Blackberry Application Center
Proving Apple’s dominance in the mobile application market, RIM is rushing forward with their own answer to the App Store. The largest difference is that each carrier will run their own store, and be allowed to filter apps in whatever manner they choose.
As more App Store-alikes come forward, this is starting to feel more and more like the early days of iTunes. Sure, you could purchase (or otherwise obtain) music in a variety of other ways, but Apple did something revolutionary: easy, comfortable purchasing of digital music for their Apple-branded music player. Others followed suit, some even tying their offerings to hardware, but nobody was quite able to match the success of iTunes or the momentum of the iPod.
You’ll know it’s time to change platforms when Wal-mart opens a mobile application store.