Creator lessons from Apple and Roblox
How Roblox takes more, but gets more love, from creators.
The recent Fortnite Vs Apple battle over App Store fees has made consistent headlines over the last month. Fortnite, a massively popular multiverse game, circumnavigated Apple’s 30% fee on in-game purchases by starting their own in-game payment system. Apple responded by banning them from the platform. A deeper look on the issue can be found here. This isn’t the first time a company has had an issue with Apple’s 30% app tax. AirBnB, Spotify, Classpass and more have also spoken out about their frustrations.
The battle made me think of Roblox. Roblox is an online world containing thousands of games and experiences created by third-party developers. You can build your own avatar, play an ever-expanding variety of games, learn in a classroom, visit a waterpark, build a pizza empire or participate in thousands of other experiences, in real time. Three quarters of American children ages 9 to 12 play Roblox, and they play often. In July players clocked a massive 3 billion hours of game play.
Fundamentally, Roblox and the App Store are surprisingly similar. They’re both platforms that people visit to find entertainment. They rely on external developers to add depth and variety to their offering and they take a cut from developer’s in-app revenue.
Roblox takes a 50% cut from creator revenue, far greater than the infamous 30% from Apple’s App Store. Yet Roblox creators, like Anne Shoemaker speaking to the NYTimes, rave about the platform:
“It feels incredible,” Ms. Shoemaker said. “People used to tell my mom, ‘Stop letting her play this video game; it’s not going to get her anywhere.’ And it’s getting me somewhere.”
For creators it’s not just about money, it’s about value. By making creator empowerment a core principle, platforms like Roblox are able to maintaining positive creator relationships even as they take larger revenue splits.
Today we’re going to look at how platforms reach different levels of creator fulfilment, we’ll dive into how Roblox built their platform around creators and look at why treating creators as partners, not customers, stimulates platform growth.
A Hierarchy of Creator Needs
I created a Hierarchy of Creator Needs to show which platforms have moved beyond the basics to attract creators.
Level 1: Creator Fundamentals
Fundamentally, creators need three things: Technology, Scale and Money.
Technology: Somewhere to host content in a way that’s easy to experience for viewers, doesn’t create glitches for the host and allows content to shine.
Scale: The opportunity to reach a large audience.
Money: The ability to create revenue from their content.
First mover platform giants such as YouTube, Instagram and Spotify grew from their ability to satisfy these fundamentals, but fundamentals don’t help creators create and grow.
Level 2: Creator Enablement
A new wave of platforms are addressing the need for creator enablement by integrating tools to help creators develop their work with ease avenues to raise revenue directly. Twitch does this with Twitch Extensions and I’ve previously spoken about how Tik Tok enables anyone with an iPhone to create and monetize viral content.
Level 3: Creator Empowerment
The fastest growing and most newsworthy platforms are those that empower creators to make a tangible impact on the game itself. Platforms like Minecraft and Roblox not only have the fundamentals and integrated creator tools, they also allow completely autonomous creation that constantly changes the universe of the game itself. Metaverse games like Roblox and Minecraft constantly grow and morph as creators develop new games, levels and experiences on the platform.
Case study: Roblox
Let’s look at how Roblox empowers creators.
Transparency
Roblox is transparent about how they make money from creators, and share cost specifics.
This level of transparency helps justify what on the surface looks like a huge creator revenue share as it contextualises their costs.
From Tools to Teaching
Roblox has a full suite of developer tools to help creators make whatever games or experiences they’d like. Additionally they have educational programs that enable creators to get the most out of their tools.
Roblox also partners with online educators to help teach the basics of code to students. This is a unique strategy that fosters the creator mindset from a young age.
Limitless creativity
Roblox CEO David Baszucki said: “We’re the toolmakers, our developers are the real creative geniuses”. This outlook proves true with their no borders approach to creativity. The universe is entirely built by creators, and apart from inappropriate content controls there is literally nothing creators aren’t able to make. Roblox features everything from classrooms, real-time streaming, sports events, war games and live concerts. Opening the door for limitless creativity motivates a wider range of creators to work with the platform.
Treating creators as partners not customers
Google, Facebook and Apple treat their employees famously well. Which begs the question: Why don’t they see creators as worthy of the same investment? Creators not only provide direct revenue for platforms, they are instrumental in growing and shaping the platforms themselves. The least platforms can do is treat creators as employees, and the best will treat them like partners.