Google Extends Market Refund Window to 48 Hours; Pulling Spam Apps from Market?
Let’s face it: with the openness of the Android market comes a pretty foul cesspool that – instead of nasty sewage – is filled with useless apps. Not to step on the toes of the developers of some of these apps, but the Android market could really do without you clogging it up and getting in the way of the goods. According to AppBrain, one developer – For-side.com Co. Ltd. – had published over 4,000 apps. To date, most of them appeared to be eBooks with good intentions.
We can’t say there’s a surefire way to describe spam in the Android market (mostly “[name of celebrity or popular entity] Gallery” apps are generally regarded as spam) but something’s not right when you have more apps on the market than most people will be able to hold on their phones (even those with root and apps to SD functionality). The fact that most of the aforementioned company’s offerings were eBooks doesn’t give them a pass: why not offer one platform (like the professionals – Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and Kobo) and offer the downloads through that?
Similarly, developer StoneJordan had over 500 apps in the Android market. Where are these guys now, you ask? I can’t say for sure, but I can tell you that they aren’t in the Android market. Google will often remove malicious apps or apps that violate the terms of use (either the ones Google’s set for Android or terms set by a carrier). This time, however, is different. It’s not often we see Google bulk-removing a developer’s apps by way of suspending their developer account, and the fact that these two instances occurred within a week of each other gives us cause to believe Google might finally be cracking down.
We’re not sure to what extent they’ll be trying to clean things up – nor do we know if this is some sort of new excursion against spam apps for the long haul – but we like it and we hope Google continues to take the appropriate steps toward creating a better market experience.
If all of today’s market news wasn’t enough (earlier we learned they’re gearing up to bring more purchase options to make purchasing apps easier), you might also be pleased to know that Google’s increased (or will be increasing) the trial period for paid apps in the Android market. The developers behind WidgetLocker told Androinica that the new changes to the developer agreement included the change from a 24-hour period to a 48-hour period for refunding apps and games. As I went to the market to purchase a game it still showed 24 hours. I clicked through to Google’s full refund policy to see if they’d updated anything on their support side and the refund policy there still shows 24 hours, as well.
Perhaps the changes haven’t been implemented just yet in order to give developers time to accept or reject the changes (Google’s giving them 30 days to do so) but the change is definitely coming. As time goes on, it’ll be interesting to see what else Google will end up doing to try and offer users, developers, and anyone else in the Market ecosystem a better experience overall.