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Apple App Store Hits 10B App Download Mark
alphadogg writes "The Apple App Store hit the 10 billion app download mark overnight on Friday, marking a milestone involving an awful lot of Doodle Jump, Tap Tap Revenge and Angry Birds playing, not to mention Facebook and Pandora usage. The Apple App Store hit the 1 billion mark in April of 2009, after opening in July of 2008. Apple is rewarding the downloader of the 10 billionth free or paid App Store app with a $10,000 iTunes gift card in a bit of showmanship that Willy Wonka would be proud of. As of 7AM EST, however, Apple hadn't publicly identified the winner, only saying that you'd need to come back later to find out who won. Apple put an iOS app countdown ticker on its Website last week to build buzz around the milestone and generated about 250 million app downloads since. It also revealed a list of all-time most downloaded free and paid iPhone and iPad apps." The winner of the $10k is Gail Davis, a British woman whose children installed an app without her knowledge. She actually thought the phone call from Apple was a prank at first. "My daughters told me they had downloaded it and they knew there was a competition and that we may have won it," she told BBC Radio 5 Live.
Apple is like Augustus Gloop, who ended up losing because he was incredibly gluttonous and enjoyed stuffing his face beyond what one could think humanly possible.
vos nescitis quicquam, nec cogitatis quia expedit nobis ut unus moriatur homo pro populo et non tota gens pereat.
I had a similar thing happen with Apple's iTunes a few years ago. One of my kids downloaded a couple hundred dollars worth of stuff using my debit card. Since I didn't (still don't) own an iPod and run Linux on the desktop (no iTunes client) there was no way it was me. I was pretty sure it was an inside job, but there was no phone number to contact Apple. The child vehemently denied any involvement. After going back and forth a few times with iTunes' web support people, they told me it was fraud and I should involve the local police department, ending the matter where they were concerned. I went back on their site, but instead of reporting it as a fraud issue, I took the "I forgot my username and password" route. I entered my credit card info and they gave up the goods, handing over the kid's email account. The iTunes were also discovered on the kid's iPod, as well as receipts in the yahoo mail folder. Busted.
never ask a question you don't want to know the answer to
I miss the Apple that made great hardware (although a little bit overpriced), and a nice OS to go with it. The iPhone/iPad/AppStore/iTunes/we-control-the-device-even-if-you-bought-it Apple that has put Macs and OS X to the background is not so nice and geeky anymore.
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So, like, when you subscribe, you're immune from being mod'ed "Offtopic"?
And like, the Apple Fanboys can't touch you and mod you "Flamebait" or "Troll"?
I may have to get a paid account with a username of 'FaggotAppleUser'.
You don't have to pay tax on your winnings in the UK.
Or Canada, Germany, Australia, Italy, and a bunch of other places.
I am waiting for the Big App, and Quarter Program with Cheese.
Apple is almost the exact opposite of Augustus, in that they are still a very lean company with not a lot of employees for the revenue they produce.
The problem with the computer industry is that most of the competition is in fact heavily Augustusized - thinking only of income and very bloated/slow to boot.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
has put Macs and OS X to the background is not so nice and geeky anymore.
That's not at all true. OS X and the computers they make have been updated with around the sam regularity as before. And if Apple was putting OS X in the background why would they have just launched a whole App Store dedicated to the Mac? If anything they are trying strongly to migrate some portion of the very large developer base they have amassed into doing Mac software too.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The -ize ending is valid in non-American English too, it isn't an Americanism.
The prize is a $10,000 iTunes Store gift card, not $10,000 in cash or a $10,000 Apple gift card. Last I checked, the iTunes store doesn't sell MacBooks.
...what does one do with $10,000 to iTunes? I'd be hard-pressed to find 10,000 songs or apps that I liked. Does it work on the mac app store? Because I could see using it then for expensive productivity software.
You don't have to pay tax on your winnings in the UK.
Yes you do, if you didn't pay tax on the original bet. I don't know if this applies to competitions, but it does to wagers.
Who is children?
The IRS would still consider that as $10,000 USD income, as that is the taxable value of the prize.
Good-bye
While they might not have put OSX into the background they do seem to be putting the environment & UI there. They seem to be trying to shift the usage from a few apps that do a lot to dozens of small apps that each do a few specific tasks.
Which is the UNIX approach to dong things, which has worked out very well for a long time.
Great monolithic applications are the exception, not the norm. It's a lot easier to write very useful software if you target it to a specific use.
It wouldn't surprise me if they shift to a more iOS user interface and phase out the taskbar
That would surprise me a great deal since on a device where primary input is a mouse, you need something like the dock.
They can also be the gatekeeper for all your private data shared between your apps.
Only if everything went through the cloud. But Apple is a practical company, and they know networking is inherantly a secondary service, something you cannot rely on always being present. Remember they are still not letting iOS users sync over the internet, requiring a local computer - does THAT sound like someone who is going to act as any kind of "gateway" for anyone?
If you are looking for gateways of content, look no further than Android I'd say as that sounds exactly like something Google would want to do (if nothing else than to collect data about what you sync!).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The IRS can tax people in the UK? Wow, didn't know they were that powerful.
The Intel switch happened long ago. The only software I can think of that's not really been re-writen that is a major loss, is Framemaker. Apple was actually amazingly good about supporting older software for as long as they could, with Rosetta and making compiling Mac applications to universal binaries fairly easy. In fact I don't know if there's a single OS maker that has EVER been able to transition architectures the way Apple did and thrive instead of die (though a large part of that of course was switching to a more mainstream processor).
Apple still supports small business just fine - I know because I get a small business discount, and the Apple people have been very helpful.
As mentioned by another poster if there's something you really, really need to run you can do so in emulation. But there's pretty much no pre-OS X software I can think of that was Mac oriented, that has not been pulled forward into the modern era of Intel OS X.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Tax free or not, it seems a less than brilliant prize; not that I'd be complaining if they gave me a voucher that's pretty much worth all the music and video I can eat for a decently long time, but for the relative pittance that it's worth to a company like Apple they would have been much kinder to give out a voucher that could be used for hardware too.
A couple of shiny new MacBooks, an iPhone for everyone in the family, and enough left for an Apple TV, a 30" display or two, and a handful of iPads is a pretty serious prize, whether to keep or to eBay - more or less unlimited access to the iTunes store, while still something I'd like, would be a far less exciting prospect.
I seem to recall that US citizens are taxed on income earned outside the US, so yes, the IRS can tax people in the UK.
That said, there's no mention of the winner being a US citizen, so it's probably a moot point in this case.
They can if the people in question are US citizens.
It's left as an exercise for the reader to decide if the GP grasped that subtlety, or he's just a dumb fat trailer dweller who couldn't point to another country on a map - and I mean a map of the country he's supposed to point to.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
OK, let's do some very, very rough calculations here: assume that there are six billion people on the planet and that a third of them own a computer with Internet access. That's two billion. Assume that Mac users are 10% of that group. that's 200 million. In order to account for 10 billion apps, the mean downloads/person would be 50. Really? Since the vast majority of Mac users already had the apps they needed before the store opened, I find this very hard to believe.
the app store censorship drives jailbraking and for mac os to go that way will be very bad for it.
and for locking down data shared between your apps what are you going to for users to have to upload big movies and photos to cloud? US ISP upload sucks.
Over 10B Macs Served. I would prefer an Android with fries over that.
It's pathetic how lame slashdot has gotten over the last few years.
10 billion of anything is an amazing number. 10 billion apps is amazing, especially given that the app store didn't even exist a few years ago. That means that a huge percentage of the installed base actually uses the app store. That's a lot of hits. That's a lot of usability thinking. That's a whole lot of infrastructure.
You haters who think Apple sucks - they have an infrastructure capable of billing, invoicing, tracking, and serving up 10 billion plus items; the same infrastructure is used for iTunes. 1% of their traffic would crush your website. They have enough stuff, created by developers, that they can sell 10 billion of them. That's a lot of SDK downloads. That's a lot of developers. Most importantly, that's a lot of money, both spent on infrastructure and spent by consumers.
10 billion apps is around 127 apps per second for 2.5 years, if my math is correct. And it's all what, backed by WebObjects?
Now I can start downloading apps again without fear of being involuntarily opted in to a global competition and publicly identified as the winner.
You mean like the state trooper neat the Cumberland Gap who asked me when I said I was from England, 'So you are from Maine then?'
Sigh.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
From TFA: "marking a milestone involving an awful lot of Doodle Jump, Tap Tap Revenge and Angry Birds playing, not to mention Facebook and Pandora usage
Yes, yes, progress.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
It was a bit awkward when they told her what app her son had downloaded. Apparently she did not approve of "Almost nude sexy girls on the beach."
However, there were a handful of exceptions that were strictly spelled with -ise, and because it was thoguht a greater crime to spell them with a z than to spell the remainder with an s, -ise became popular through the rule: "if in doubt, use an s".
There's even an episode of the 80s TV detective series Morse, where he questions the authenticity of suicide note, because "No Oxford man would spell 'realize' with an s".
Yeah in the word 'size' maybe. In almost anything else it's an Americanism. Those Irish potato famine victims who went to the US weren't very good at spelling ;-)
I don't think the money has an expiration date on it. You could buy a meager 5 albums per year at $10 each, 4 seasons of television shows at $50 a piece, and rent 12 movies per year at $4 a pop, for a total of $300/year, and would run out out of money in 33 years.
I remember geeks' denials:
1) When dumb terminals were going to kill the pc.
2) When smart phones were going to kill the pc.
3) When cloud computing was going to kill the pc.
4) Insert your favorite vapor/fluffware here.
And I'll see your sarcastic reminiscing and raise you an "I remember, many moons ago, when PC first beat Mac on Photoshop benchmarks." The natives were restless that night...
Also, I think an (old?) geek is one of the most conservative, unimaginative and entrenched personalities in our culture (vi/gcc/gdb chain kinda proves it).
There is one most efficient way to perform a task, and your novel idea is probably a skyhook. On the other hand, if you have a genuine improvement to the software you mention, you're able to implement it and compile it for your own use- which is more than you can say for most Apple software.
the app store censorship drives jailbraking and for mac os to go that way will be very bad for it.
Actually that system works out really well for iOS. Your statement makes it sound like Jailbreaking is bad.
In iOS, you have a very secure system for the beginning user, and if they choose to learn more about the system they can open it up further.
However I don't see that happening to OS X anytime soon. Computers are the way they are and you can't really transition it to a more closed model. I think Apple has done the only thing you can do to really improve security, by offering the Mac app store they give beginning users a safer place to obtain new software than through random web links.
The funny thing about your statement though is that in fact the somewhat closed nature of the Mac app store is driving a Cydia store for the Mac also!
and for locking down data shared between your apps
Why would you? iOS doesn't lock that down, anything can for instance access the photo library. What you can't do is overwrite something there.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
With a plastic case, cables running here and there, no optical audio INPUT, no support for dual processors, no support for OS X (unless you hackintosh it), no software support, etc.
These value comparisons blow my fucking mind. Let's focus on the price premium and ignore the premium upgrades. I understand, you don't give a shit about aluminum cases and you can remove your own viruses. Great! You're a Slashdotter.
55555555.555555555
Greek math rulez!
You don't have to pay tax on your winnings in the UK.
Yes you do, if you didn't pay tax on the original bet. I don't know if this applies to competitions, but it does to wagers.
If you are running a gambling business (bookmaker etc) then that is taxable like any other business. There are also some special duties payable by certain types of gambling business such as bingo halls and e-casinos. However gambling winnings themselves are not taxable in the UK. Of course, I wouldn't expect you to believe an AC, so why not read the UK tax manual...
the dual processor mac pro starts at $3500 and you only get 6gb ram and a 1TB hdd at that price. So 10k I can only get 2. But for 1.5k-2.5k you can get build one and get a real raid card / on board hardware raid.
Apple wants $700 more for a 4 port raid card. But high end server cards on the pc with more ports are like $300.
No word on the Mac App Store's success... (snicker)
There is having a safer place for apps but censorship bans should not be part of that.
What if a I or a user wants a safe sex or fart or joke app?
more or less unlimited access to the iTunes store, while still something I'd like, would be a far less exciting prospect.
It's a nice way to ensure you get locked in. One of my friends has said a couple of times how he would have bought some non Apple products, but because of the library of TV series etc he already has on iTunes, he just stuck with Apple products.
which is totally what she said
The key operating word in my statement was 'would'. It was in response to the person above me and phrased using the knowledge of my country. IF this were to happen in the U.S., The IRS would consider it $10,000 income, modified by whatever windfall adjustments there are in the tax code. Thanks for being a troll and not bringing anything to the conversation but your ignorance and lack of critical thinking.
Good-bye
We know about the 30% cut for applications, but what about music, movies and TV series?
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
http://thepiratebay.org/browse/304
Interesting. I'm 28 and can never remember being taught anything but -ise, and was always told -ize is American.
Mind you I'm Australian. It's possible that -ize was historically more acceptable in Britain than here, or that we shifted from -ize to -ise at an earlier date. This kind of stuff fascinates me...
July of 2008 to April of 2009 is...10 months.
April of 2009 to January 2011 is...22 months
If these trends continue....aaaayy!
It's been a few years since the last time I posted here. Anyways, this just goes to show how wrong was the, by now classic, quote on the original iPod launch by CmdrTaco almost 10 years ago:
"No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."
http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23/1816257
Best,
Articulos para gente geek: Poleras, linux, libros y mas
There is having a safer place for apps but censorship bans should not be part of that.
I find it a pretty grey area myself as far as there being a reason to disallow these things, but as long as web access has equal precedence then there is a way to get things that are banned...
And it's not like you can't get Fart apps aplenty.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
1 thousand = k
1 million = M
1 billion = G
1 trillion = T
I was teaching my students to use the right notation for units, this week. Every time I open a newspaper, I see things where million is m, billion is mm or MM, or a somethings weight X kilos. Unit is part of the maths, too!
Thanks
Impressive but I'm sure they are probably including EVERY download, including reinstallations, updates and bug fixes.
What is it with people who don't capitalize their sentences? Do you not realize it while you're typing?
hahahahahahahaha
no.
It's a nice way to ensure you get locked in.
This is true, and it wouldn't work for me. I've more or less considered myself to be primarily a Linux user since about '96 or so, but over the last 4 years I've spent a lot of my more productive time using hand-me-down Mac laptops, and I've come to actually like them, despite my discontent with Apple's arrogant and punitive business model.
So I guess I'm a fan of some of their hardware (laptops and iPods) without ever being in danger of becoming a fanboy.
Apart from the software that comes with the machines, I use FOSS almost exclusively. The only application I actually paid (a negligible amount) for is the tiny but (to me) useful Audiobook Builder, which I use probably twice a week. I know the function can be replicated via various GPL utilities, but the application is so convenient, I don't begrudge the small payment for someone's work.
I used to be a fan of the Mac computers since I grew up with them, but my last MBP had serious issues with overheating (if you tried to play a 3D game for more than an hour and it would lock up), and many other people were reporting the same thing online. Apparently the MBP models after that were fine, but I've already decided I'm going to just avoid Apple laptops for a while, and buy devices that have decent Linux driver support. My current machine is a netbook that cost 1/4 of what the MBP, and the MBP is being used as a web applications server and virtual machine server for when I need to use Windows.
I've always disliked iPods as far as the functionality you get for the cost compared to other MP3 players, but I begrudgingly bought a 2nd hand one last year since my car stereo works quite nicely with iPods. I really wish someone would make an app for Android that can emulate the iPhone USB interface.
I definitely don't have a problem with paying for stuff, I just have a problem when I feel I'm getting ripped off.
which is totally what she said
Like me, for example.
Having shelled out 500€ on a phone only to see it deliberately crippled by the vendor after less than 2 years is annoying.
I don't care about their business strategy on platform fragmentation: Apple should either put iOS 3 on maintenance mode for a reasonable amount of time or tune iOS 4 to run unimpaired on an iPhone 3G.
This behavior is unacceptable.
Mi domando chi à il mandante di tutte le cazzate che faccio - Altan
I have no problem believing your claim about your MacBook overheating when gaming. I've never had such an extreme case, but the heaviest loading I give my machines is with big compiles, since gaming doesn't rock my boat. But I have noticed the machines getting a bit warm, so it's probably true to say the machines are designed more with form in mind than function.
I am interested in your claim regarding functionality of iPods. It's highly likely that my simplistic brain has failed to appreciate the offerings of other devices, but (IMHO) the iPod Classic user interface is hard to beat for sheer elegance and simplicity. I would be interested to hear an alternative viewpoint on this. But as far as cost is concerned, every time I've had occasion to be in the market for an mp3 player, the Apple products have happened to offer much more physical storage for the buck than any credibly functional alternative.
I have no problem believing your claim about your MacBook overheating when gaming. I've never had such an extreme case, but the heaviest loading I give my machines is with big compiles, since gaming doesn't rock my boat.
I found it especially irritating because I knew that the graphics card was actually underclocked as standard, but it still overheated even at the Apple approved clock rates.
When talking of functionality I wasn't even talking about the usability of the interface, just the functionality that you get for the price. For example when choosing my first ever MP3 player I went with the HP iRiver 120, which had a built in microphone for recording, FM radio, picture and text viewing (albeit in monochrome) all for less than the cost of the 120GB iPod of the time.
As far as the interface though, I also saw many reviews saying that the in-line controls on the headphones (you could plug in your own headphones to this controller) were actually nicer to use than the iPod interface, as you didn't have to get the device out of your pocket. It had its own LCD screen and you could operate pretty much all of the functions from it.
Perhaps things are better now, but that experience did turn me off of iPods. I got quite annoyed at all the fuss people were making over them, because it was clearly a case of style over substance. Sometimes I'm a sucker for that kind of thing too, but not this time. The iPod Touches are pretty nice, but my Dell Streak would be just as good if only accessory makers would provide an Android media interface.
which is totally what she said
OSX isn't as locked as iOS, though. The Mac App Store conveys the idea of "Hey! If you get stuff from here, it's guaranteed not to screw things up! Sure, you can get apps off the net or off a disc, but we can't guarantee safety!"
A wise man once said, "Where is my other quotation mark?
...you can't buy physical Apple products.
I lived in England for several years. Most of my Apple hardware was purchased there. You are just making stuff up.
AC's poor communication skills account for misunderstanding.
He should have said, "since you can't buy hardware with an iTunes card". Instead, what he wrote inferred that you can't buy Apple hardware in England.
So sell your card on ebay and use the cash to buy hardware?
Yes, that's called convenience. Calling it lock-in makes you look petulant.
Oops, misread your post...disregard.
Misreading posts makes you look petulant ;)
which is totally what she said
Since a dual processor mb will cost you $350 minimum and you will be hard pressed to find a 6 core Xeon for under $1000 (buying from Newegg), going to have a hard time getting RAM under your $2500 budget. Please link the dual processor MB and 6-core Xeons you are using.
Not really expecting a response, but if I get one cool, now I know where to buy CPUs for half-off.
That used to be the case, but it was abolished a few years back.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The post you replied to didn't mention the US, neither did its parent or grandparent.
If you were talking abut the US, then why not add the words "In the US" at the beginning? Critical thinking indeed...
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."