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<blockquote data-quote="resistor" data-source="post: 4858912" data-attributes="member: 9142">Despite the fact that we've publically explained this, people still don't that we actually really don't charge that to spite people.We got in a lot of trouble a while for &quot;suspicious accounting practices&quot; where we accounted for a sale at time of sale (duh), but then put money into providing upgrades/new features that were accounted for after the sale.&nbsp; While support/maintenance expenditure is obviously kosher, apparently upgrades/new features after accounting for the initial sale is not.For the iPhone, we account for the sale over a two-year period.&nbsp; As in, you pay $X up front, but we actually account for that sale as a sale of $X/24 for each month over a two year period, so we're OK on providing upgrades/new features post-sale on it.&nbsp; However, this screws with our quarterly financial reports, because it hides the influence of (say) the holiday sales surge, or the sales rate of new releases, which can negatively impact stock performance, etc.&nbsp; As such, we simply can't use that trick for our entire product line, in addition to the fact that it just doesn't make practical sense for a product that really is buy-once like the iPod Touch, in contrast to a subscription-based product like the iPhone.So the nominal fee for feature upgrades (not bug fix/maintenance updates) really is necessary from a not-getting-in-legal-trouble perspective.&nbsp; Trust me, we wouldn't do it if we didn't have to.&nbsp; The income from iPod Touch upgrades isn't nearly enough to offset the real development costs, and it's a huge pain to audit every free release to make sure it's not too featureful or whatnot.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="resistor, post: 4858912, member: 9142"] Despite the fact that we've publically explained this, people still don't that we actually really don't charge that to spite people. We got in a lot of trouble a while for "suspicious accounting practices" where we accounted for a sale at time of sale (duh), but then put money into providing upgrades/new features that were accounted for after the sale. While support/maintenance expenditure is obviously kosher, apparently upgrades/new features after accounting for the initial sale is not. For the iPhone, we account for the sale over a two-year period. As in, you pay $X up front, but we actually account for that sale as a sale of $X/24 for each month over a two year period, so we're OK on providing upgrades/new features post-sale on it. However, this screws with our quarterly financial reports, because it hides the influence of (say) the holiday sales surge, or the sales rate of new releases, which can negatively impact stock performance, etc. As such, we simply [I]can't[/I] use that trick for our entire product line, in addition to the fact that it just doesn't make practical sense for a product that really is buy-once like the iPod Touch, in contrast to a subscription-based product like the iPhone. So the nominal fee for feature upgrades (not bug fix/maintenance updates) really is necessary from a not-getting-in-legal-trouble perspective. Trust me, we wouldn't do it if we didn't have to. The income from iPod Touch upgrades isn't nearly enough to offset the real development costs, and it's a huge pain to audit every free release to make sure it's not too featureful or whatnot. [/QUOTE]

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