Back in the summer of 2016, I sat waiting for a movie to start at Cineworld. Wanted to check something, I was forced to use the mobile website. At that point I wondered if they had an API and within 2 days I had a version of the app ready for Windows Phone store.
A few months down the line, I ported it to Windows 8 and then ended up using Azure to generate dataset for the apps. For the last 2 years or so I have been paying for the service.. it wasn’t significant but still odd 200 a month and having looked at IAP purchase in the last 2 months I decided that it was time to call it a day.
While Microsoft might say mobile didn’t work for them, I’d beg to differ. Windows Mobile version of the app had nearly 4k downloads (3976) vs desktop app with 256 downloads. YES a full 256 downloads.
Mobile app – Windows Phone app (WP8x and Windows 10 Mobile)
Desktop app – Windows 8 app (Windows 8x and Windows 10 Desktop)
That tells you all you need to know about consumption of certain apps on desktop vs mobile – it might not be global but it definitely is so in UK.
Now lets look at IAP.
IAP for Mobile app
IAP for Desktop app
Above are for the last 2 months – minus governmental and store taxation, I could have paid for the Azure service for a month.
Having decided that it wasn’t economical, the fact that Microsoft officially acknowledged end of the road for mobile was sufficient to determine that the app will never ever pay for itself.
The source for the Apps and Azure services is available on GitHub
Most code was before I adopted MVVM for Windows Development so please except my apologies for whatever you find in there.
Happy coding
Invoke IT Limited 
It’s a sad tale, Hermit, but all too common. As a developer myself (25 years developing with MS tools), I enthusiastically followed MS lead and developed WP/UWP apps. It’s a dead end. In spite of that, I still prefer Windows Mobile over other platforms.
Personally, I found Belfiore’s recent comments about the death of WM to be woefully inadequate. Clearly, MS did not do everything they could to incentify developers to adopt UWP (I paid £90 per year for the pleasure of publishing my FREE apps). It’s been one misstep after another.
MS should be scared shitless. Without a viable mobile platform, UWP is weakened and may fail. And that undermines their ecosystem. Even modern apps for Windows 10 Desktop is failing. It appears that Windows and Apps just don’t mix. So, where are we when MS finally throws in the towel after announcing UWP just isn’t catching on?
If that falls, the rest will follow…eventually.
I think there’s an elephant in the room and no one at Microsoft wants to acknowledge this. I think this wasn’t about developers but large corporations – the tops apps on other platforms who wouldn’t dev for Windows and that isn’t going away any time soon.
I still use and develop for Windows but I think its time to take stock of where the future lies.