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Apr 10

iPhone App Store Approaches 1 Billion Downloads

A new milestone for Apple’s wildly successful App Store is fast approaching — one billion downloaded apps.

In anticipation of the momentous occasion, Apple on Friday launched a web site featuring a countdown tool and a promotion giving away prizes. As of this writing, the App Store is 70 million downloads short of one billion.

Just nine months old, Apple’s iPhone App Store has shaken up the mobile software industry. The store launched in July with just 500 apps and grew rapidly, recently surpassing 30,000 applications available for download. Hoping to ride off similar success, other mobile companies, such as Research In Motion, have announced plans to start their own app stores as well.

In addition to being a victory for Apple, some developers have reaped from the benefits immensely. One of the biggest success stories to date involves independent developer Ethan Nicholas, who earned $600,000 in a single month from sales of his iPhone game iShoot. Nicholas recently told Wired.com he broke $800,000 in March.

And now iPhone owners have a chance to get lucky in the App Store, too. Any iPhone owner who downloads an app during the countdown promotion is automatically eligible to win prizes — a $10,000 iTunes gift card, an iPod Touch, a Time Capsule or a MacBook Pro. Each download counts as an entry to the contest; customers can enter up to 25 times. Those who don’t own an iPhone or are unwilling to download an app can enter by filling out a form.

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Photo: superciliousness/Flickr