Yeah, you can follow companies, but "relationship" generally implies that it's reciprocal. A one-way "relationship" is called "stalking" ;) I don't really see why the App Store affects the ability for customers to choose to follow their favorite developers.

Because it commoditizes the product. Apple wants apps to be fungible and rapidly consumed and thrown away, and that does not lead to a real relationship with a producer. You have no reason to form a relationship with the provider of something that is placed, and consumed, on the same level as a Snickers bar.

Games on PCs, Valve's best efforts notwithstanding, are not yet so reduced.

There's plenty of incentive for Apple to make apps plentiful and easy to acquire, but I strongly disagree that there's any incentive for Apple to want apps to be fungible. Why would there be? This is a claim I've seen repeated a few times without any supporting evidence. And I can't think of any reason why Apple would want apps to be fungible (more-so than any other software platform, at least; there is an incentive for there to be competition within any given category, but that's not the same thing as having the apps actually be fungible).

There are a lot of people who like having tons of new games available to try for a few minutes or hours or days, and then throw them away. But the existence of those people / that market does not mean that there isn't also a market for games that people stick with for a long time, and that are sold and maintained for a long time.

> Yeah, you can follow companies, but "relationship" generally implies that it's reciprocal.

iD and Bungie both have a long history of heavy interaction with their customers. That's rolled off for iD, but Bungie's back-and-forward seems as lively as ever.

I'm still unclear on what part of the App Store makes it impossible for companies to engage with their customers. I've played many Bungie games, but nowhere in the purchase process for any of their games was I encouraged to form a relationship with the company. Any back-and-forth with companies happens in channels other than the retail channel; twitter, forums, websites, etc. I don't understand why selling on the App Store vs, say, PSN Store, or Xbox Live Arcade, or any of the numerous Windows PC retail channels, affects the ability to engage with customers in this fashion.

> I'm still unclear

Given you're fighting with actual, successful game developers as well as adopting a take-em-all-on style with everyone else I'm not sure you want to be clear.