iPhone App Store Celebrates First Birthday

Apple's App Store turned one yesterday and the company used the occasion not only to promote some of its most popular applications and games but also to celebrate one of the most successful mobile ventures ever.

After one year, App store has grown into a massive marketplace with more than 60,000 applications and more than one billion downloads have been logged (that was back in April 2009). The App Store release was timed to coincide with the launch of the 3G version of the iPhone and was phenomenally successful.

Now with an estimated 50 million iPhone and iPod Touch available worldwide, Apple gas already started to ponder on the glittering future of the App store, which it hopes, will allow the company to rake in $1 billion annually.

iPhone developer news website 148Apps.biz writes that on average nearly 8,800 applications have been submitted to Apple for approval in June 2009. While many of these are free - nearly 12800 of them - the majority are still fee-paying with the most expensive, a video surveillance apps, costing a staggering $900.

Unlike say, Microsoft which has yet to come up with a decent competitor, Apple has managed to understand the psyche of its customers, which is why it is so successful where others have so miserably failed. Others like Palm, Blackberry and Google are scrambling to catch up with the pioneer.

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