Apple's Beats brand in April unveiled the Powerbeats Pro, a redesigned wire-free version of its popular fitness-oriented Powerbeats earbuds.
Mac App Store Hits 100 Million Downloads
Apple today announced that its Mac App Store has surpassed 100 million downloads in less than one year of availability.“In just three years the App Store changed how people get mobile apps, and now the Mac App Store is changing the traditional PC software industry,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “With more than 100 million downloads in less than a year, the Mac App Store is the largest and fastest growing PC software store in the world.”The press release also offers promotional comments from representatives of Autodesk, Pixelmator, and algoriddim highlighting the value of the platform for app distribution on the Mac platform.
The Mac App Store's pace pales in comparison to that of the App Store for iOS, which easily surpassed 100 million downloads in less than three months of availability back in 2008. But with a smaller user base, a smaller library of applications, more expensive average pricing, and the fact that the Mac App Store is not an exclusive official distribution platform for OS X, it is unsurprising that the Mac App Store has grown more slowly than its iOS counterpart.
Apple has worked hard to shift Mac application distribution to the Mac App Store, moving most of its own software, including OS X Lion, to the store and in many cases also discontinuing or severely limiting availability of boxed versions of its software. The Mac App Store is also gaining traction with even the largest developers of Mac App Store, and while flagship products such as Microsoft Office and Adobe Photoshop are not yet available through the store, Adobe does offer several applications including Photoshop Elements via the store. Microsoft is also said to be "actively working" to bring Office to the Mac App Store.
Update: Apple provided some additional information on the milestone to The Loop, noting that the number does not include purchases of OS X Lion, updates to previously-downloaded apps, or repeat downloads from a single user installing apps on multiple computers.
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101 months ago
Still, they need to address several significant shortcomings of the mac app store model:
1. Trial software
2. Discounted upgrades to new versions
3. Transferring licenses from apps purchased outside of MAS to MAS
If they can address those three critical things then I think they would have something really good. Right now it's just something I have to have for Lion and other OS updates.
Edit: Bonus #4: A better way of finding apps. Just like iBooksore, it's just a royal pain to look for things outside the top 25 of a broadly defined category.
1. Trial software
2. Discounted upgrades to new versions
3. Transferring licenses from apps purchased outside of MAS to MAS
If they can address those three critical things then I think they would have something really good. Right now it's just something I have to have for Lion and other OS updates.
Edit: Bonus #4: A better way of finding apps. Just like iBooksore, it's just a royal pain to look for things outside the top 25 of a broadly defined category.
101 months ago
Agreed, free trial versions, or perhaps even those following the "freemium" model, which are now abundant on the iOS App Store would be good.
Oh Gawd. No "freemium" apps please. Nothing is more annoying than the "free" apps that do little until you purchase "in app" options. Before you know it the "free" app cost more than if you just purchased a full featured version outright. Plus it's annoying to keep getting nickel and dimed for basic features.
As for trial version -- completely unnecessary for the very reason Apple doesn't allow them. It clutters up the store, hogs bandwidth. Unlike iOS apps, users can d/l trial versions from multiple sites online, including the developer's site.
101 months ago
Am I the only one who read Phil Schiller's quote in his voice? Maybe I watch too many Apple Keynotes.
101 months ago
I would definitely say most people don't know what they're looking for and prefer to browse. But it inhibits exploring to do it the way they have it now. For example, what if I wanted to explore apps that do facial recognition. How would I even attempt that? I may know a little about it but not enough to know that software title X is the only one to choose.
Bruce Tognazzini's latest article touches on this pretty closely: http://www.asktog.com/columns/085BrowseVsSearch.html
I completely agree, all Apple has to do is look at something like Steam to understand how a store can work. Steam is still not perfect of course but much more useful.
WHY does the MAS not even have an "On Sale" category?
I've come to rely on the "Store News" app and AppShopper.com for any decent insight into the App Stores.
101 months ago
A minor annoyance with the Mac (and iOS) App Stores - you have to download the complete app for even a tiny incremental bug fix. Considering many apps are several GB, that's quite a pain.
101 months ago
Agreed, free trial versions, or perhaps even those following the "freemium" model, which are now abundant on the iOS App Store would be good.
Freemium model? Are you serious?!!!
Do you realize how expensive freemium gets? And in general is annoying to try to use if you do want to use it "free"? Most of the time I'd rather pay for the whole software than have to pay for it piece by piece (which can get ridiculous in price under the freemium model, sometimes never ending cause you have to keep paying).
I'd like to see it go extinct and hell no would I like to see it come to computer software. I'd like to actually be able to own and use the software, not "rent" it.
101 months ago
An example: the HD must be replaced. So I send the iMac in for repairs and get a new drive. Instead of reinstalling everything, even with "automagic" MAS reinstalls, I simply press one button on the SuperDuper app.
Everything is transferred, bit by bit an identical copy of my old HD, onto the newly installed HD in the iMac. I restart, everything is as it was the day the HD crashed. All information, everything.
That's magic. That's impressive.
That app is not available on the MAS.
From my perspective the MAS is a failure, it is solving a problem that was never there (unless of course it is solving the problem that Apple didn't get 30% cut of every Mac app sold, in which case it is trying to remedy that)
I have always found software I need, just search the web.
In fact, I find it more difficult to find the app I need on the MAS; I can't look for apps by price, by specific function or expect all apps to be represented.
Furthermore, apps are all subject to Apple's review, redaction and cencorship - something I don't appreciate.
Finally using the MAS means I have to link my credit card to the Apple account, an important step for one to be "embraced" fully into the Apple ecosystem. :p
Everything is transferred, bit by bit an identical copy of my old HD, onto the newly installed HD in the iMac. I restart, everything is as it was the day the HD crashed. All information, everything.
That's magic. That's impressive.
That app is not available on the MAS.
From my perspective the MAS is a failure, it is solving a problem that was never there (unless of course it is solving the problem that Apple didn't get 30% cut of every Mac app sold, in which case it is trying to remedy that)
I have always found software I need, just search the web.
In fact, I find it more difficult to find the app I need on the MAS; I can't look for apps by price, by specific function or expect all apps to be represented.
Furthermore, apps are all subject to Apple's review, redaction and cencorship - something I don't appreciate.
Finally using the MAS means I have to link my credit card to the Apple account, an important step for one to be "embraced" fully into the Apple ecosystem. :p
101 months ago
*shrug*, he was specifically talking about iTunes, not the App Store, and claiming that all people who buy music online are sheep.
I didn't read it like that at all.
101 months ago
I bet too.
I mean, 100 Million really is a nice number. But what is behind that? Can any small developer show any numbers? Not those from last february. I want actual ones.
No you don't. According to *LTD*, Apple's success does not need to be analyzed, unless it's a failure, then we blame the public for not being ready for innovation.
Note that this standard applies only to Apple, and may not be used to quantify the success of any non-Apple company; the success of any other company is, by default, non-innovative and takes the easy path.
101 months ago
So now you're a sheep if you use iTunes? And if not piracy, then what's the alternative? Buying CDs? How does that not make you a sheep as well?
There's quite a bit of software available for Macs, legally, outside the App Store without having to buy "CDs". :rolleyes:
I don't use the App store (though was forced to for Lion and XCode 4), and yet I don't condone piracy or have a CD drive on my MBA.
How does that fit your poor logic my friend ?
Why do some people feel the need to aggressively attack others who make different choices than they do ? Why does this even need to turn into an argument. The MAS isn't as big a hit as the iOS app store and that's frankly because of the limiting rules it puts in place on apps.
I'd rather my applications not be forced to be stripped down and thus I don't use it. Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks this way.
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