• Over 40 sessions ranging from beginner to advanced covering topics like “Live streaming with Core Audio”, “The Fundamentals of iPad Programming” and “Game Center, Beyond Games”
• 5 Hands-on sessions including Saul Mora’s Unit Testing That Doesn’t Suck workshop, InMobi’s The Economics of Your Ad Supported Application Business, Adv. Debugging, and Xcode Customization.
• Parties Sunday thru Tuesday night including the welcome reception Sunday night after Hands-On training.
• Every attendee gets an iPad sketchbook from Apress
• Tuesday night we’ll have another Game Jam. All night game creating awesomeness!
• The speaker page is packed with awesome names. Check it out!

Second, and by many accounts more important, is the opportunity to meet and make new friends in the iPhone community. The size of 360iDev is just right so you don’t get overwhelmed by crowds and lines. This will be my third time at 360iDev and I can’t wait to hang out with the folks I met last time.

If you’re on a budget and have to pick just one conference, this is the one! It has the right mix of technical, business, marketing, and design sessions, and you won’t be disappointed. See you there!

In a short couple of weeks the App Store turns two. There will undoubtedly be big celebrations in Cupertino and elsewhere as Apple trumpets the latest milestone of its success. Here at Mundue headquarters it’s time to look back and reflect on the first two years of the App Store. Let’s start with the big news first.

A Cool 7 Million

Sometime on June 17th we passed 7,000,000 downloads for all our apps. The majority are from our reMovem games, and most of those are free downloads. Nevertheless some of our lesser known games like iKeno and inFact World are selling a decent amount each month as well.  A little while back when I realized the upcoming milestone I calculated it would occur around July 7th. Celebrating 7 million on 7/7 sounded like a great idea, and it’s close to the App Store’s actual birthday of 7/11/08. In the meantime we decided to put reMovem up on the FreeAppADay promotion site on May 4th. This resulted in an extra 96,000 downloads which sort of accelerated things a bit.

iPad Heats Things Up

Earlier this year the reMovem lineup received a major addition with the introduction of reMovem 2 for iPad. While the gameplay is familiar, the larger board and extra features have helped to pave the way for more changes in the iPhone versions. Little things like unlimited undo, theme support, and better graphics are making their way into reMovem and reMovem free with the most recent updates. The iPad is a fantastic device to use and develop for, and I can honestly say it made our extended roadtrip in May much more memorable.

Ad Revenue Spins Up

Along with the upcoming iOS4 comes iAd. Everyone is talking about iAd now. In early 2009 we put a few banner ads in reMovem free. With millions of users and dozens of updates it seemed reasonable to try to earn a little bit along the way. Because I was still working at a medical software company, I hadn’t quite reached the point where I could take the plunge as a full-time indie developer. At the time I calculated that ad revenue could eventually exceed paid app sales. There were many bumps along the road, including some bad blood between AdWhirl/AdMob and others, but eventually we ended up with ads in all our free apps and the revenue started to add up. Late last year Google began testing AdSense for iPhone and that has been a major win for us, exceeeding all other ad networks in every way. Still, with iAd on the horizon… it’s certainly worth a look.

Look Beyond Our Borders

Translation has been such a big win for reMovem, I can’t stress that fact enough. Nearly 3 million downloads of all versions of reMovem have come from outside of the U.S. It took a few months to finish the process, but we ended up with 13 languages and some months more than 50% of the downloads come from overseas. It’s a bit of a pain to manage the updates and merging changes, but well worth the effort. For those who read the earlier post about number of games played, Pinch metrics showed 1.78 billion new games, before they shut their reporting service off. [Pinch was acquired and rolled into Flurry's service.]

What’s Next?

We’ve got some short-term updates for iOS 4 and iPhone 4 compatibility, then a round of sweeping changes for the reMovem products. Having just returned from Apple’s WWDC, it’s apparent there is a long list of good things on the horizon that we need to prepare for. Of course there are a couple of top-secret projects that we’re also working on. Looks like we’re in for a long hot summer, time to head for the mountains to cool off.

WWDC is the big event of the year for Apple developers. This year’s gathering was no exception. I’ve been going on and off for twenty years; my first was in 1990 at the San Jose Convention Center. Much has changed in two decades. I was there for the System 7 rollout, and yes I met Sculley. That was during the interregnum while Steve planned his comeback. Old stuff.

This year’s WWDC was awesome by all accounts, even if there was no free phone from Apple. It’s probably hard to seriously modify the juggernaut that is WWDC, but there are signs that things are getting better. Without naming names, Apple has hired many fine indie developers and empowered others from within the organizations. In addition, several popular sessions were offered a second time in their entirety (not recorded/replayed). One unexpected treat was the opportunity to meet with App Store review team personnel, a shift from last year’s no-questions-allowed talk on the same subject.

As I’ve gone over to iPhone and iPad development full-time, I did not miss the Mac sessions too much, but one wonders what’s in store for the future. It was odd that the keynote did not touch any non-iPhone topic at all. I’m not worried about the viability of the Mac platform, but I’m concerned about the division of the developer communities. Will there be specialized developer conferences in the future?

In any case, this year’s event was a great opportunity to reconnect with old friends and meet many new ones. Although I don’t drink nearly as much as my compatriots, I did attend my fair share of the parties. This is the true advantage of WWDC: your chance to hang out with most (not all) of the best and brightest in the Mac and iPhone worlds. In addition to demoing my app to hundreds(?) at the Mobclix/Chomp/SGN Mashup,  I was lucky enough to get a write-up in TUAW, and an unscheduled consultation with John Geleynse. All in all, a great week indeed.

Can’t wait for next year!

As a part of the Indie+Relief program we are donating the proceeds from all our app sales on January 20, 2010 to assist the Haiti earthquake victims. The proceeds will be donated to both the American Red Cross and Yéle. For every dollar that is spent on our apps we will donate a dollar. This means that in addition to the 70% we normally get from Apple, we’ll contribute the additional 30% (their cut) from our own pocket. If we sell 1,000 copies of our apps (each $1.99) we’ll contribute $1,990.

You can help by purchasing one of the Mundue games: reMovem, iKeno, inFact World, inFact USA, or inFact Hoops. Already have our apps? Then visit the Indie+Relief website for a list of other independent software companies participating in this Haiti relief program.

Please help to spread the word by tweeting, emailing, or publishing a link to this page on Facebook.

Thank you!