TapeDeck on the Mac App Store

Going forward, TapeDeck will be available for purchase exclusively through the Mac App Store. I feel that the Mac App Store and TapeDeck are a great fit.

Based on my experience with supporting TapeDeck's customers, I learned that it is very common for folks to purchase the application sight-unseen, and then they have trouble registering the app, or simply forget to.

What's worse is when I get a gut-wrenching email from a paying customer that tried to record a meeting, only to realize that TapeDeck cut out after 5 minutes because it is in trial mode.

When I encountered situations like the above, it made me wonder whether TapeDeck was better suited to a pay-to-download model. Or, if it should exist as boxed software (which I get asked about quite a bit.)

Handling licensing and registration is a difficult problem, and I think I've handled it well in Capo and FuzzMeasure. However, both of those applications serve very different markets (which include products requiring hardware dongles, networked license servers, etc.)

TapeDeck's customers have made it clear to me that licensing and demo limitations are the largest blemish on TapeDeck's reputation. I am so glad to finally offer an improved solution for customers from now on.

I am also looking forward to a better track record for product updates in the field. Many customers requesting support appear to still be using older copies of the software, having chosen to disable the automatic Sparkle updates. I can only assume that the Mac App Store will make this a better experience by offering system-wide update checking.

Free updates to the 1.x product will continue for paid customers of TapeDeck. It means a bit of extra maintenance on my part, but I will do my best to keep my existing customers happy.

If you haven't already, head over to the Mac App Store and check out TapeDeck. Maybe buy a copy for a friend as a gift, if you already have one for yourself… :)