I can't really imagine what "pain in the ass" pza is talking about. The Mac App Store is the real pain in the ass between dealing with certificates, waiting for Apple reviews to finish and much more.

Selling direct takes a bit more initial setup but once it's done it's great. I can talk directly to my customers. I can fix bugs and ship those fixes. I can earn more money. We didn't have the Mac App Store for years and things worked pretty well. It's pretty clear we don't need it now either.