“The overnight success of iShoot is one of those fantastical stories that causes instant buzz among iPhone developers and fanboys alike. Developer Ethan Nicholas, is having the kind of success with iShoot that many app creators will hope is contagious,” iPhone Savior reports.
“Ethan’s tank combat game originally went live in the App Store back on October 19, 2008. The response from cult of iPhone fanatics was ‘just ok’ according to Nicholas. Soon after its launch, iShoot disappeared into obscurity only after a moderate number of downloads,” iPhone Savior reports. “‘I work a day job at Sun Microsystems,’ Nicholas told the iPhone Savior in a short phone interview, ‘I developed iShoot in my spare time with no updates since it was first released.'”
“Finding time to tinker with iShoot over the Christmas break, Nicholas decided to release a free ‘Lite’ version of his $2.99 app, hoping it would be rediscovered by iPhone faithful,” iPhone Savior reports. “That brilliant decision turned out to be the magic bullet iShoot needed. ‘iShoot Lite‘ went live on January 3, 2009. Less than ten days later on January 11, the original iShoot rocketed out of obscurity as the number one Top Paid App in the iTunes App Store with 16,972 downloads in one day. It virtually blasted the reigning number one iFart app off its perch overnight. iShoot simultaneously grabbed the Top Free App number one spot as well.”
iPhone Savior reports, “For an app to reach number one and remain there, some 10,000 plus downloads per day are required. That’s roughly $21,000 a day for this $2.99 app after Apple takes its 30-percent stake… ‘I’m still in shock,’ Nicholas said, ‘I’ve given my two week notice at Sun Microsystems. I’m gonna do this full time now.'”
Full article here.
Lucky basturd.
My advice to Nicholas: Don’t quit your day job.
Not lucky at all. His hard work and dedication is what did it. He deserves the success.
Not sure luck had anything to do with it–seems like he created his own “luck” through creativity, hard work, and marketing smarts!
Congratulations and best wishes to him.
Jake
@drmacnut
Why not? With this on his resume, I’m sure he could get any number of other developer jobs.
The value of giving a free version to try out first. Tons of interesting looking apps out there I won’t pay to test out. But would gladly pay for if I like them
iFart?
@Jacob, I suppose you may be right. It just seems that having one hit on such a fickle enterprise as the iPhone App store so quickly might not mean he can necessarily do it again. I applaud his good work and his good fortune, no question there. It just seems to me that he could probably find time on weekends, evenings, etc., to work on other apps and see how they do, all the while keeping his job at Sun. That is the perfect money to put into retirement funds and so on.
It just seems to me that he may be quitting his job too early. But who knows, eh? I wish him all the best of luck regardless.
Good for you, Ethan. Best of luck!
Sure this guy is lucky, he is lucky in the sense of getting the smarts, the creativeness and the motivation. Good for him. He also had the vision to entice people to use his application by providing a light version for free. I has 4 stars in a half and he is going to be making even more money in the future as the iPhone gains further popularity. Last moth everybody in my office jumped on the iPhone. What a cool gadget it is.
@drmacnut Day jobs are highly over rated.. There is no longer such a thing as job security. The only job security one can have is the security they create themselves. Good for him for getting himself set up! Besides do the numbers.. he’ll take in more in three days than he makes a year at his day job.
You go boy!!!
D.
ok, for the lovers of day jobs, some calculations:
$21,000 a day he is collecting.
Lets say he has a decent day job of $75K. Every 4 days of iphone app downloads is worth 1 yr of his day job.
do the math, 1 month of downloads is worth 7 years of slavin’ for the man.
Wow, his app blew iFart right out of its Number One position!
God I wish I knew how to program.
Not a lover of day jobs, but do want to add some corrections to caddisfly’s comments:
$21,000/day – this only counts for as long as he stays on top of download list. This is virtually by definition a limited thing. Let’s bank on less than a month in top 10 (though could easily end up being longer).
Decent job at 75k – you have to count benefits, which might well double his salary (healthcare, taxes being the biggie). So he needs to ‘bring home’ in the neighborhood of $150k to maintain same lifestyle and benefits of before.
Now he’s also running his own business, which means continued development costs, marketing, art, etc (overhead anotherwords). For now I won’t factor in anything here, but just be aware that he does have costs to cover there also.
So if he manages to stay on top of list for 10 days, and brings home $210,000, he’s definitely done well enough to justify working for himself. But he’s just over a year’s worth of income (especially after Uncle Sam gets involved). Meanwhile this app will move down with or without continued updates, maybe marketing – as every previous #1 has. That means, given the current iPhone app market, that he needs to find another hit by next year.
Which is doable since he’s freed up from his day job and obviously some level of competent. I wish him the best of luck, envy him slightly, and hope to make similar luck of my own one of these days.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” /> Aren’t iPhone success stories wonderful?! (Just keep in mind he’s one out of tens of thousands of developers.)
MW: cost. heh.
Have to agree with drmacnut: I am thrilled the guy hit #1 but, as with music, you have 1-hit wonders. 21G/day is indeed giggle-inducing but I’d have waited to see if my second app is just as successful. On that note, off to d/l the Lite version
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Grrrrrr…..as my iPhone app sits in limbo as I struggle to get the SQLite database to work properly.
I have to agree with those who thinks this kid may be jumping the gun. This isn’t like Trism, where the developer became a millionaire and was able to start his own software company. iTank has been at the top of the list for a whopping three days. He probably hasn’t even received his first check from Apple yet!!
Heck, by the time his two-week notice period at Sun is over, things could have changed greatly.
But I do wish the guy luck.
——RM
I think the whole deal is brilliant. Probably writing the second hit is the hardest, but still worth a try. The key is to capture some of that income and use it to avoid making interest payments across the board and to find ways to turn the upfront wad of cash into sustainable income streams.
Once you write the second hit, you’ve got proven chops as a developer and can hire out to companies that want a custom app, but haven’t got in-house capabilities. The hope is to produce that app that all 20 million (or so) iPhone owners must have. A fellow can dream, can’t he?
The benefits on top of a $75k job is not another $75k. It’s more like $25k for health insurance, social security, retirement plan, etc. So, he only needs to beat $100k, and then he can deduct some home office business expenses that he didn’t have before.
@LordRobin
The brilliant part is you don’t need the company, the marketing department, etc, etc…
You need a Mac, an iPhone, brains and programming skills. Apple has worked the entire distribution chain. Maybe some viral marketing, but no need to create a kingdom.
Good deal, keep at it
And to the 1,000,000’s of other Ethan Nicholas’s out there
May you all sell 1,000,000,000’s of Apps
And make $100,000,000,000’s
Change the World™
BC
Hope it lasts – he might find himself knocking on Sun’s door again before too long!
Re: adding a “Lite” version to stimulate sales. I really wish Apple would offer a trial period for paid software. I would like to try some but won’t pay when the quality is unknown, the customers reviews can’t be relied on, and there’s no refund process. The result is, I don’t buy at all unless I read a thorough review in a tech magazine.
Could this be why some big developers are complaining (albeit obtusely) about the way the store is set up? They have been used to owning the market, and the small independents are getting a fair chance now.
For all their complaints, bottom line is all you have to do is beat iFart… and they are not happy about that?