I don’t normally comment on Apple products, as I don’t use them myself. I’m impacted, however, as most of my family has bought into the Apple ecosystem, including iPhones and Macbooks.

I predict that during the next two years Apple will see a noticeable decline in App Store downloads because of one short-sighted decision in the product development department. Here’s how I think they dropped the ball.

My daughter used to have an iPhone 5c and when its contract came due, we decided that the 6 is the next logical and cost-effective step. Normally, when a company comes out with a shiny new device, whether it’s a phone or a laptop or a car, the feature set of the new device is an improvement over the previous device at the same level. Curiously, Apple decided to keep the entry-level iPhone 6 at 16 GB of RAM, the same as the two-year older 5c. I’m not sure what their motivation was for this decision. It might have been to save a few dollars and keep the entry-level cost down. Or it might have been to encourage an upgrade to the much more expensive and substantially increased 64 GB model. Whatever the case, it was a bad decision, because they are strangling their own app store.

I’ve had at least two conversations with my daughter over the last few weeks since she’s had her new phone where I’ve asked her if an app I use on Android is available on the App Store. She’s replied that she doesn’t know and that she doesn’t have space to try it anyhow. That’s just sad on two counts: 1. She has to live for another two years with an inadequate phone, and 2. Apple has lost two years of App downloads from yet another customer. They must know that there are now millions of iPhone users out there in exactly the same predicament. That does not spell good news for IOS developers.