The best thing about Android is that it is open source. Developing and submitting apps to the Android Market (now Google Play) is far easier than doing the same for Apple's App Store.

For end users too, the Play store is connected to their Google account. If they are logged in to any Google account (like Gmail), opening the Play store in another browser tab automatically logs them in the store. Browsing and downloading apps is now just a click away.

For developers, uploading apps to the Play store is easy. They have to log in to https://play.google.com/apps/publish/signup , pay a $25 fee and upload their apps. Google takes 30 per cent of the app's price as transaction fees.

Unlike other mobile OS app markets, there are third party app markets for Android. But is there a need for third party markets? Yes. Google does screen the apps that hit the Play market, but not to the extent Apple does. Even then, there are some apps that fail to clear the Google screening.

One such third party store is  http://slideme.org/ . It also does not charge registration fees or take any transaction fees for selling apps.

http://mall.soc.io/apps  is another store. Again, no registration fees for developers.

End users can download apps from slideme and soc.io by downloading the apps from the respective stores, through which they can download other apps.

There was a report recently that said even Cynogenmod was contemplating opening a store for Android. Koushik Dutta of Cynogenmod said in a Google Plus post in January: “I've been bouncing this idea around for a while now, and it seems like an even better idea now, given my recent brush with this problem: we need an App Store for root apps. We also need an app store for apps that are getting shut down for no good reason, other than carrier, or some random corporation doesn't like it. “

dinakaran@thehindu.co.in

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