Latest News In The World

Google Search Options Appended With New Filters

2009-10-03T23:30:00.000-07:00

Google offers a set of filters called the Google Search options that can be used by users to refine their search. This was introduced by Google few months ago in May for web search and image search. It was introduced in order to increase the search speed. Google has now added more filters to the web search in order to make it even more sophisticated and for giving a better search experience for the users. Google Search options have been appended with nine new search options. The filters that have been introduced include more shopping sites, past hour, fewer shopping sites, specific date range, books, visited pages, not yet visited, blogs and news.

By clicking on the ‘show options’ link on top of the Google search results page, users would be able to see the filters listed on the left side of the search results page. These options would be very useful for users as with these options they would be able to refine their search like just searching the information they need like videos and more. The product manager in search, Mr. Nandu Janakiram has said that Google is introducing new options in search that be used by Google users to find the last one hour results posted in Google News and Google Books. Users would even be able to see more less results from the stores depending on what they need.

Though it was already possible for users to make their searches within Google Books and Google News, Google feels that this new update in the Google Search Options that has included several filters would help users in making their search without having to leave the main search results page. Mr. Nandu Janakiram has said that even when the user clicks on the ‘News’ filter page, the look and feel of the search page would not change.
One more advantage of this is that Google would now be able to sell different types of ads on the same the same results page. Mr. Nandu Janakiram has said that the filters that the users choose to can be “a potentially helpful signal about user intent, so it does change the way ads appear,”. It is not sure on whether different sets of ads would be used by Google but it can be said that users would now be able to remove ads that are irrelevant in some search pages.
The filters that Google has updated now would be available for all Google visitors. However, if the user has a Google account then he or she would also bee able to refine results pages that they have already visited. This would be very useful for users as they would not have to go through the entire search again as they would easily be able to trace out the website that they have already visited.

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Best Google Fast Flip

2009-10-02T00:05:00.000-07:00

Google Fast Flip is a web application that lets users discover and share news articles. It combines qualities of print and the Web, with the ability to "flip" through pages online as quickly as flipping through a magazine. It also enables users to follow friends and topics, discover new content and create their own custom magazines around searches.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does it work?
We capture images of the articles on our partners' websites and then display them in an easy-to-read way. The stories are grouped by categories, such as Entertainment, Business, Opinion, Politics and Most Viewed. Readers can flip through stories quickly by simply pressing the left- and right-arrow keys until they find one that catches their interest. Clicking on the story takes them directly to the publisher's website.

How are the Topics selected? Can I choose my own?
The Topics are generated automatically by rising stories in the news. Users can also search for any subjects they want and basically create their own topics, almost like a custom magazine, on the fly.

How are stories recommended in the Recommended section?
The stories in this section are recommended by users of Google Fast Flip in direct and indirect ways. We take cues from how often they read stories, e-mail stories and register a public vote for stories by clicking on the "Like" button on each article.

Can I recommend stories that I like to other people?
Google Fast Flip allows readers to vote on an article to tell the world they liked it. Clicking on the "Like" button on a story page lodges a public vote for that story, which is one of the factors in whether Fast Flip includes stories the "Recommended" section. At the bottom of the home page, Fast Flip users who are signed in to their Google Account can see which stories friends in their Gmail contact list have "liked."

How do you personalize results on Google Fast Flip?
We are able to take the cues you give us - such as the stories you read, recommend and e-mail - to present sections, news sources and specific authors tailored specifically to your interests. To enable personalization of the articles you see, you must sign in to your Google Account. You can easily create a Google Account on this page if you don't already have one.

Is this available for all languages and editions of Google News?
At launch, Google Fast Flip is available on the Google Labs website with English-language content. International users should be able to see this feature in Google Labs.

Does Google Fast Flip work on mobile devices?
At launch, Google Fast Flip will work on iPhone and Android mobile devices. Going forward, we'll explore rolling out support for other mobile platforms.

Where can I see a full list of the publishers included?
You can see a full list of the sources at http://fastflip.googlelabs.com/sources. We are currently testing Google Fast Flip with a limited number of publishing partners in the U.S. We hope to add more publishers in the future but can't share a specific time table.

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Ethical SEO Marketing Company Unlimited Web Solutions Expands Website, Pricing Structure & Facility

2008-09-05T21:53:00.000-07:00

Unlimited Web Solutions, a leading SEO and Internet marketing company, has announced the expansion of their facilities, pricing structure and website. This expansion gives customers more options for Search Engine Optimization training and online marketing plans while increasing the client's access to the desired services.

Raleigh, NC (PRWEB) September 5, 2008 -- The search engine optimization marketing agency Unlimited Web Solutions has announced it has expanded their pricing structure, facility and website.

To make facilities more comfortable for their staff and open the possibility of expanding their employee numbers in the future, Unlimited Web Solutions has expanded into a new location four times the size of their current location.

The Internet marketing firm has expanded online as well. Their newly re-launched website features a new logo and header as well as streamlined graphics and navigation. The header features four corners outlining the company's area of expertise including Organic SEO, Programming, Pay-per-click advertising, and Social media. Co-owner and Vice President of Unlimited Web Solutions, David Williams, is pleased with the redesign of the website and feels customers will be able to get a good feel for what their company can offer.

"We are looking to target businesses who are serious about their online image and presence. Our goal is to partner with companies who can benefit from all four aspects of our expertise -- not just one or two. In this way we feel we can really make an impact with rankings and onsite conversions," said Williams.

Lastly, Unlimited Web Solutions has added additional options to their pricing structure. Now, in addition to beginning a long-term relationship with clients on a monthly basis, the Internet marketing company offers customers the option of flat-fee projects including on-site SEO training and consultation and in-depth online marketing plans specific to a client's needs.

The on-site SEO training program offered by Unlimited Web Solutions is geared towards medium to large web design firms, IT firms, and advertising agencies that can benefit from increasing the SEO services they provide.

"We fly to wherever the client is located and conduct a thorough two-day training session. We find many of the designers and companies we work with are amazed at how many things they have been doing wrong when it comes to SEO. We not only help them better serve their existing clients, but give them the tools required to increase their fees and add additional sources of income. The training session easily pays for itself in a matter of months," said Williams.

The marketing plan offered by the Internet marketing agency is designed for end-users looking for an in-depth analysis of their current online status. This plan includes in-depth keyword research, competitor analysis, and website analysis. From there, the search engine optimization specialists will recommend a plan to increase online presence including organic SEO, social media marketing, and website optimization. The Internet marketing specialists also include up to a total of five hours of telephone consulting to ensure the customer understands every aspect of the recommendations and results.

About Unlimited Web Solutions: Unlimited Web Solutions is a full service Internet marketing agency offering a selection of Internet and SEO marketing solutions. The online marketing company is a leader in organic search engine optimization and ethical SEO optimization, training, and consulting to allow their customers to maximize their ROI.

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Google Amends Chrome License Agreement After Objections

2008-09-03T21:09:00.000-07:00

Google will dump a section of the licensing agreement for its new Chrome browser after some Internet users objected to its copyright implications.

Google said Wednesday it would dump one section of the end-user licensing agreement that gave the company "a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through" the new browser.

Several Web users raised copyright and privacy concerns about portions of the licensing agreement shortly after Google launched Chrome Tuesday. Some critics suggested the language would allow Google to use any Web content displayed in Chrome without getting copyright permission.

Google said it borrowed language from other products, "in order to keep things simple for our users," when it inserted the copyright provision in the Chrome license.

"Sometimes, as in the case of Google Chrome, this means that the legal terms for a specific product may include terms that don't apply well to the use of that product," Rebecca Ward, senior product counsel for Chrome, said in a statement. "We are working quickly to remove language from Section 11 of the current Google Chrome terms of service. This change will apply retroactively to all users who have downloaded Google Chrome."

In addition to the perpetual copyright granted to Google in section 11, the license allowed the company to "make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services."

That language comes from Google's universal terms of service, the company said.

The wording lead to a copyright debate on Slashdot.org, although one poster noted that Slashdot's parent company, SourceForge, uses similar language in some license agreements. Florida lawyer David Loschiavo dissected the Google licensing agreement in his own blog post.

"In other words, by posting anything (via Chrome) to your blog(s), any forum, video site, myspace, itunes, or any other site that might happen to be supporting you, Google can use your work without paying you a dime," Loschiavo wrote."It applies to everything you pass through Chrome. Google can take your submitted content and edit and reuse it all they want, as long as they do so in connection with Chrome."

The license agreement seemed to assume that Web users had ownership of all the content they produced and displayed through Chrome, he added. Employees of Web publishers or universities probably couldn't legally agree to the Chrome terms of service, "because these people most likely don't have the right to give a license to the intellectual property (IP) they produce," Loschiavo wrote. "Most likely your employee or student agreement requires that your employer/university exclusively owns all IP that you make during your time there."

Web content creators, such as news writers and musicians employed by a company, may have been in breach of their employment contracts had they agreed to the Google license, he said. "Further, you probably can't use your company or school email with Chrome, because your company probably exclusively owns your email, and you can't give away a license to something you don't own," Loschiavo wrote. "You also can't make representations to Google that you have the power to license this IP if you don't."

Other companies have attempted to use similar language in Web-based products, including Microsoft and AOL for their instant messaging products, Loschiavo said. Those attempts raised objections as well, he said.

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Clusty.com is a Meta Search Engine

2008-08-25T02:03:00.000-07:00

Clusty is meta search engine developed by Vivisimo which offers of results. A cluster is a group of similar topics that are related to the original query. The aim of search engine technique is to organize numerous search results into several meaningful categories.

Clusty is a whole new way to search engine by search results. Clusty search engine has some features. Clusty search queries combine the results several search engines such as Ask.com, Live.com, Open Directory and etc,. Then it has three icon every search links, like New Window, Preview and Show in Clusters. Clusty helps to us change of font size.

Clusty search engine will now be available on Mobile Phones.

Original Article

StumbleUpon is Finally Removing the 200 Friend Fan Limit

2008-08-09T05:50:00.000-07:00

StumbleUpon has plans to finally remove their 200 friend limit. I am so thrilled as this has been a huge pet peeve for me for months now. I have over 1300 fans, but I can only make 200 of them my friends…. meaning at this moment I can only subscribe to 200 of these StumbleUpon member’s Stumble-Reviews. These StumbleUpon changes will allow me to make Stumbler’s friends with an option to subscribe or not subscribe to their Stumbles. The Official StumbleUpon Blog states….. "Over the next couple weeks we are going to separate the social & content aspects of friendship on SU, so you can subscribe to someone’s favorites without necessarily becoming their friend, and become someone’s friend without necessarily seeing their stumbles. You’ll also be able to "Subscribe" to more than 200 stumblers, since we’ve changed the way they are stored in the database. Mutuals will just be "Friends", fans will become "Subscribers" and you’ll simply be "Subscribed to" stumblers who rate great content." This makes me so excited and I am totally looking forward to start seeing these changes. These new changes will allow me to make new friends with StumbleUpon members and check out some of their Stumbles…. something I was restricted on in the past. This restriction caused me to be so selective in the past and limited me from opening myself up to new StumbleUpon friends…. I just wasn’t able to. Once a month I would have to do a StumbleUpon House Cleaning where I would clean house of my StumbleUpon friends that were no longer active or no longer stumbling things I would be interested in. I hated doing it, but I had to purge my friends list often. I am sure I will have to clean house occasionally, but now I won’t have to do it as often and I will be able to put this time in to something more useful…. like enjoying my new friend’s Stumbles. So, I look forward to your new changes StumbleUpon…. you know how much I love you. Our first year together rocked my world, StumbleUpon!! But, I have a feeling this next year will be our best yet!! Original Article

Flash and SEO: Like Oil and Water

2008-08-08T02:21:00.000-07:00

We often deal with clients that are planning to "revamp" their sites with Flash, with SEO having already generated tremendous gains in their sales. The thing that we most dread to hear is that they've hired an experienced "Flash designer" that will be taking their websites to the "next level." Unfortunately, that "next level" is often the basement - at least in terms of SEO results.

The bottom line here is that a site built entirely in Flash still faces huge obstacles. While there have been recent moves from Google and Yahoo! to try to index the content from combined Flash/SEO sites, those moves have not yet, from my experience, translated into SEO results or success (at least when compared to html sites).

We should make a distinction here between embedded Flash and sites built entirely from Flash. For example, a site that contains Flash elements but still contains basic html elements will not overly suffer, as the Flash element (usually a movie in a box on the homepage or elsewhere) is externalized. A search engine spider will generally not try to parse through any files that have been externalized in the code - they will only index the code that is readily apparent on the source page.

However, from an SEO results perspective, there are still major issues with sites that are built entirely in Flash, and SEO is normally the first thing that suffers. First of all, the URL generally never changes no matter where people navigate on the site. As any decent SEO practitioner will tell you, every page of your site is a potential entry page for a search engine. With a site built in Flash, SEO suffers even more as you only have one potential entry page, which is the main URL. This cuts off dozens, hundreds, or thousands of potential pages that could otherwise be indexed in Google and Yahoo! (and all other engines). When your only potential entry page in the search engine listings is your home page, it is very difficult to target a wide assortment of keyphrases, potentially eliminating SEO results or rankings.

Content is another very large issue. Search engines rank pages based upon a number of criteria, but one of the most important to SEO results is the text that they can "understand" on individual pages. At present, search engines read primarily html text (although some also read text in the PDF format) - which means that if you decide that you want to use a rare and fancy font that must be displayed in graphic form (since the visitor may not have that particular font available on his or her computer while browsing), the engine will not read the text and therefore will not know what the page is about, which could harm SEO results. Naturally, this also includes any of the text included in Flash. While Yahoo! and Google have recently announced enhanced capabilities in reading content within Flash, I have not personally seen that translate into great SEO results for competitive keyphrases.

One other emerging aspect is that as search evolves, more and more people are looking for information while they are away from their computers. Many mobile devices are currently incapable of displaying Flash content, although recent moves by Adobe to make "Flash Lite" available may change this. However, it remains to be seen whether people that are seeking information on a mobile device will even want to navigate through Flash, especially if they can get the information that they seek from a fast-loading html page. In my opinion, lean html content will be at a premium when a company is trying to target a mobile audience.

Despite the difficulties, it is not the intent of this article to assert that Flash and SEO will always be incompatible - merely that it is the state of the current situation. You can find many differing opinions on mixing Flash and SEO on the internet, but the true test is to try to find a Flash site (that is to say, a site built entirely in Flash) that you admire and see if it ranks well in SEO results for 50+ competitive terms that are related to the specific business (in Google or Yahoo!). In my experience, such sites that combine Flash and SEO are nearly impossible to find. If anyone out there knows of one, please let me know.

Flash can be, and often is, used for great effect on the internet, in interactive kiosks, and in many other applications. I'm not from the "any Flash is bad" school, although I do think that many Flash practitioners tend to get a little carried away and often ignore basic usability issues. However, sites built entirely in Flash with SEO elements are still, again in my opinion, like oil and water - Flash and SEO are obviously individually useful, but they don't mix well. Until they do, I will continue to advise my clients not to build sites entirely out of Flash - or, at the very least, to have an alternate html option for search engine and user preference purposes. At the end of the day, many clients are surprised to find out how many visitors actually prefer "old school" html.

Original Article

Planet Google - Everything You Always Wanted to Know

2008-08-05T23:50:00.000-07:00

There's one book every search engine marketer will be reading this fall:

Planet Google: One Company's Audacious Plan to Organize Everything We Know.

Based on unprecedented access he received to the "Googleplex," New York Times columnist Randall Stross takes readers deep inside Google. His revelations demystify the strategy behind the company's recent flurry of bold moves, all driven by the pursuit of a business plan unlike any other: to become the indispensable gatekeeper of all the world's information, the one-stop destination for all our information needs.

Will Google succeed? And what are the implications of a single company commanding so much information and knowing so much about us?

As ambitious as Google's goal is, with 68 percent of all Web searches (and growing), profits that are the envy of the business world, and a surplus of talent, the company is, Stross shows, well along the way to fulfilling its ambition, becoming as dominant a force on the Web as Microsoft became on the PC.

Google isn't just a superior search service anymore. In recent years it has launched a dizzying array of new services and advanced into whole new businesses, from the introductions of its controversial Book Search and the irresistible Google Earth, to bidding for a slice of the wireless-phone spectrum and nonchalantly purchasing YouTube for $1.65 billion.

Google has also taken direct aim at Microsoft's core business, offering free e-mail and software from word processing to spreadsheets and calendars, pushing a transformative -- and highly disruptive -- concept known as "cloud computing." According to this plan, users will increasingly store all of their data on Google's massive servers -- a network of a million computers that amounts to the world's largest supercomputer, with unlimited capacity to house all the information Google seeks.

The more offerings Google adds, and the more ubiquitous a presence it becomes, the more dependent its users become on its services and the more information they contribute to its uniquely comprehensive collection of data.

Will Google stay true to its famous "Don't Be Evil" mantra, using its power in its customers' best interests?

Resource

China Blocks FeedBurner RSS Feeds

2008-08-05T03:23:00.000-07:00

FeedBurner, which powers hundreds of thousands of blog, podcast and mainstream news feeds (including this one), is apparently being blocked by Chinese authorities. Here is a Yoda-esque loose English language translation of William Long's original post. William even used a proxy server to verify that the issue is with the Chinese, not FeedBurner. His subscriber count dropped from over a thousand readers to zero overnight.

I have nothing but respect for Dick Costolo and the FeedBurner crew. They have been extremely helpful in troubleshooting various issues on my blog and others. I am sure they are doing everything in their power to remedy as best they can. This issue goes way beyond FeedbBurner.

This is a big deal. Essentially, the Chinese government is choosing to block some of the most popular RSS feeds in the world. That's like they decided to block the largest airline from their airspace. It is as close as you will see a nation coming to blocking the entire RSS/podcast transport. This goes beyond blocking blog services like TypePad and is important to watch. This might be a sign of bigger trouble for RSS in China.

Later: The ban lasted only a day and has since ended.

Original Article

Facebook Kills Scrabulous, Makes Hasbro Look Stupid

2008-08-03T22:00:00.000-07:00

According to the NY Times The New York Times , Facebook has officially killed Scrabulous, the world’s most popular Scrabble Scrabble look-a-like and one of the most popular applications on the entire service.

When you click on the Scrabulous link, it displays a message saying “Scrabulous is disabled for U.S. and Canadian users until further notice. If you would like to stay informed about developments in this matter, please click here.” Once you click on that link, you’re brought to a form from the Scrabulous founders asking for your email address so they can keep you abreast of the future of their platform.

Of course, practically everyone knew this day was coming. Hasbro facebook-scrabble-is-here-sort-of Apr-7-2008 , the company holding the rights to Scrabble, sued the founders of Scrabulous, Rajat Agarwalla and Jayant Agarwalla, earlier this year claiming their game was in violation of the DMCA.

“Hasbro has an obligation to act appropriately against infringement of our intellectual properties,” said Barry Nagler, Hasbro’s general counsel, in a statement. “We view the Scrabulous application as clear and blatant infringement of our Scrabble intellectual property, and we are pursuing this legal action in accordance with the interests of our shareholders, and the integrity of the Scrabble brand.”

But were that move and the subsequent takedown really in the “interests” of Hasbro’s shareholders? The way I see it, a service that copies your game and enjoys over a half-million actives probably shouldn’t be shut down if you knew what you were doing.

Instead, you should buy it up and turn a profit by exploiting those active users.

The Old Guard never ceases to amaze me. Companies like Hasbro that have been around the block more than a few times should know all too well that eliminating the copy cat isn’t necessarily the best move if the copy cat is representative of all the things Hasbro is doing wrong.

Let’s face it – Scrabble, is, well, one of those board games that ten-year olds play with Aunt Mary and eighty-year olds play in the nursing home. Other than that, few people are running down to Target to pick up the millennium edition of a game that was popular a long time ago.

Instead, most of these people found that Scrabble wasn’t half-bad after playing Scrabulous and decided to play online instead of picking up the board version. And Hasbro is upset about that?

Two men from India own Scrabulous. Hasbro is a huge corporation that incurs billions in revenue every year. Don’t you think it might be able to get a bargain for Scrabulous and use all of its users to its advantage?

Once again, the Old Guard has lost all common sense in the face of the DMCA and other draconian policies that help cloud judgment and make for predatory practices. Instead of embracing the past and clinging to its faulty hope that Scrabble will somehow beat Scrabulous, Hasbro should have realized that the latter has over 500,000 active users at any given time – far more than those playing the board game – and could quite easily monetize that game and enjoy an even greater Return on Investment than it will by shutting it down.

Maybe it’s me, but I’m a firm believer that the old fools running these companies don’t know what they’re doing. It’s time all these empty suits stop calling their lawyers, and start calling their acquisition specialists so they make the right move instead of the one that will have a major negative impact going forward.

Although it may be too early to tell, I think Hasbro’s handling of Scrabulous will be one of the company’s greatest blunders and will ensure that it has no standing in the online space. In essence, Hasbro today threw away 500,000 people who could be worth more than twice that in dollars a year from now.

Original Article

New Search Engine Has Google Nervous

2008-08-01T22:01:00.000-07:00

A new search engine launched today has market leader Google nervous. Why? Because Cuil.com (pronounced “cool”) is being touted as having the potential to topple Google off their pedestal. Yes, it’s been predicted before to no avail, but this time the critics might be right. Let’s take a look at reasons why:

1) Cuil can apparently claim the title of world’s biggest search engine, searching more pages on the Web than any other site. That’s three times as many as Google and ten times as many as Microsoft.

2) Cuil tackles the issue of privacy by promoting the fact that they don’t collect user data. Privacy concerns are apparently one of the main reasons users abandon Google in favor of other engines.

3) The three founders of Cuil know search inside out. They include ex-Googlers Anna Patterson and Russell Power of the TeraGoogle project and Tom Costello of IBM’s WebFountain project.

4) Even Danny Sullivan thinks Cuil could be a major player. As he points out:

“Google already did a blog post in reaction to Cuil and its size claims on Friday, before Cuil even launched or those claims became public. If Google’s paying that much attention, then anyone should.”

That’s good enough for me!

5) Cuil provides some unique tools for researchers and serious searchers. After you perform a search, you sometimes see a box on the right-hand side that says “Explore By Category” with a list of subjects related to your search.
If you roll-over a category, it will open and show related refinements. It reminds me of the dig tool you sometimes see when performing keyword research on WordTracker or KeywordDiscovery.

And what exactly does “Cuil” mean? Apparently it is an ancient Irish word for knowledge. How very cuil!

Stay tuned to see if Cuil can make a dent in Google’s 1st place trophy.

Original Article

Apple Launches iTunes App Store With 500 Applications

2008-07-10T22:15:00.000-07:00

After months of work, Apple's App Store for the iPhone/iPod Touch is complete. For all the criticism for carrier exclusivity, Apple made one key reversal of stance, when after initially trying to clamp down on them, it decided to embrace third-party developers. As the months passed its enthusiasm grew, as it released software development kits.

Now with the arrival of the new 3G iPhone, which goes on sale Friday, Apple has formed the applications market into a second pillar of its phone business. Customers of the iPhone -- old and new -- will greet this new venture gladly; gone are the days of a scant few handpicked Apple apps. Now anyone with a good idea and a bit of software savvy can make their own application.

The store opens Thursday and will offer 500 software applications. Games, educational programs, mobile commerce, and business productivity are just some of the plethora of software. Twenty-five percent of the applications are free, including AOL's AIM. And of the remaining applications, 90 percent are $9.99 or less, making them an easy impulse buy. With the iPhone looking to one-up usurping rivals like Verizon's Voyager or the various HTC smartphones, the applications store Apple hopes will give the iPhone an edge.

The store has support from major players -- Facebook, MySpace, AOL, eBay, Major League Baseball, Sega and Bank of America among others. Facebook and MySpace have a new competitor though -- Friendbook (pictured). This new iPhone-specific social network may become a top new social network.

To download applications, you can simply directly access the store and download on your iPhone/iPod Touch. Additionally, it is also relatively simple to install applications through iTunes; just update your iTunes to the latest version -- 7.7 -- download the software, and sync it to your iPhone. In addition to the Apps functionality, the new iTunes version features the Nike+iPod functionality, long rumored, which allows you to track your runs using your iPod and special Nike brand shoes.

Steve Jobs, Apple CEO and founder, is more than pleased with the store. He states, "The reaction we have gotten so far has been really strong. The quality and the sophistication of the applications you can write for the iPhone is in a different class."

Having learned his lesson from the failure of Apple computers in the 1990s, which was thanks in part to poor software support, Jobs was determined not to make the same mistake. Now the new applications store promises to provide fast, easy instant access to software perhaps akin to Valve's software distribution network on the personal computer, but never before on this scale on mobile phones.

The store is projected to generate as much as $1.2B USD in yearly business by 2009. It will also help to fuel iPhone sales. While Apple certainly looks poised for success, don't think Apple is profiting much at the expense of its hardworking independent developers. Apple gives developers a generous 70 percent of sales. Mr. Jobs insists that the goal is not to make much profit, but rather merely to "sell more iPhones."

The 30/70 profit split was derived from the video games industry, according to Mr. Jobs. This seems logical as a third of the applications for the iPhone are in fact video games.

The store, however, is being met by a wary eye from some developers. Some are concerned that their applications -- say web browsers or music services -- might be disallowed by Apple as they would compete with Apple staples such as iTunes. Thus far, Apple has been rather liberal in its allowances, unlike many phone companies, but this may change. Mywaves, an ad-sponsored free mobile video service which would compete with iTunes video already has received a bit of a cold shoulder. Mr. Jobs acknowledged this, but indicated that talks would continue.

Also, while Apple's distribution may be more streamlined than its competitors, its competitors still have more developers and more software despite being more restrictive. Palm says it has 30,000 software developers writing for its products, while Microsoft boasts that its Windows Mobile OS has 18,000 applications, available on 160 carriers worldwide.

Despite this adversity, the iPhone App store seems likely to succeed, perhaps thanks to Apple's marketing mystique. Says Gene Munster, a senior research analyst at Piper Jaffray, "Everybody wants to build an iPhone app. It’s pretty rare you hear things like this. The enthusiasm is surprising."

How serious is the new store? Matt Murphy, a partner in a fund set up by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers is directing a $100M USD fund to invest in iPhone developer startups. Of 2,000 ideas submitted, his firm is seriously considering backing 100 of them.

Some of the applications it supports are rather exotic. The iControl Networks proposal will allow homeowners to turn off their lights and alarms and watch security cameras -- all from their iPhone, remotely.

With the variety of options and strong interest and investment capitol the App Store seems poised to make a unique splash in the phone and music player industries. It marks a new chapter for Apple's style of developer interactions. And it marks perhaps one of the strongest features of the already popular iPhone, yet.

Original Article