The popularity of Smartphone applications apps has been a fairly recent phenomenon on the internet. In fact, the industry wasn’t regarded as such until Apple announced that users had downloaded over one billion apps in only the first eighteen months.
Those who believed this was nothing more than a passing phase were dumbfounded when the company later confirmed that users had downloaded another billion apps, this time in only six months. Three months later, the last of the skeptics were forced to eat their proverbial words when Apple announced that users had downloaded another billion apps, this time in a mere three months!
At that point it was patently clear, even to avowed technophobes that applications were here to stay. As you might expect, the astonishing success of Apple and their apps encouraged every Smartphone maker on the planet to get in on the act. After all, Apple was making billions of dollars a year on these little programmes and they weren’t really doing anything.
What we mean is that Apple doesn’t actually create the bulk of their applications. Instead, they pay independent designers about two-thirds of the profits to create their own applications and submit them to the company. All Apple has to do is review these apps to see if they are appropriate and then add them to their catalogue.
Currently, the Apple catalogue stands at over one-hundred thousand apps. While most of these programmes can be downloaded for a small fee, a small number of the more advanced apps will set you back five to ten pounds.
