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Apple Begins Countdown to 50 Billion App Store Downloads

tekboi said:
Now matter how much you hate Apple.... 50 billion app downloads is amazing.
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I really wonder what makes you write that.

Why would anyone hate Apple? I'd say "it shows how much people love Apple... 50 billion app downloads is amazing.".

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numidian said:
My best guess by extrapolating the rate for change from observation is it will average a little over 1 app downloaded per second from its current rate of a little less than 1/sec.

Best guess:

Tuesday, May 11th 2013, 10:34:53 pm EST.
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You mean 500 per second currently.
 
ArtOfWarfare said:
The ticker keeps going if you lose an Internet connection, meaning that it downloads and stores a rate + a current data point to your computer when the page loads and projects from there on while you're still on the page.

So you just have to find where in memory that rate resides. Unfortunately, I think you'll find that the rate isn't linear enough - particularly with so many people trying to buy at the exact right moment, to accurately predict even the second that the 500 people will win during.
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Apple uses transaction servers around the world for app purchases whose network times are probably only measured in 1,000th of a second. So I think there is a likelihood of multiple purchases at the same exact recorded time. How would they account for that? And also, even if the ticker is linear, the apps download rate would change between day and night, so writing a computer program to download the 50 billionth app is impossible.
 
mrtravel123 said:
How about a $10,000 Apple Store Gift Card vs. a $10,000 App Store Credit?

With $10,000 I could buy a couple of very nice MacBook Pro laptops and have money left over for other pieces of great hardware.

$10,000 at the App Store?

I've never understood the PR rationale for that.
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Apple gains not one bit more bit publicity giving away an Apple Store GC vs an iTunes GC and the focus of the contest is to promote iTunes/iOS downloads. The prize is appropriate to that goal. Otherwise Apple could just give $10K in cash away... pocket change for Apple. It's likely not trying to save a few pennies here, just make the prize fit the contest and what Apple wants consumers to focus on.

Most people will just see "$10K..." anyway. Whoever wins will first be ecstatic, then p.o.'d once the tax bill comes rolling in. (Yes, the winner has to pay taxes... major bummer if that extra $10 bumps you to the next bracket).
 
A $10,000 app store gift card is absolutely retarded. Hurr durr, just putting 10,101 $0.99 apps on my iPhone. Apple out of touch, as usual.
 
Chupa Chupa said:
Most people will just see "$10K..." anyway. Whoever wins will first be ecstatic, then p.o.'d once the tax bill comes rolling in. (Yes, the winner has to pay taxes... major bummer if that extra $10 bumps you to the next bracket).
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In many countries you don't pay taxes for awards.
 
sebastian... said:
In many countries you don't pay taxes for awards.
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Many? Let's not exaggerate... at least the countries were the iTunes store operates. In most countries prize winnings at the $10K level, either in cash, goods, or services, is taxable.
 
50 billion downloads?
Given that 536,017 are unreferenced never-downloaded "zombie" apps (thanks, apptrace.com), that means about 300,000 viable apps with an average around 166,000 downloads each; of course, the few big hits mean the median download count is far less, perhaps by 1-3 orders of magnitude.

Any ideas on how many apps pull in over $100k/year? that as a ballpark of the odds of an app making enough for someone to live on (all business expenses included).

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Greg. said:
A $10,000 app store gift card is absolutely retarded. Hurr durr, just putting 10,101 $0.99 apps on my iPhone. Apple out of touch, as usual.
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Well yeah, if you stick with cheap-crap apps (remember, you've got $10K to spend) at a buck each.
I'd have no trouble finding 10 apps >=$10 in each of 10 categories each year, wouldn't last me even 5 years. Music? OCR sequencer, a few classic synth emulators, a good DJ app, ... Imaging? photoshop, lightroom, various drawing apps ... Games? could blow the budget on those alone ... Software development? git tools, ObjC editors, ... etc. Consider each category has about 10 new awesome/must-have apps each year, yeah I could spend that much (and probably will).
 
Greg. said:
A $10,000 app store gift card is absolutely retarded. Hurr durr, just putting 10,101 $0.99 apps on my iPhone. Apple out of touch, as usual.
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App Store gift cards have always worked for music, audio books, and ebooks as well.
 
Chupa Chupa said:
Many? Let's not exaggerate... at least the countries were the iTunes store operates. In most countries prize winnings at the $10K level, either in cash, goods, or services, is taxable.
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The two countries where I know it (Germany and UK), no tax is being paid on lottery prices, like this one, or an gambling wins.
 
Hi, first post!

Ok, 50B apps. Quite an achievement!

My question is if anyone can take 50B and divide by iPhone handsets sold (all models of course). How many apps per phone on average? 200-300-400?

Would be an interesting number. I myself have downloaded roughly 200 apps throughout 3 iPhones. Average, below, above?

I assume a couple of members have a pretty good idea :)
 
macman34 said:
50 billion downloads and apple repays developers $350 bucks when they have $150 billion in the bank? If there's anyone who's helped them sell millions of idevices it's the developers themselves, the vast majority of which are barely getting by due to the intense competition. Excuse me but they paid John effing whatshisname Dixons manager 3 million for half a year of mucking it up in retail and they can't afford more than $350 for their developers. Head honchos are throwing around hundreds of millions between themselves for the past few years, and as token of their gratitude towards the people who make the applications without which their devices would pretty much be glorified bricks what they can muster is a little over the price for an average ipod touch?

I think that's not just stingy, it's downright insulting. A $500 gift card on the 50 billion downloads mark. Wow, that's effing generous. (as an aside they are surely going to make a few tens of times that amount they are giving away. out of the people buying just to hit the 50 bill mark and get the price, kids especially.)

(In addition, I, as a consumer would like them to handpick 100-500 apps that are great but are not getting by in sales (and they know very well who is or isn't selling) and curate them so quality rises in the app store. )
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Where are you arriving at the amount of $350?

Uh keep in mind, it takes a platform for the developers to "develop" for and it takes a successful company to create a successful product without advertising for developers to benefit from. The iPhone was already a smash hit before the app store took off. Developers can't make money unless the platform and the product are smash hits. You're making it sound like the developers did Apple a favor, gimme a break. :rolleyes: The app store has made quite a few developers so wealthy they've given up their day jobs so you're excused for misunderstanding that Apple gave people a way to make a great living.

As far as the 50 billion download gift card prize. I don't recall Apple being required to offer this and since they have $150 billion in the bank as you so humbly mentioned it doesn't look like they need to have a prize drawing to attract customers. $150 billion SAYS they don't need to. Could you be so kind as to give me the link to the drawing that Dell, Sony, HP, Lenovo or Samsung is currently offering that's better than Apple's? Or shall I Google search it? ;)
 
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