Moving to the Business forum.

8 hours ago, Allen Bipster said:

I heard that a decent/basic Android game on Google Play can fetch a whopping 50 cents to one dollar (including ad clicks) a day after being downloaded a few million times e.g. (2.5 mill).

A high quality Android game can fetch a whopping 5c-$1 per user. That means 2.5M downloads = $125k to $2.5M gross retail revenue. 

This kind of game might cost a few hundred thousand dollars worth of time to create though (2 experienced devs for 2 years is already over $250k wages at market rates ?). Hard for a new company to break into. I do know plenty of indies in this space though (indie = independent teams of only a few individuals). 

As a new developer making anything less than high quality titles though... Yes, the numbers don't stack up to an easy living (or a living at all).

1 hour ago, Hodgman said:

(2 experienced devs for 2 years is already over $250k wages at market rates ?

You has forgot to account overseas countries. For example into most xUSSR countries salary of FA programmers that works into industrial robotics field not exids $200/month. And it kind of progrmmers usualy have a knowledges that exids requirements even for desktop AAA games development. So most of indie develoment just goes part-time. Some  developers already shifted to tini mobile gamedev companies, but salary rare exids $1000/month. Really program of most of xUSSR univercities intended to train a CAD/CAM/FA and scientific software developers, but it kind of developers is not contributes here. Mostly contributed is webdev. But webdev company prefer to hire developers trained into web developer schools, not university educated. (just becouse by xUSSR realities no more than 25% of graduated software engeneers able  to developt any kind of software, other 75% not able to developt at all). Indie and remote CAD/CAM/FA development is nonsence, so skilled developers here usually have 3 options: reallocate overseas, work for pennies here, or shift to indie or  remote gamedev, where contributed same knowledges as into CAD/FA/scientific software field.

40 minutes ago, Fulcrum.013 said:

You has forgot to account overseas countries.

Yeah I didn't mean that you have to actually spend/have this much money. That's just a valuation of what the work/time is worth to a business. I'm also not in the US

This can also be useful in other areas - for example, my state government will provide up to 50% funding for creative projects, and they will allow valuations of existing work to be counted as part of your project budget. So if you've done "$50k worth" of work on a game yourself already, and it's half finished, they will consider granting you $50k in cash to finish it. 

1 hour ago, Hodgman said:

hat's just a valuation of what the work/time is worth to a business

For most indie developers here it is not a bussines. It is just opportunity to get moneys comparable with lifetime salary for having some fun during development on sparse-time. 

11 hours ago, lawnjelly said:

The independent side is even more likely to be loss making - although the development budgets are smaller, the marketing budgets are also smaller, and marketing is a large part of success.

Really for long-term  games such as "free" to play MMOs best marketing is "WOW IT IS SO COOL!" - so most players just refering his friends for cost of nothing and so on.

12 hours ago, Allen Bipster said:

Could someone please explain why people would do what looks to be completely stupid free Android game development for Google ?

Just calculate what  is can make more revenue - one time $5-$10 paid for game by customer, or premium items and ammo purchases( for example on free to play MMO World of Worships premium ships valued $30-$100 each) or even in-game ads that most mobile   games shows approximately each 10 minutes during gameplay.

There should be some type Law's in place to protect emerging internet markets for Indies.

Why?

No, really, think about that: why should the government obstruct the free market to make a vague subset of competitors within an industry more likely to succeed by giving them an unfair advantage? What would it actually accomplish?

It seems to me it would just serve as an excuse for people to not get a real job and instead continue to persue an endeavor that, in a free market, is such a bad decision economically that you'd be better off professionally buying lottery tickets.

You refer to competition from the big guys as "stealing". It is not. It's competition. Competition is the whole point of capitalism and it's what drives progress in our society.

Exactly what measure do you propose to "protect emerging internet markets for Indies", anyway?