Notification for Existing Users re Mac App Store

bobbd

I suppose this was inevitable. More and more apps will switch to the Mac App Store (MAS). It's unfortunate that Apple didn't provide a mechanism for Apps to detect that there was an existing version and allow upgrades. I have been very happy with 1Password and Agile's support. And I can't argue with you charging for a version 4. Unfortunately, most existing users will have no choice but to upgrade in order to stay current. But all of that is not my question.



Which is, why didn't you send an email to existing users telling them of all of this before it happened? I'll bet that half of the messages and posts are because people were surprised at the change and simply reacted to it. You could have put the FAQ into the email.



You say that you're offering 1Password at 50% off for a limited time. This again is why you should have notified your existing customer base first. Now my question is, how long is a limited time? Should I be rushing to upgrade ASAP?



Bob

Ben

Hi Bob,



For a little background info... 1Password was just accepted into the MAS last night (around midnight I'm told). This was MUCH sooner than we expected it to be approved.



We try not to send out a lot of email. Of course, there has to be a balance somewhere.



We don't have a definition of a "limited time" at this point. We haven't even made that decision internally as far as I'm aware. We want to give folks a fair chance at getting the discount, but can't leave it up forever. <img src='http://forum.agilebits.com/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=';)' /> As I mentioned in the FAQ, we aren't able to do rain checks, so if you definitely know you want to purchase 1Password 3.9 at the discounted price, I would suggest that sooner would be better than later.



Thanks

Ben

bobbd

Thanks for the reply and I certainly understand about discounted prices and how the App Store works. 1Password was submitted a certain number of days ago. Presumably you expected that the approval process would take at least a week or two. My point is that unless Apple prohibits it, in my opinion you should have started sending out notifications when you submitted it to the App Store. It's as simple as saying this is what's happening, here's the FAQ, for an updated version please see, and this is the pricing scheme.



However, that ship has sailed so to speak so there's no use beating a dead horse or digging up a bunch of other analogies. I'm hoping that you will be sending out a notification to all existing users. I only found out from an article in MacWorld.



And I'll be purchasing soon. As I said, I like 1Password and support has been great to date.



Bob

MikeT

Hi Bob,



We'll look into this but I can't guarantee anything. It is certainly possible that Apple may add support for notifications in a future update to the Mac App Store app and give you what you're asking for.



The other thing you can do is subscribe to our twitter feed at @1password, which will release any updates information we have. Many of our users found out about the updates via here.



Thanks for your suggestion.