Best of 2009 in the App Industry

2010 is coming up on us faster than the Millennium Falcon made the Kessel Run. Taking a step back and sifting through mountains of data, we’ve compiled a list of this past years biggest contributions to our industry. So without further ado, here are…

THIS YEAR’S BIGGEST APP STORIES…

Location-Based Apps

Apple’s iPhone has opened up a whole new market for developers with location-based apps. So it’s really no surprise that 2009 gave us more than our share of these little gems from an end-user standpoint. But as developers, it’s given us an opportunity to become millionaires with the stroke of a pen. Gowalla, based in Austin, Texas is valued at nearly $30 million dollars, and when reading posts like this, where IAC CEO, Barry Diller is sitting on $2 billion (yes, that’s a b) looking for valuable web properties to purchase, we are very excited to see what the next year will bring.

User Experience

We don’t like hearing the word “trend” when it comes to User Experience as it makes it sound as if it will come and go, and UX is surely here to stay. User Experience, User-Centered Design, Interaction Design, or whatever term you prefer, 2009 helped those of us who may not have understood it’s importance, drink the proverbial kool-aid and embrace it as an early necessity when developing and designing.

In the book, “The Brand Gap” author, Marty Neumeier describes brand as, “…a person’s gut feeling about a product, service, or organization.” User Experience Design uses this same type of philosophy, and in 2009, those of us not already riding the UX train, jumped on board.

Web Fonts, CSS3 and HTML5

Fonts on the web have been a thorn in the side of web designers and developers since the early days of the web. If you wanted to use typefaces other than Arial, Verdana, Times New Roman, etc., you were out of luck unless you wanted to create an image and use it in place of fonts. Then came font image replacement techniques like Scalable Inman Flash Replacement (sIFR) in 2005 and we’ve even seen some server-side dynamic image creation using ImageMagick in the early 2000s. In 2009 we saw a resurgence of this trend but now we are giving credit where credit is due by licensing the fonts. Sites like TypeKit and Typotheque offer these services and we hope to see a lot more sites embracing the concept.

Even though a final release still hasn’t been announced, we saw designers and developers taking advantage of CSS3 and HTML5.  Safari 4 and Chrome have the most feature support last I heard, with Firefox close behind.  The latest version of IE has a long way to go before they catch up. Most notable of the group is Safari Mobile, iPhone’s web browser, which makes iPhone App development pretty slick. When you can use CSS animations and transitions to mimic a native iPhone app and coupling that with the OpenSource PhoneGap, you can develop mobile applications that will run across multiple mobile platforms. The neat thing about using strictly browser-based technologies to develop your mobile applications (mostly iPhone) is that you can modify the browser elements of your application without having to go through Apples approval process when versioning, just update your mobile site.

1,000,000,000 Downloads

On April 23, 2009, Apple’s App Store reached 1 billion downloads, only having launched a mere nine months prior. This story could make a best of 09 list for the sheer shock value alone. But the reason it makes our list is because of Apple’s financial agreement with app developers and other potential income generating items like in-app advertising.

iPhone App developers earn 70% commission on every app sold which is really an amazing commission considering the App Store is the only place you can peddle your (iPhone) wares, and the massive amount of advertising Apple does to promote it’s store is a win-win.

In-app mobile advertising is a more slippery slope to consider. But if you’re offering your app for free, it’s certainly a revenue generating path to consider.

Social Networking

2009 saw an explosive surge of Social Networking apps, enhancements, and opportunities. From Facebook’s iPhone app and site enhancements, a gazillion Twitter apps from mobile, to browser to Adobe Air. It seemed as if there would be no end to how many ways we could share information between each other and even from one social medium to another. APIs, OpenID, OpenSocial, and OpenSource. These tools made 2009 an awesome year to be a developer.

Social Networking isn’t an app, it’s not even a technology. It’s a concept, and it dominated every aspect of our lives in 2009. I don’t think I’m going out on a limb when I say that we’re at, what Malcolm Gladwell would call, a “Tipping Point”. 2009 showed us as designers and developers that Social Networking is obviously here to stay and I can’t wait to see what 2010 will bring us.

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