For all the coverage of smartphone proliferation, Android, search, G+, and so on, we haven’t heard as much about Google’s fledgling web apps market. We’re quietly sneaking up on the first birthday of the Chrome Web App Store. Google’s browser itself has been quickly gaining ground amongst the competition, as Robin reported last week that Chrome had passed Firefox to become the second largest browser in marketshare, with 25.7 percent. Based on those numbers, both Firefox and IE (which has the top share) have been in seemingly aggressive declines, while Chrome has been growing steadily.
As to Chrome’s app store, the early reports showed slow growth and sales, but in September the Web Store passed 30 million aggregate users. Then came the redesign. → Read More
In what I think is an interesting experiment, CBS this morning debuted a “60 Minutes” application that you can find in and launch from the Chrome Web Store (which just got a major facelift).
Granted, “adding it to Chrome” doesn’t really do anything but take you to this page, which you can just open in Chrome just like you would any page, but the Web app does look pretty nice. → Read More
Looks like Google this morning rolled out a brand new design for its Chrome Web Store, and it’s a major improvement.
The updated Web app marketplace, first released in December 2010, is all about the software, now boasting large squares with attractive app visuals. → Read More
On September 1st, Google’s popular browser, Chrome, celebrated its third birthday. In a relatively short span of time, Chrome has gobbled up 22 percent market share among browsers, compared to Firefox at 28 percent and IE at 42 percent. The browser continues to iterate, now working in rapid-fire six-week release cycles, and its ecosystem at large has taken some big strides forward over the last year. For me, personally, I use multiple browsers daily, but Chrome has really become my go-to.
In December, Google debuted Chrome OS and the Chrome Web Store, followed by Chromebooks in June. But, as Jason pointed out in last week’s post, as well as our early coverage in January, the Chrome Web Store had seemingly gotten off to a slow start, perhaps not attracting as much traffic (and, more importantly, sales) as expected prior to launch. → Read More
“One of the reasons we’ve been angry is that we haven’t been able to bring Angry Birds to the web,” a Rovio developer noted on stage today at Google I/O. Well guess what? Thanks to the Chrome Web Store, it’s finally here.
And that’s not all. Google’s Sundar Pichai also had some more to share about the Chrome Web Store. In the first three months since launch, they’ve seen 17 million app installs. And developers are telling them that apps installed through the store are seeing users spend roughly two times the amount of time in their apps installed through the store. → Read More
After months of anticipation, Google finally unveiled the Chrome Web Store this past December. But a lot of users were disappointed with the launch for one very big reason: it was U.S.-only. Starting today, Google is finally taking the initial steps to change that, as they’ve opened a developer preview of the Web Store for 15 more countries.
Note that this doesn’t mean the store is ready quite yet for international users. Google says that a full launch will happen “later this year”. “We are releasing this developer preview ahead of the consumer release so you have enough time to prepare your apps for international users,” Google notes. This is the same thing Google did for U.S. developers back in August of last year. If that timetable holds, international users should get access in about four months. → Read More
Google publicly unveiled the Chrome Web Store a week ago. Looking at the most popular apps in the U.S. by weekly install numbers, it looks like TweetDeck has fast risen to the most prominent spot on the list, as relayed by the startup’s founder Iain Dodsworth earlier today.
With about 102,500 weekly installs at the time of writing, TweetDeck thus beats NYTimes, whose app has seen approximately 87,700 weekly installs to date, roughly seven days in.
So where are the Google services? Right behind the TweetDeck and the NY Times, it appears. → Read More
It’s now just about time for the Chrome event Google is holding in San Francisco, presumably to show off both the new Chrome Web Store and the beta version of Chrome OS. We’ll be there to cover it live, but here are a few last-minute tidbits.
First, as Google Operating System noticed, Google uploaded two new videos to the YouTube Google Chrome channel earlier today. While neither video is live, the thumbnails are and confirm that one is about Chrome OS (a tour) and one is about the Chrome Web Store. → Read More
Earlier today, we were tipped about this thread in the Chromium Google Groups area. Gregor Hochmuth, the Product Manager for the Chrome Web Store, responded to a question wondering if Google would be giving developers advanced notice before the store goes live. Hochmuth said that yes, there would be reminders sent out before the launch to let developers get edits and updates in before it rolls live. Well, the first such message was sent out today.
Specifically, Google is starting to notify current Chrome extension developers about the upcoming Chrome Web Store launch. The reason is that extensions (and themes) will be wrapped into the Web Store alongside apps. In the email, Google will only say that the store is launching “later this year”, but this email seems to be the first indications that it’s coming sooner rather than later. → Read More
Back in August, at a conference in Europe, Google showed a little preview of the Chrome Web Store and noted that a launch would probably take place in October. While there were some hints of it coming along in October (including some pricing details that were apparently turned on by accident), it never came. And since today is the last day of November, I think it’s safe to say it’s not coming this month either. But it now definitely appears that Google is ramping up for an early December launch of the store, perhaps alongside a Chrome 8 release or a Chrome 9 beta release.
Earlier today, there was a flurry of activity in the Chromium Issues list. Specifically, there was a lot of activity surrounding the “ReleaseBlock” labeled items. And if you look them over, you’ll notice that most of these 16 issues are related to the Web Store or Chrome Apps in some way. Google appears to be tying up loose ends to get this product out the door as soon as possible. → Read More
When I heard that Mozilla would be outlining their own open web app ecosystem for the first time today, my immediate thought was that this was to pre-empt the Chrome Web Store. I still think that, but I think the timing may be even more calculated now. From what I can gather, Google’s launch of the store may be imminent — only a few obstacles remain and the search giant is working quickly to hammer them out.
First of all, this morning, Google officially unveiled Chrome 7, the latest iteration of their web browser, with little pomp and circumstance. The company has said they’d be plowing through new versions much faster than they have previously (a new release every six weeks or so), so they’re downplaying it. But it appears that this may be a critical step one in getting the Web Store ready to go. → Read More
While they’re still only officially saying that the it will launch “later this year”, it appears that Google is taking the steps to get ready for a Chrome Web Store launch very soon. Specifically, a post today highlights that developers can now hook their apps up to Google Checkout merchant accounts (to be able to sell their apps — U.S.-only for the time being), and that there is now a way to preview how your app will look in the store when it goes live.
None of this should be too surprising consider that a presentation in August stated the Chrome Web Store would launch in October. But all the pieces are finally falling into place. While the placeholder space for apps in Chromium (the open source browser that Chrome is based on) keep popping in and out of existence, the Web Store itself seems to be fully functional (it’s a part of the Extension online area). → Read More
Earlier this week we covered new details about the Chrome Web Store, an ‘App Store for the web’ that Google first announced at its I/O conference in May. Now Google is giving developers their first taste of what they can expect from the new marketplace: the Chrome Web Store has launched in a developer preview.
Developers can now start uploading apps using the developer dashboard at the Chrome extensions gallery. During the preview, developers will only be able to see applications they’ve uploaded themselves (they won’t be visible to users). Details are on the Webstore’s overview page.
One key thing to note: while Google’s slides that were presented at GDC (and we reported on) indicated that developers would only pay a modest fee of 5% (Apple’s rev share on the App Store is 30%), the fee is actually 5% plus an additional 30 cents per transcation — which obviously represents a more significant chunk if your app is only selling for $1.99. Also note that the minium price here is $1.99, not 99 cents as it is on the App Store. → Read More
Earlier today, it was revealed that development of the Chrome Web Store is well underway, and Google hopes to deploy it around October. That’s good news, and the fact that Google apparently only plans to take a 5 percent of revenues from developers is great news. But look closer at the screenshots leaked from GDC Europe. See that area in the store called “Apps your friends like”? Yes, it appears that this new store will play nicely with Google’s new social strategy.
The key word in the area is “friends.” If you look at Google’s current social products (Buzz, Reader, Wave, etc) none of them use the term “friend” to indicate a connection with another user. Instead, social connections are all “followers” or “contacts” or “connections.” Hell, even Friend Connect (which, let’s face it, no one talks about anymore) doesn’t really use the term “friend” too often outside of its name. → Read More
One of the big announcements at this year’s Google I/O was that a new Chrome Web Store was being built. Think of it as Apple’s App Store or the Android Market but for web apps. In it, you’ll be able to purchase (or download for free) and install apps that can run in Google’s Chrome web browser. Google would only commit to the store and apps being ready “later this year,” but work on app compatibility for Chrome progressing quite nicely.
Builds of Chromium (the open source browser behind Chrome) have actually been able to run early apps for weeks now. The ability is still hidden behind a flag, but if you go here you can figure out how to turn on the functionality. As you can see in the screenshots below, these builds allow you to install apps (you can find some here) that then reside on your main “Most visited” Chrome page (the one with web page thumbnails for sites you often visit). From here, you can click on any of these apps to launch them in a new pinned tab. → Read More
Perhaps the biggest story of day one at Google I/O was the announcement of the Chrome Web Store. This store is meant to highlight web apps while at the same time, providing a way for developers to better monetize them (if they choose to). But the store isn’t ready to be shown off just yet, and so as you might imagine, there are a lot of questions about it. Throughout the course of the day today, Google addressed some of them.
One question that came up a few times in various discussions was if the Chrome Web Store would be Chrome-only? It will, for now, Google VP of Product Sundar Pichai acknowledged. The store itself will be limited (and built-in) to Chrome and Chrome OS (when it’s available). That said, apps written for the web are apps written for the web, so they should work on any browser. Of course, those that rely on some sort of Chrome Web Store payment structure likely won’t be accessible without the store (though Google won’t say either way). → Read More
Perhaps the biggest announcement during day one of Google I/O was the Chrome Web Store — an app store for web apps that lives in Google’s Chrome web browser (and soon Chrome OS). There’s a lot of curiosity out there about how this will work. Here are a few early pictures to show you: → Read More
Today at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco, Google showed off a preview of a major new product: the Chrome Web Store. Yes, this is an app store for the web.
As you can see in the images below, those big icons are all web apps. This is where the apps you choose in the store with reside. In the store itself, you will see a gallery full of these icons (much like the Chrome Extension gallery, or the Chrome Theme gallery). You can see ratings for the apps, as well as reviews. But perhaps most importantly, developers will be able to charge for these apps. → Read More
