Everyone loves free mobile applications. Just look at the iPhone App Store’s volume of free-app downloads and you’ll start to understand. Interestingly, it’s actually the premium applications that drive development of free apps.
The Android Market is full of free Android apps, but hasn’t yet attracted the kind of developer-attention that the AppStore enjoys. The problem isn’t that the Android platform is more difficult to develop for than the iPhone OS. The problem lies in the Android Market’s lack of premium applications.
Without premium (paid) apps, big name developers aren’t going to be eager to invest time and resources into developing an application that won’t generate any revenue. The lack of a payment platform also means that free applications have no chance of generating “upgrade” or brand-loyalty purchases down the line.
Just yesterday Google announced that they would be accepting premium applications in the Android Market. But, what does that mean for Android users?
In the same way that Apple’s for-pay application store has inspired big-name developers to flock to the iPhone OS, the Android Market’s introduction of paid applications will likely spark a wave of free-app development. Once developers see that there’s money to be made in the Android Market, they’ll no doubt be willing to get their name out there with free applications that show the Android-world what they can do. We’ll also see “lite” versions of premium applications hitting the Android Market.
Free applications like Wikitude and RemoteDroid have already given us a glimpse of what’s possible with a little ingenuity and some coding know-how. We can only imagine what a flood of developer support will mean for the future of the Android Market. The iPhone AppStore will have some stiff competition from the Android competition.
But, with only a fraction of the iPhone and iPhone 3Gs installed user base, the Android Market still lacks the App Store’s global reach. So, the real question is whether or not this will affect developers’ decision to spend time in creating an Android application?