I launched a Mac utility; now there are 5 clones on the App Store using my story

50•tTarnMhrkm•1h ago

I'm a solo dev, and I wanted to share a recent experience as a case study on the current state of the App Store and indie development.

A few months ago, I built a simple macOS utility to solve a personal frustration: verifying the actual speed of USB-C cables and devices in the Mac menu bar. It is call USB Connection Information (usbconnectioninformation.com) and it supports macOS 13 and up. Before launch, there were no other apps in this specific niche on the Mac App Store. The app became unexpectedly successful, hitting the top 100 paid utilities and getting a good amount of organic press.

In the last two weeks, at least five near-identical apps have appeared on the App Store. The concerning part is that some of these clones have copied my App Store description, including my personal origin story about why I built the app.

A few open-source clones have also appeared on GitHub, which I see as a positive community contribution. My concern is with the commercial clones on the App Store that are engaging in plagiarism.

This raises a few questions I'd be interested to hear HN's thoughts on:

I've been transparent about my success on Reddit. How much are LLMs lowering the barrier to entry, allowing others to take a validated idea and marketing copy and generate a functional clone in a matter of days?

It seems that derivative apps with plagiarized descriptions and app elements are being approved without issue. Does this signal a shift in App curation?

My app's value is its simplicity. In an environment where simple, successful ideas can be replicated this quickly, what is the moat? Is it brand, speed of innovation, marketing, or something else?

Curious to hear your perspectives.

Comments

joshu•1h ago

DMCA the ones using your text?

tTarnMhrkm•1h ago

I am in the process for doing this. I have heard mixed results on action taken for these. There are some that I would think it is extremely clear on. Thanks for the info!

add-sub-mul-div•1h ago

Can you build a moat on someone else's property?

tTarnMhrkm•1h ago

Lol, depends on the century.

cwmoore•1h ago

Can they?

akerl_•1h ago

It's not clear to me what you'd want the moat to be. It can't be the idea, because you don't hold ownership over the concept of checking USB device speed. The marketing copy is pretty clearly something you could DMCA but also it seems unlikely people are buying a USB connection tester because of the dev's origin story.

tTarnMhrkm•35m ago

You've hit on the exact right questions, and I agree with your analysis.

Regarding the origin story and copy, you're probably right that it's not the final reason someone clicks "buy." Its value is at the top of the marketing funnel—it's the hook that makes someone stop scrolling and consider an app from an unknown indie dev in the first place. It builds enough initial trust for them to actually look at the screenshots and features.

And thanks for the point about the DMCA—I will definitely be looking into that for the most blatant copycats.

akerl_•25m ago

I can only speak for myself, but when I'm looking for apps, the hierarchy of needs is something like:

1. Does it solve the underlying problem

2. Am I a standard or outlier user of the product

3. Does it make it easy to get it / use it

4. Is it from a company/developer that I like

I'm obviously not going to use an app that doesn't solve the original goal. Beyond that, some examples of things that have made me go chasing for other alternatives:

1. Updating the app isn't automated -- I use a window manager on Windows where updates have to be manually downloaded and run, and every time I update I google if there's a viable replacement.

2. The app has a bunch of fluff -- I'm currently trying a couple new apps for logging infant activity like diaper changes / feeds, and 90% of the options can do the task but are covered in other buttons/options/reports that I do not care about.

3. I'm clearly not the target audience for the developer -- I use Anydesk for remote management of some Windows desktops but all their plans are clearly enterprise/prosumer-focused and I'm actively preparing for them to kill off my plan level or break the functionality.

chrismcb•1h ago

Personally I works at least submit a DCMA takedown of the plagiarizing.

tTarnMhrkm•24m ago

Thanks for the tip!

tensorlibb•1h ago

Any idea where these copycat devs are from?

tTarnMhrkm•29m ago

It seems to be all over. Some of them look like this is not the only app they copy on the App Store.

lapcat•1h ago

> The app became unexpectedly successful, hitting the top 100 paid utilities

What's your definition of "successful"? Mac App Store volume is quite low, especially with upfront paid apps. You're likely averaging only a few unit sales per day, right? Maybe only one unit per day, and even that might be a generous estimate.

> A few open-source clones have also appeared on GitHub

Is your app open source? If so, that's probably why you're getting copycats.

> It seems that derivative apps with plagiarized descriptions and app elements are being approved without issue. Does this signal a shift in App curation?

No. Apple's so-called "curation" has always been terrible.

tTarnMhrkm•22m ago

You're right, "successful" needs context, especially on the Mac App Store where volume can be low. For me, as a solo dev, it's meant having days with multiple sales. It's more than enough to validate the idea and fund ongoing development, which feels like a huge win.

To clarify, my app is not open source. I only mentioned the open-source clones that have also appeared.

bix6•1h ago

> what is the moat? Is it brand, speed of innovation, marketing, or something else?

You could try and develop a brand and market it but I don’t think that would go well for something like this. Best case maybe you can game the rankings to stay number one but you’re probably up against professional app copiers.

So your moat is speed of innovation. Your basic app is copied. What new feature will enable you to stay ahead and drive sales? Or perhaps no feature can do that as the crowd grows so it’s on to the next app that doesn’t yet exist. What’s your new pain point?

apwell23•55m ago

when app store opened on ios i created a pomodoro app. I got some sort legal notice from creator of pomodoro technique ( some italian dude). I took my app down immediately.

tTarnMhrkm•29m ago

Interesting, thanks for sharing your story.

jffry•54m ago

> My app's value is its simplicity

With or without the advent LLMs, it's an uphill battle to build a moat around a small (but nice!) wrapper around the output of a command-line tool shipped with MacOS.

> what is the moat?

Increasingly, and sadly, it's online services with a monthly subscription and no data portability. Get users in with a generous free tier and pull up the drawbridge so they can't get out easily.

tTarnMhrkm•25m ago

Thanks, I really appreciate the honest take. With this app, I'm intentionally trying to go against that dominant modern playbook.

My goal was to build a classic, single-purchase utility that does one thing well and doesn't require an account or a subscription.

jffry•12m ago

I appreciate you having a go and it does look very attractive. It's not a problem I have but $5 is a reasonable request for something that gets the info into an understandable format for somebody.

I do think that small, single-purpose apps are probably the easiest lunch to eat. Narrowly scoped greenfield projects are where the LLMs seem to excel right now so that game seems like a race to the bottom.

As far as the cloning goes: your only recourse is probably the DMCA angle for the exact duplicate text. It's a shame they're so lazy as to straight copy it, but I suspect the response (if any) will be them lightly laundering it through ChatGPT so it's no longer the same.

Good luck! And I hope you find more useful ideas people might pay for

mcphage•48m ago

Clone it yourself 3 or 4 times. Rather than getting 1/6 of the traffic, you’ll get 5/10 of the traffic.

tTarnMhrkm•35m ago

Lol, this is great. Thanks!

sltr•38m ago

The best moat is you.

Study an audience for their pains and worldview and what they buy. Earn their trust through writing and freebies. Then they will want to buy because it's from you specifically.

I can recommend https://30x500.com/

tTarnMhrkm•30m ago

Haha, that's a great way to put it. You're right, the best moat is the relationship you build with your audience.

It really feels like we all have to become influencers these days.

fijiaarone•5m ago

There are two problems: 1. The Apple monopoly. They don’t have to care about indie devs because they own the market and are above the law. 2. Global marketplace. You can’t sue a nameless company in India for copyright infringement.

an0malous•2m ago

The end game for software moats is patents and proprietary data

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