I've been following Gas, an anonymous messaging app for kids I expected to disappear as quickly as it appeared. But I was wrong. Very wrong.
Instead, Gas has stayed at the top of the App Store in the US, the only place you'll find it, for weeks now. Can those downloads be organic? I don't know, but something feels off to me.
Anyway, that isn't why I bring it up...
Gas gained momentum very quickly and topped the charts seemingly overnight. That's nothing new, a bunch of apps did that this year. Some for just a few days (MD Vinyl) while others enjoyed a longer run (BeReal).
But in both cases, while the downloads were high revenue wasn't. That's what's interesting about Gas.
According to our estimates, Gas just crossed a big milestone -- $3,000,000 of net revenue, which means what Gas gets to keep after paying Apple's fees. That's about 3 million more than I'd expect Gas to be earning...
It's too early to tell if the success Gas is seeing is a sign of anonymous messaging becoming a trend again, after disappearing just a few years ago, but that's not what matters here. Having a clear business model and a way to monetize that isn't based on selling ads from the get-go makes a real difference.
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