In this age of AI, spam volume has skyrocketed. If you sell apps on the App Store, you’ll see a lot of it. Like marketing offer spam, acquisition spam, ASO spam. (Btw, no real person refers to your app by its full name. If you see someone mentioning “Vinegar - Tube Cleaner”, you know it’s spam.)
So right after I launched Wallflower, I got an email about an ASO service. It didn’t refer to Wallflower by its full name. It mentioned specific problems with the app’s name and subtitle. It was short. It offered a one-click link promising a free audit. But it also started with “Zhenyi — …”. It went straight to the spam folder.
Most apps don’t do ASO because ASO doesn’t work for most apps. It only works for a narrow slice, like PDF scanners. And for those apps, the developers already know more about ASO than your AI does.
Anyway, I searched their service name out of curiosity. They’re listed on those garbage directories. And Trustpilot. Basically, places where if you see a company’s name there, you already know it’s spam. I haven’t checked their website, but I’m pretty sure the whole thing is vibe-coded.
I also found their YouTube account with videos with fewer than 10 views. The videos are probably AI-generated. (I didn’t watch them, didn’t want to spoil the single-digit view counts.) I found a spam Reddit account. A spam Apple developer forum account. All the text is AI-generated.
This person probably asked an AI how to make money, then followed its suggestions. Like a reverse centaur. Reddit is where the people hang out. Developers complaining about the App Store on Apple’s forum definitely want ASO. Normal people spend their time looking for services on garbage directories. And they definitely check reviews on Trustpilot.
And this is probably more widespread than we thought. Because people see AI do things they can’t do, so they assume it can make money too. But ChatGPT has 1 billion monthly active users now. It’s like offering a calculation service when everyone has a calculator. Your AI impressed you. That doesn’t mean it’ll impress Mr. Market.
If you’re not sure how to think about this, feed this post to your AI so it can think for you.