Consumer app of the week

Got a killer idea for an app but don’t know how to get it to market? Submit it to FundedApps and watch the cash roll in … or that’s the theory at least App: FundedApps By: Offficial , the trading name of Ridgegate Digital Price: Free Available on: iPhone What is it? It allows you to submit your own app ideas, for £1.19 a pop, to the FundedApps creators who will analyse your idea before dumping it or creating it. Who is it by? FundedApps was formed in November 2010 as part of Offficial – an investment funding company which develops mobile apps, set up by ex-Nokia designer Alastair Curtis and msn.co.uk developer Jamie Lyons – and launched in February. What does it promise? FundedApps says it is “bringing brilliant ideas to life”. If it likes your idea it will pay £250 plus 25% of any net profit the app makes when it is published. How does it work? FundedApps will acknowledge receipt of your idea in writing within three working days of your submission, and you will get a simple “yes” or “no” decision within seven working days (app ideas not submitted in English will automatically be categorised as a “no”). If accepted, your idea must overcome a further hurdle: it will be presented to an investment committee and you will only get your £250 if the committee grants final approval. FundedApps still reserves the right to cancel development of your app after this stage but it won’t ask for the £250 to be refunded if it does so. Once you have been paid £250 you effectively give up your full rights to the app. You will then be paid 25% of net profits on a quarterly basis within 15 working days of the end of each quarter, and be provided with a statement setting out the revenue generated and your share of it. So far, so transparent. But what happens if your idea is rejected? According to the legal blurb FundedApps will keep your idea “in strict confidence”, and employees, agents and sub-contractors will be bound by confidentiality obligations. And Curtis himself says “All ideas are time-stamped and logged on a database, and we have no ownership of ideas unless they go forward. If we reject an idea, it remains the owner’s idea.” Is it easy to use? The actual process is simple. The home page features a giant grey wheel that users can move to access their history, notes and the legal terms and conditions – and has a large purple button in the middle for users to submit an idea. If users do so it is at this point they enter into a binding contract with Offficial. Is it fun? The process itself is not exactly a riot – you cut and paste an idea into a box and click send – although the wheel does make a robotic noise and parts of it glow when it turns. It would obviously be more of a blast if your idea gets turned into an app, but this is statistically unlikely: the creators state “the percentage of rejections will be high so brace yourselves for a potential rejection.” Is it pretty? There’s nothing offensive here, but the predominantly black and steel-grey colour scheme has a touch of the 80s Playboy theme about it. Should you download it? It’s free, so there’s nothing to lose, but whether you want to pay £1.19 to upload your app idea is a different story. If you are a clueless, penniless technophobe who happens to have a smart idea, it might be worth a look. But if you have any other way of getting your idea built and to market there seems little point in signing over the majority of your potential revenue to FundedApps. As Curtis himself says: “The price of £1.19 helps provide a buffer to prevent people submitting silly or bogus ideas.” Ed Lea of established app developers Grapple Mobile says the FundedApps creators will undoubtedly make the most money out of the app, but it’s “not a bad deal for some consumers”. He was a little wary because the company could not provide any evidence of a customer’s idea making it to market. Indeed, since its launch the creators are yet to publish a customer-led app, nor will they say how many app ideas have been accepted, nor can it produce case studies of people who have had an idea taken forward to the next stage. Until this happens, FundedApps will face a degree of scepticism. Consumer affairs Internet, phones & broadband Apps iPhone Apple Mark King guardian.co.uk

Posted by on April 15, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.