the parents would often say, well they’ve gone and spent £1200 of their own money but actually the device could have been funded by health or education and therefore cost them nothing. Although they’ve bought cheap, they needn’t have spent at all and they’d have had a lot more support ... that.  So, it, there’s many, there’s many different factors that need to be considered when you’re choosing an app or a device. (interview 2019/09/06)

This was another interesting comparison between AAC apps and dedicated devices. Not only do the prices of AAC apps not cover the training and implementation, but the cost of other hardware are not usually counted by users or customers as well, such as the price of an iPad. Interestingly, the prices of AAC apps and AAC devices have actually become cheaper, but the prices of iPad and other tablets seem to be increasing. 

[To be continued...]


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