Eideard

A software engineer who wrote what he calls a “terrible” and “crap” app in less time than it typically takes to eat lunch has since watched it shoot to the top of Apple’s App Store, where it’s now generating over $200 an hour despite being a free download.

22-year-old High Gloss has worked on more than 20 other iPhone apps for an iPhone software developer…In just 20 minutes, he wrote Sound Grenade, which is currently listed third under the top free apps, in the wild card category of “Utilities”.

“The goal of my app was to create a tool for people to annoy others,” Gloss wrote in a blog entry at his website. He set a one-hour time limit to write and upload it to Apple. “The end product was Sound Grenade, which is a really terrible app, one button turns a sound on or off, period. For 20 minutes’ work, I thought it would be interesting to take the ride.”

“You can imagine my shock when I checked the App Store page on the first day to see 50 glowing reviews. Two days later, another 50 reviews. Five days later, Sound Grenade is in the top ten free apps almost everywhere in the world.”

Gloss said he’s troubled by how popular “crap” can be on the App Store, calling it “a sad state of where the world seems to be at.” However, he still had high praise for the App Store concept. “I really enjoy the App Store, I think it is amazing,” the New Zealand-based programmer said. “If you know what you’re looking for, you can find an app and download it either paid or free in a very minimal amount of time from almost anywhere in the world.”

At first, Sound Grenade was completely free. Once it entered the Top 50, High said he decided to switch to an ad-supported model. Now, after processing a million ad requests in 24 hours, the app is generating upwards of $200 per hour in clickthrough revenue.

I love his final quote: “Every idea that I don’t do, for being too rubbish or stupid, could have been in the top 100.”