While it seems like it has been around forever, the Apple App Store is celebrating its 5th birthday this week. From Angry Birds to productivity programs, consumers of all kinds have flocked to the popular store to download applications to improve nearly every aspect of our lives. This can be anything from sitting on the subway and using Apple products to read, play games or handle work tasks to having your doctor take notes and update your medical records on an iPad.
Launched on July 10, 2008, with 500 apps, the store took off immediately and saw 10 million downloads in the first weekend. By September 9, over 100 million worldwide downloads had taken place.
Since then, thousands of applications have been created and enjoyed by consumers and business customers alike. In May of this year, the store surpassed 50 billion downloads and is experiencing nearly 800 per second. There are currently over 900,000 apps available and that number grows every day. During the Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple announced it has paid more than $10 billion to developers.
Currently the story has several applications that are normally paid apps available for free to celebrate the anniversary of the App Store.
The variety of programs has helped make the iOS platform a powerful tool for numerous avenues. It is the reason that mobility options are being adopted by companies across the globe, but knowing which ones to download can be difficult. An IT consulting firm that specializes in iPad deployments can become a valuable resource.
