Will Apple unveil iOS App Rentals tomorrow?

Mon, Oct 3, 2011

News, Rumors

Perhaps Apple has more surprises in store for us tomorrow than we realize.

After playing around with the recently released iTunes 10.5 beta 9 – the same one that references iPhone 4S – Twitter user @SonnyDickson found some data strings which suggest iOS app rentals may be a possibility.

Take a look at the image below:

While this is clearly not enough evidence to determine whether or not app rentals are in our future, the reference to apps being removed from a user’s iTunes library at the end of a rental period is certainly intriguing.

Assuming that an app rental service is in the works, it’d be interesting to see how it’s implemented. Would Apple let users rent apps for a day, as a very brief type of trial run experience? Or, would users be able to rent apps for perhaps weeks on end? The latter seems unlikely given the low-cost of apps to begin with.

Indeed, Apple wants to keep developers happy and the best way to do that is to get users to actually purchase apps. That said, a brief rental period that wets the palette, so to speak, of iOS users might be a shrewd way to increase paid downloads from the iTunes App Store.

via TheTechEra

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