Sadly, I don’t think some of my competitors think that: http://bit.ly/idq8lM
I know Keith had an unfounded 2-star review on the Mac App Store recently too. It’s such a flawed process as I cannot respond to reviews or contact customers in any way. Both Keith and I have absolutely zero visibility of customers on the Mac App Store.
It’s so frustrating.
Still, what doesn’t kill you makes your bladder weak an’ all that…
All the best,
Mark.
Hay! I resemble that remark.
Mr. Mark,
You are too right. It was a very old .fdr file.
Tried it with .fdx and it opened fine.
Sorry.
No problem. I’m glad it worked! 
Let me know if you have any other problems.
All the best,
Mark.
Isn’t one of the reasons we hate the App Store that it’s infested with scuttling roaches and slackjawed quidnuncs who think it tremendous alpha-status fun to post their subliterate and ill-digested “reviews” after the manner of a dog pissing on a treestump?
Movie Draft Mark: the trouble, apart from the above, is a lot of people who buy writing apps of one sort or another are striving (or even not-striving) hopefuls. (It’s just rude to call them “wannabes”. They have hopes. Good luck to 'em.) But I suspect a number of them hope that MacNewWritingTool, whatever it may be, will turn out to be The Answer. It will make it all easy. It will make them finish, without sweat. It will with magical MacPheromones, lure agents and publishers and producers to their bedroom door at home in, for some reason, Brookline. Don’t know why. Leave me alone. Shh.
So when they find it doesn’t do any of that, and they’re still precisely where they were yesterday, they are angry and disappointed and frustrated and sad, and so who do they take it out on?
Exactly.
The great problem with the web, amplified on single-resource things like the App Store, is that nobody thinks anyone else is real.
Hi Michael,
I agree with every word you said, especially the last bit. It’s so easy to think of a software company as a faceless, person-less entity. This is why I’m so keen to be as transparent as possible in my dealings with customers, to inform them that I’m just one guy trying to get this thing off the ground etc so that they are aware that I’m a real person. A person that will listen to them and feedback on their ideas or troubles with Movie Draft, but also a person with limited resources who can’t do everything at the same time - no matter how much I’d love to.
Unfortunately the divide is literal with the MAS as there’s a true segregation between customer and developer to the point where no developer can contact a customer directly, nor can a developer comment on a review. It’s a one-way road where the customer (be they genuine or not) have all the onus.
I think that separation only emphasises the faceless-company mindset so that people feel that they can say anything they want as there’s no fear of harming any real person’s feelings, reputation or livelihood.
Such is life.
All the best,
Mark.
I think the secret to combating App Store trolling is good customer service. Actually, not just good customer service, but absurdly good customer service, and on the Internet* that means spending a lot of time in places like this. When you’e engaged with your customers, when you’re responding quickly to their emails and forum posts, you’re not just making your product better, you’re building a group of loyalists who have your back. (Keith et al have gotten so good at this, I often wonder how they have time to do anything else.)
Another aspect of this is keeping your price as low as makes sense – finding that balance between making it easy for people to take a leap of faith and pricing too low, so you end up resenting half the people who buy your app.
The App Store is what it is, for good and bad. I like it. I think it’s a place where excellent, focused apps can thrive. Unfortunately, in the early stages, it gives disproportionate voice to morons and unethical competitors.
Movie Draft Mark, I think you’re handling it just right. When you get frustrated, go look and listen to reviews of Scrivener online. Seems that every time someone prominent mentions Scrivener, they cite this forum not just as a benefit, but as an actual feature. Eventually good software gets the word of mouth it deserves.
*Text Expander capitalizes Internet? (Just did it again! Internet. Internet. Damn it!)
OT:
I thought TextExpander was right, but it appears to be a developing story.
Just wanted to say, I read the negative review of Movie Draft on the App Store, and the reviewer claims to have blown $30 on the app. This guy is clearly a genius. Not only was he able to get the app to do something it doesn’t actually do, he managed to hack to app store so this allowed him to pay $10 more than the thing actually costs. Good job, App Store Troll!
[looks sheepishly] Actually, I did put the price up to $29.99 the other day as an experiment. 
Do you think it’s too expensive at $29.99? I’m trying to find the right balance of every-day-writer price and the earning-a-living-for-me price. Perhaps I should have kept it at $19.99? I’m not a businessman so I’m winging the price bit - as you’ve no doubt just realised.
However, I think your sentiment still stands about the troll. 
All the best,
Mark.
p.s. Thanks again for the great review, Sean. I appreciate it.
Hi Sean et all,
Just to keep you and everyone on here updated as you’ve all been fantastically warm and welcoming to me, for the next couple of weeks I intend to do no development on Movie Draft whatsoever, for the greater good: http://bit.ly/gktAn1
I believe it’s the right move to make at this time. Thoughts appreciated, as always.
All the best,
Mark.
Is it me or has that troll review been pulled from the US MAS? Just went on to see if there were any more bad “reviews” and noticed it had been removed…?
I’ll wake up in a minute.
All the best,
Mark.
Spoke too soon. 1-star? I mean - really?
Mark.
Hey Mark –
I ran across Movie Draft SE because it was one of the apps featured on the front of the app store. Downloaded the demo, gave it a try, and then bought it! I own Screenwriter and Final Draft and am always looking for something that will help me write stage plays (I don’t write screenplays so much any more), and MD looks like it will allow me to do that without all of the overhead of FD and SW. I will be telling my playwriting friends about it.
I will say, though, that if the introductory price was $19.99 you might want to remove the bit about the introductory price running out soon from the app page.
My main feature request right now is typewriter scrolling a la Scrivener. I’m really used to being able to keep the cursor in the middle of the screen!
Hi Diane,
Firstly, thank you for your support. I appreciate it.
I have responded to you via email re: your feature request but thought it’d be polite to respond here too.
Yes, it shouldn’t be a problem for me to add that to Movie Draft for you.
All the best,
Mark.
Quite the best sentence I’ve read on this or indeed any other forum in all the years I’ve been ploughing money into BT and/or its acolytes’ coffers to provide me with this risible albeit exorbitantly priced internet connection. Well done sir!
Well wadda y’ now!! The old perv’s back 
Are y’s out on parole…again?
Must say the standard of offtopicking, has deteriorated atrociously, since last you were here. When was that by the way. Just after St Paul’s was completed, wannit?..long time ago anyway. Bywater’s ok I suppose, but he’s not consistent. Moderators get a lot of complaints about his foul language.
Still on dial-up, are y’s? 
tch! tch! shame…shame.
Nice to see you back again, Ethel,
Take care
Vic
Looks very much like this young Mick of Movie Draft, is another Kevin of Scrivener. Lovely boys 
Fluff
Yes well [redacted] the [redacted] moderators and the [redacted] they [redacted] [redacted] on, frankly. They can [redacted] it on the [redacted] or [redacted] it [redacted] [redacted] [redacted]. And that’s putting it mildly.
Peace be on your house(s).