An Open iTunes App Store: What Would It Look like?

It's probably one of the most highly debated/argued issues out there today. Should Apple continue to keep their App Store closed down, or should they open it up and have developers just upload it right to the App Store? There have been many arguments on both sides as to what Apple should do, but honestly, I think we all know what they WILL do. They're probably going to keep it locked, and that will be the end of the story.

But have you ever imagined what would be the case if Apple let the gates loose and everyone was able to get an app approved to the App Store almost immediately? Here are a few of my predictions (good and bad) of what the iTunes Store would be like unleashed.

An overcrowded, Hard to Use App Store

Yeah. You may be thinking that if Apple opens the gate to the App Store, everyone will be happy downloading their own application and downloading all the other banned applications to their iPhone. But you also need to look at the fact that there are already over 185,000 applications in the App Store. There are probably 20,000 banned applications that have been rejected by Apple, and I'm sure there are many more that if Apple didn't have the policy they have now, would be on the iPhone. If this number goes all the way up to 500,000, or maybe even 1 MILLION, it will be very hard to look through Applications in the App Store. Yeah, we have a search feature, but what if you're just looking for some new games? There will be a ton of games to search for and quite frankly, it will just get too overcrowded.

1 Million + iPhone apps

Definitely a possibility. Think about it. If you have a locked iPhone App Store with 185,000+ apps, just imagine how many applications the App Store would have if Apple let any developer make their own application. At first thinking about this, I saw this as a good thing. But then I started thinking that it would eventually become a bad thing. The App Store would then start getting bloated with random apps that no one cares about(yes, more pointless than some of today's apps) and the App store would take forever to load on your iPhone. However, there will be some nifty applications that would come out of this lift. So it's petty hard to choose. More productivity, but more crap as well.

Categorized Apps Approved by Apple

This may be a bit confusing, but here is how it could work. If Apple opens the App Store, they should have a little "certified" green logo on the bottom of every application that has been approved in the App Store from the top 25 paid, free, etc. Then the ones that have not been certified by Apple have a little "uncertified" logo on the bottom. All certified applications would be apps that Apple has checked to see if they don't contain any malware or if they are a scam. Those not certified by Apple are giving the user a warning saying that this application may not be what you expect it to be, since we haven't checked it and not sure what it could contain. And lastly, have an explicit button in the app if it contains any explicit material, such as porn, bad words in text, violence, etc.

Filtering

This would be something that would be a huge improvement to the App Store. As the App Store continues to expand, it will get to a point where there will be so many sub categories of each category that Apple will probably add a filtering feature, where you can have a certain category or sub category not show up in the App Store. This definitely would fix the issue with the store being overcrowded.

Don't get me wrong. I would love to have an open App Store, but in order for that to happen Apple would have to reconstruct the App Store, because with the way it is now, it will get way too overcrowded. At first, if Apple did this, people would be very happy and thank them for finally not locking down their system. However, as the App Store grows exponentially and eventually the number of pointless, stupid, and useless apps beat out the productive, well-made, thought out apps, and the App Store gets overcrowded, people will start to complain again and ask Apple to remove some of the useless apps. As a matter of fact, we have that going on right now! People are complaining as we speak for Apple to remove some of the useless apps in the App Store.

You've seen my thoughts on how an open App Store would be like. Do you agree or do you think it will go someplace else? Keep in mind, this probably won't happen since Apple has kept an unpopular policy of keeping their operating systems as locked as possible.

A Look at Some iPad Apps

Here I have a little video on some really cool iPad applications that will be available for use tomorrow! The ones I showed in the video are: Plants vs Zombies HD, Tweet Deck, Twitteriffic, Weather HD, Tap Tap Radiation, iBooks, iWork, N.O.V.A. HD, Netflix, Articles, Wordpress, Brushes, Flight Control, Monder Combat, Sandstorm, Asphalt 5, Touchgrind HD, Words With Friends HD, Scrabble, Touch Hockey Extreme 

There are many more and they are sure to impress, so have a fun iDay tomorrow!

iTunes Reaches 10,000,000,000 Song Downloads

This deserves at least a small blog post.

Apple announced today that they sold their 10 billionth (billion with a b) song through iTunes. This is a huge milestone to them, and whomever downloaded the 10,000,000,00th song will receive a $10,000 iTunes gift card. The winner of this contest hasn't been announced yet, and won't be for a few more days. I personally love iTunes and the ease of use it presents to its users.

So, from the Internet, congrats Apple. You've done well.

Awesome iTunes 9 Mod (Mac and PC)

I was just browsing through one of my favorite sites, Deviant Art and I found this amazing mod for iTunes 9! It is available for Mac OSX, Tiger and up, as well for Windows, Windows Vista and 7. 

Windows Version - http://rfly.me/win

Mac OSX Version - http://rfly.me/mod

Now, the installation is self explanatory, but I have also attached a video doing so and what it looks like. Thanks for reading and watching!

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The iPad

With Apple's press conference this morning I was extremely excited to wake up. Unfortunately I had to go to school, but right when I got home I jumped on my computer and checked Apples website. The headline caught my eye as it wasn't what i though it would be called. The rumours had it being called the ISlate, and i knew that there was a good chance that that wouldn't be its name. I still thought that it would be, but now that I think about it, the name IPad has a good ring.

The specs for the device are almost right on with what most people were guessing. It has a 9.7 inch LED touch screen. That is 1024 by 768 resolution at 123 pixels per inch. It is running off of a 1 gigahertz processor made by Apple. It has a height of 9.56 inches, a width of 7.47 inches, a depth of .5 inches, and a weight of 1.5 pounds for the wifi model but on the wifi and 3G model it is 1.6 pounds. It comes in six different models. Some people may find this strange but stilllike it because it provides a model for every one. There are three different sizes: 16 gig, 32 gig, and 64 gig. The other three models are those same sizes but come with an AT&T 3G plan. Apple is saying that you can get up to 10 hours of battery life. This would be great, but will you really get these 10 hours? No one can tell you that right now, although if you go to the bottom of the IPad's page you will find this: "Testing conducted by Apple in January 2010 using preproduction iPad units and software. Testing consisted of full battery discharge while performing each of the following tasks: video playback, audio playback, and Internet browsing using Wi-Fi. Video content was a repeated 2-hour 23-minute movie purchased from the iTunes Store. Audio content was a playlist of 358 unique songs, consisting of a combination of songs imported from CDs using iTunes (128-Kbps AAC encoding) and songs purchased from the iTunes Store (256-Kbps AAC encoding). Internet over Wi-Fi tests were conducted using a closed network and dedicated web and mail servers, browsing snapshot versions of 20 popular web pages, and receiving mail once an hour. All settings were default except: Wi-Fi was associated with a network; the Wi-Fifeature Ask to Join Networks and Auto-Brightness were turned off. Battery life depends on device settings, usage, and many other factors. Battery tests are conducted using specific iPad units; actual results may vary." The ports on the IPad include dock connector, 3.5 millimeter headphone jack, built in speakers, built in mic, and on the 3G models a SIM card slot. Some people mayask where you charge this device this is now power jack. To charge it, you have to use an IPod cable (really called a 30 pin cable)to usb. This means that you have to use a computer or one of the many usb to wall/computer converters. The IPad also has bluetooth, this means that with IPaddock you can have your device act like a monitor screen and use a wireless Apple keyboard to type. Those are the specs for the IPad.

 Apple already has a line up of accessories ready for the device's launch in 60 days (90 days for the 3G model). There are just a few of them right now but we know that soon there will be many more. The first one is a case foriPad, it not only protects the pad but can put it in different positions for easy use. Another accessory is the 6 foot power cord. This power cord lets you plug your device directly into a wall outlet. The third accessory is the IPad dock. The IPad dock lets you plug the IPad into the wall, into your computer, a powered speaker set, and it lets you use the other cool accessories. The last accessory that is out right now is called the IPad Camera Connection Kit. This lets you either plug the usb cable from the camera directly into you IPad of the other version lets you take the SD card out and put it in and transfer your pictures to the IPad that way. Those are the four accessories out right now.

Also, along with the App Store and ITunes store, this device will have a new store that will be just for books. The App will be called IBook. In this app you will have a bookcase-like look that shelves all the books that you have bought and downloaded to your device. Then there will be a button that you can click that will move you to the book store where you can buy the book. This will all happen in the same app so you don't have to go all over to buy a book then read the book. The other big released apps are the IWork apps. IWork is Apple's version of Microsoft Office. These apps will sell for around 10 dollars for each of the different programs. These are designed to work with multi- touch and everything else on the IPad. The next question that some people may be wondering is if they will be able to play all the othergames that I have on my IPhone or ITouch.Well the answer is yes. The new SDK was released so that developers can design apps just for the IPad. This means that they will be taking full use of the processor and the size of the touch screen. The IPad is running a beefed up version of IPhone OS. This means that all the pre-made apps are on it. They have all been changed for the better and made more to feel like you're really on a mac. Just by looking at pictures and the video that was released I can tell that there are really nice changes.

Now for the Prices:

16 gig: $499

16 gig with 3G: $629

32 gig: $599

32 gig with 3G: $729

64 gig: $699

64 gig with 3G: $829

To learn more about the IPad or find pictures or the video go to:http://www.apple.com/ipad/