Files

T

gramps 54de9c3dfb docs(decisions): Store route re-opened via an Individual developer account

Creator ruling 2026-10-30: the Microsoft Store is the distribution target again, through an
Individual (not Company) developer account — which is what made the 2026-10-22 withdrawal necessary
in the first place, and why no legal entity is now required. The publisher line shows the verified
individual name; distribution work stays parked until the account exists, and the site's 'coming
soon to the Microsoft Store' copy is accurate again.

2026-10-30 16:15:28 -07:00

7.0 KiB

Raw Blame History

Decisions log — retired paths, kept so they are not re-litigated

One dated line per decision that no longer governs, plus the reason it died. Read only when you are about to re-open one of them. Live rules live in the subsystem files; this is the graveyard with cause of death.

Monetization

2026-10-30 — freemium replaces free-forever (creator ruling)

Free tier caps output at 720p30; $10/month or $400 lifetime unlocks 1080p. Reverses the 2026-10-08 free-forever ruling below, which was a current decision, not an absolute.

Superseded: free forever (2026-10-08, TASK 54)

2026-09-21 one-time perpetual licence $29 founder → $49 list — superseded 6 days later.
2026-09-27 $10/mo subscription or $400 lifetime, no annual. Store revenue share was verified at 15% (ADA v8.10 §6(b)(i) → $8.50 / $340 net), including subscriptions.
No annual tier because Microsoft does not pro-rate: "monthly subscriptions and initial (pre-renewal) purchases aren't eligible for a prorated refund" — a first-year subscriber who cancels loses the remaining months and the developer cannot refund it.
Clean numbers, no .99 (creator: "Let's stop with the x.99 stuff"). The convention exists only to make a price look cheaper, which is incoherent for a brand sold on honesty.
Escalation model (2026-09-01): the credit was deliberately obnoxious self-promo; the cadence is the nagware — no modals, no feature locks, no stream-time cutoffs.
Pre-GA posture — preview-only flash (reversed 2026-09-26): the credit used to render in the preview and never on the broadcast, to keep test VODs clean. The creator ruled the free tier must be honest advertising; it now composites into output and recordings when enabled.
Rejected: always-on watermark (obscurable — replaced by the flash), hard stream-time cutoffs (a stream dying mid-broadcast reads as broken), soft-limit nagging, freemium feature tiers, donation-only, and any resolution/quality ceiling. Auto step-down (TASK 33) is a protect the stream feature, never a monetization penalty.
Polar — $50 already paid, 5% + $0.50 Starter, merchant of record. Dormant, not deleted-in-principle: no product, org ID, key prefix or discount code exists (d105dfa1-…, c05fb364-…, LCYT-, LLAMAFOUNDER/LLAMA50, the portal-validate endpoint and the 14-day offline-grace machine are all gone). Distribution.md §4.2/§4.5 keeps the design.
Store IAP was never implemented — Windows.Services.Store appears nowhere in the repo.
⚠️ Two obligations any future subscription would create (ADA §6(h)): fulfil the whole period as marketed (breach → Microsoft may refund in full at its discretion), and raising the price disables auto-renew — the launch price is effectively locked for the product's life.

Distribution — Store route RE-OPENED 2026-10-30 (Individual account)

2026-10-30: the Store is the route again, via a Microsoft Individual developer account (not Company), so no legal entity is needed and the publisher line shows the verified individual name. The creator will open the account; distribution work stays parked until then. The site copy ("Coming soon to the Microsoft Store") is therefore accurate again, and the 2026-10-22 "Store is dead / direct + Steam" ruling below is superseded.

Superseded: Store route withdrawn 2026-10-22

2026-09-27 Store MSIX + Store IAP decided; 2026-10-22 withdrawn. A brand name on the Store's publisher line requires a Company account → a registered legal entity (LLC ~$85 New Mexico with a ~2-week SOS backlog, ~$143 Wyoming). Partner Center does not convert an Individual account to a Company account later, and an Individual account publishes under the verified legal name. The creator will not fund an entity for a nameplate.
2026-10-22 Velopack deleted — it downloaded and executed, which Store policy 10.2.2 forbids. The Store was going to update the app, so that premise died with the route: the app now has no update path, and StorePackagingTests currently asserts that no updater exists — rewrite that guard with the chosen updater, never leave it to veto one.
The MSIX package still builds (159 MB artifacts/LlamaCasty.msix, submitted nowhere). The route contradiction between ai.md's older text and the TASKS files is settled in one sweep at the distribution revisit, not patched piecemeal.
Signing: Microsoft removed the EV instant-bypass for SmartScreen in March 2024, so EV buys what OV buys; the 2026-10-22 ruling is ship unsigned and accept the "unrecognized publisher" warning until download reputation accrues. Deferred, not rejected.
Steam when $100 exists: Steam Direct $100/product (recoupable after $1,000 AGR), categories Audio/Video Production / Player Tools (OBS precedent), developer/publisher name self-chosen (no entity needed), 5+ 1920×1080 screenshots + capsule art, a build Valve runs, a 2-week live page, 30% cut.

Product surface — retired

2026-09-24 StreamElements replaced by native alerts (TASK 43). No third-party widget feed: the chat poll is the event feed.
2026-09-01 the screens/layers settings audit was retired into the gold pass (TASK 36 item 3) rather than run as session debt.
2026-10-04 launch position: restoring the saved position was rejected for a derived top-left placement. The live rule is in ui-surface.md; the old clamp's tolerance range is why it must not come back.
D3D11 swap compositor — superseded by the software compositor (TASK 3 item 16).
Windows 8 / 32-bit support — 64-bit Windows 10/11 only (creator ruling 2026-10-09).
"There is no v1.x" (2026-09-01): everything queues to v1 or to out of product, permanently — no feature parks "for a later version".

Out of product — permanently

Do not build these; each was explicitly ruled out.

D3D11 swap compositor (superseded by the software compositor).
OBS-style source expansion — game capture, browser-source zoo, media playlist, VLC, colour-key, MIDI. The minimal source set is deliberate; creators who need more have graduated to OBS.
Multi-layout / profiles / presets — that is what OBS is for.
Cross-process stream resume (impossible via the API; creator ruling 2026-09-01).
Stream Deck / Loupedeck integration — the device sends keystrokes, and global hotkeys already are the integration.
Per-source audio sync offset — global offset shipped (TASK 22); per-source is the OBS mixer rabbit hole and breaks the one-knob audio rule.
Chroma key / NVIDIA-only background removal (the bundled ONNX path is the one shipped).
Virtual camera output — a different product and a device-driver swamp; our output is one YouTube stream.
Replay buffer, stream clipping, multi-destination restreaming, an in-app bug reporter, and an advanced broadcast-form tab (latency/DVR/embed/projection/CC/region are fixed at sane defaults; every exposed field is a support ticket).

7.0 KiB Raw Blame History Unescape Escape