News:


Note to reviewers: There is a collection of screen shots available for use in reviews or other distribution in Picasa gallary:
  http://picasaweb.google.com/fisherds/EZCamAndEZCamLiteScreenshots  or via this zip  Press Kit Download
   And a press release at the bottom of this page.


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July 21st

Giving the milk away for free.  Oops.

  
  From the first 7 days I've realized that I had gambled a bit too much on the success of iAds. :)  From the first week, only about 10% of EZ Cam Lite's 23,000 requests for iAds are getting filled.  So 90% of the time there is no iAd in the free version.  In a way I'm giving the milk away for free.  Of those getting iAds only 3% click the ad.  3% is actually pretty good in the ad world.  People will click the iAd to make the banner go away (well, 3% will at least).  Too bad the fill rates with iAds are so low.  90% ad free is great for users, but not so great for developers.  Oh well.  Win for you! :)

iAd Totals
 
    Right now it would appear that most iAds are given to devices using AT&T's 3G network.  Apple is limiting distribution to devices running WiFi for some reason.  I'm guessing they just need some way to throttle impressions to spread out the limited Nissan and Dove For Men money.  Nissan and Dove have GREAT iAds (they honestly are really cool), but it's too bad they are the only ones out there (no others have come to my device at least).  Also too bad those advertisers are only giving iAds to the US.   For EZ Cam Lite we sure wish there was iAd support in Japan.  That would double our meager iAd revenue (which would be welcome).  iAds certainly aren't the gold mine some developers thought it might be.  Time to start looking for other ad networks to fill the voids left by Apple's iAds (especially internationally). 

iAd country info

So EZ Cam Lite has no ads 75% of the time in the US and it is iAd FREE outside the US!    Here are the fill rates from the first week.  One day EZ Cam Lite had a 15% fill rate (the best day).  Only 85% empty that day. :)  The worst day was Friday 7/16 when we had a lot of Japanese downloads.  That day EZ Cam Lite was 95% ad free.  Life will go on. :)
fill rates

Happy to share more stats about iAds, but I think the story is pretty clear already.  For complete openning weekend numbers check out the next post.

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July 19th

Opening weekend at the Box Office for EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite!


   Well it doesn't seem fair that movies are forced to share their opening weekend numbers with the world, but iPhone apps aren't.  Lucky for you, I love numbers. :)  And I'm really happy with the EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite numbers from opening weekend.  Our two apps EZ Cam ($2.99 US) and EZ Cam Lite (free) launched in Apple's app store on Thursday, July 15th.   So I'm counting Thursday-Sunday (July 15th-18th, 2010) as our "Opening weekend".   If you find the stats behind Apple's new iAd based apps interesting then read on my friend!

There are four images that tell the story for EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite on opening weekend pretty well.  Let's look at them one at a time.

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   Download and usage stats
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#1. Total Downloads - From my iTunes Mobile app

                      Opening weekend downloads

  Thrilled at the opening weekend downloads.  My prior app "TV Night Picker" had 2000 downloads total in the life of the app.  Already EZ Cam Lite is at 2989!  So cool.  My wife grew up in a 4326 population town.  We might pass that in 2 weeks with EZ Cam Lite.  The paid version is at 118 (chart shows paid sales by day).  That one makes MobAc Design money (which is always welcome).  The chart is actually very typical.  The first day you appear in the "New Release" area.  So the first day is always better due to being in that section (expected).  The real question is "Will you go back up or just go down?"  Hard to say from 4 days.

#2. Geographical information

            Usage map

  59 countries used EZ Cam or EZ Cam Lite over the weekend!  That is so crazy.  Image if your business was a local store.  You'd reach 1 country your whole life.  With an Apple app something I wrote on my couch launched a total of 4,421 times covering 59 countries.  What a crazy way to reach the world.  BTW this image calls an app launch a "visit" (tool originally for websites).   Based on the dark green areas you can see it is the US and Japan leading the charge.

#3. Country breakdown and time of usage

    Pie chart

  HELLO Japan!   EZ Cam is huge in Japan!  Without the first day numbers Japan is actually defeating the US in total downloads!  Japan loves EZ Cam and is much faster to jump on new technology.  Thanks to Maki Hirotani for doing the Japanese translation.  You are my new best friend Maki.  Other languages are big, but Japan is crazy strong.  Localizations = Important.  The other interesting statistic is the time of usage.  On average someone uses EZ Cam for only 7 minutes and 6 seconds.  That's why it is so important that your app launch quickly and come back quickly, saving state where possible.  LOTS of very short uses.

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   Money - People always care too much about the money :)
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#4. Show me the money!
  EZ Cam cost $2.99 per download and the developer gets 70%.  So MobAc Design makes $2.10 per EZ Cam download.  EZ Cam Lite uses an iAd banner that makes $2.00 per click (which is insane!) and the developer gets 60%.  So MobAc Design makes $1.20 per click (plus a small amount for impressions).    The paid downloads were 118 and the profits from iAds are show here.

              iAd profits

So there were 118 EZ Cam downloads for $247.80
The iAd revenue per day bars shown in the image are $24.71, $6.21, $15.52, and $23.24 = Total  $69.68

So the opening weekend profits to MobAc Design total = $317.48

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   Expenses - People never like expenses
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#4. Show me the expenses!

  Very happy to make money with no variable costs, however, to be fair, I figured our expenses and they are at $1719.68.  Still some work to go to break even on this project. :)  Just image...  You too can take months of time and effort to write iPhone apps and then lose money!  Isn't that the American dream? :)  Hard work for negative money!  I do hope to make some of these expenses back but I do REALLY enjoy this project.  We're gonna keep plugin!

Major costs if you are curious (adds up somehow)
 $920 for a camera man, editing, lights, etc for shooting the tutorial video with http://www.penroseproductions.com/
 $204.32 so far in our AdWords account budget (image below)
 $200 and change for other advertisement expenses
   - FreshApps paid spot:  http://www.freshapps.com/iphone-app-review-ez-cam/
   - AppStorm quick look:  http://iphone.appstorm.net/quick-look/photography-quick-look/quick-look-ez-cam-lite-remote-camera-sharing/
 $200 in thank you cards for people that helped (personal expense)
 $150 for various monthly fees (bank, webhosting, domain name)

Quick explanation for AdWords, since that one is interesting. 

      AdWords campaign

AdWords is an advertising tool from Google that I use to get people to visit my site.  My strategy is that of a complete novice.  No clue what I'm doing.  My "strategy" has been to set my max budget per day high (yes, $60 seems high to me), but to set my maximum bid very, very low (14 cents).  Right now my AdWords bidding options are set to:

Focus on clicks, automatic bidding, CPC bid limit: $0.14
Budget: 
 
$60.00/day
German; English; Japanese
All countries and territories
I don't hit my $60 per day limit at only $0.14 max bid.  They recommend $0.75 - $1.50 so I'm a GOOD ways off the $0.75 minimum, but MobAc is too poor for much more. ;)  So $204.32 has been spent since July 8th (started early) which is only like $20 per day.  Actually I've gotten $304.32 in ads, but had a $100 coupon from HostGator.  We've gotten 2042 visit to the site for that $204.32 which is freakishly close to $0.10 per visitor to www.mobacdesign.com/ezcam

I think it's a good investment, but I hate spending more money while in the red.  Hey, let's get more iAd sales to cover our expenses by buying more ads! It's a vicious cycle. :)  Someday I hope to play this game with profits instead of cash from my pocket (analogy to poker).  Happy I've got a day job.  This is me btw http://www.rose-hulman.edu/~fisherds/  college professor at Rose-Hulman.

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   Summary
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What have I learned...

#1.  People must hate ads.  I thought by clearing off the ad banner with only a single click that people would click it (since they had something to gain).  However, the numbers say $69.68 out of 3000 downloads.  $69.68 is 58 clicks.  So out of 4421 app launches the iAd banner has been clicked 58 times.  So only 1 launch out of 76 launches makes MobAc money via iAds.  To look closer at the numbers, Day #1 was our best day for iAds and the exact numbers were...
 
Request for impressions:                   3750
Impressions requests given iAds:       519
People clicking on the iAd:                   17

So 3231 iAds out of 3750 got didn't get to the device for some reason.  This is primarily because only Nissan and Dove are giving iAds to Apple right now and they are limiting the number of impressions.  Right now it certainly seems like Apple is only giving iAds to iPhones using the 3G data network in the US.  If you use WiFi or use your device outside the US you will be iAds free.  Nice for them.  Too bad for developers betting on iAds.  Then of the 519 times an iAd DID appear, 17 people clicked it.  (That reminds me I need to go click the iAd myself today)  Anyway that's about 3% clicking the visible ad.  Oh well.  Somehow I need to convince users that clicking the ad is okay and is a benefit to you in my app.  I made the Robot video as a plug there http://www.mobacdesign.com/ezcam/ridetherobot/

#2.  Japan vs. US with a camera app seems to be favoring Japan as of late!  That's awesome!  Language translations are SO important.  I wonder what Japanese tech site wrote about EZ Cam?

#3.  Paid apps are still king!  I thought EZ Cam Lite would defeat EZ Cam in profits.  You can watch a video I made back on April 6th on the YouTube page (http://www.mobacdesign.com/ezcam/youtube/).  I had the app nearly ready then but waited until iAds came out to release this app because I believed iAds were the future of apps.  Nope.  Paid apps still win. (so far at least) Scoreboard says EZ Cam $247.80.  EZ Cam Lite $69.68.

 Well that is the summary of the Opening weekend for EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite!

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the app.
 - Dave Fisher, Developer

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July 16th

FreshApps Review

http://www.freshapps.com/iphone-app-review-ez-cam/

July 16th, 2010 by dancemonkey
      Before everyone was talking about the antenna problem with the iPhone 4, people were all abuzz about the fact that the iPad didn’t have a camera. “Why in the world would I buy that?” people asked after it was announced, then several billion of us promptly ran out and bought one anyway. We all knew that the next iteration would have a camera staring us right in the face and we bought it regardless.  In the meantime there is a great app available now that can magically add a camera to your iPad (or iPod Touch, or other iPhone… for some reason).

It’s called EZ Cam Remote Camera Sharing

  .  . .

Bottom Line:
    All in all EZ Cam is a great app that I will be holding onto, hoping for the chance to someday soon use it in a real-world scenario. It does one job, a very specific albeit very useful job, and does it very well.

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July 15th

EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite go LIVE in the app store!


EZ       EZ Cam


EZ    EZ Cam Lite - Free!

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July 6th

EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite approved for sale by Apple!  Read our press release below!



Logo             MobAc Design            icon

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MobAc Design Releases EZ Cam & EZ Cam Lite for iPhone/iPod touch/iPad

Remote Camera Sharing Application Available July 15th in Apple’s App Store

[RSS Summary]
MobAc Design (http://www.mobacdesign.com/ezcam) announces EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite – Remote Camera Sharing for iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad.  Make a wireless connection between any two devices using Bluetooth, WiFi, or 3G, then both devices can see the camera preview images at the same time and take pictures with the camera, including iPad or iPod Touch.  You can be in a different place than the iPhone, but still control the camera, as if it were in your hand!



Cupertino, CA –MobAc Design (http://www.mobacdesign.com) announces that EZ Cam – Remote Camera Sharing and EZ Cam Lite – Remote Camera Sharing, version 1.0, are available for download from Apple’s App store.

Features:
 * Share your iPhone camera with an iPad, iPod Touch, or another iPhone
 * Watch live preview images, from one camera, on both devices at the same time
 * Be in a different place than the iPhone, but control the camera like it’s in your hand
 * Connect using an iPad and the pictures are stored directly to the iPad
 * Make a connection between devices using Bluetooth, WiFi, or 3G
 * Universal app optimized for use with all devices

Uses:
 * Monitor/security cam: Watch the kids in the yard on your iPad without leaving the couch.  Stream live video preview images and they’ll love it!  
 * High tech spy tool:  Use your Apple device plus a friend’s device and you have a wireless hidden camera for all your top secret spying needs.  
 * Camera for iPad:  Someday the iPad will have a camera, but until then we have EZ Cam
 * Entertainment: Do something crazy, like put your iPhone on a balloon, and take pictures from the sky.

Videos - The best way to learn about EZ Cam
 Check out these ideas and more by watching the short videos on our website:     http://www.mobacdesign.com/ezcam

Pricing:
 EZ Cam and EZ Cam Lite are 99% identical.  EZ Cam is a paid app ($2.99 US), whereas EZ Cam Lite uses an iAd banner to make the application free.  If you view just one advertisement by clicking the banner, when you return to EZ Cam Lite, the iAd banner will be gone for the rest of the day!  It is free and easy!  Try EZ Cam Lite for FREE and see if you like it!

About us: MobAc Design, an independent app and accessory development company, based out of Terre Haute, IN, was formed in 2010 by David Fisher and Nate Medland for the purposes of creating fun and creative mobile applications and accessories.

Screenshots, app icon, and images:  http://picasaweb.google.com/fisherds/EZCamAndEZCamLiteScreenshots
Full opening weekend sales information.  See the exact numbers behind iAd apps. http://www.mobacdesign.com/news/

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If you would like further information on EZ Cam, EZ Cam Lite, or MobAc Design, or would like to schedule an interview, please contact

David Fisher, Founder, MobAc Design
Email:      ezcam@mobacdesign.com

Promotion codes to download and try the app today available upon request.




Email David Fisher