Apple hits 3 billion application download milestone

I got a press release in from the good people at Apple today to let me know that they’ve hit the 3 billion milestone. There have now been 3,000,000,000 downloads from the Apple App Store.

Here’s the Jesus-phone man himself:

“Three billion applications downloaded in less than 18 months–this is like nothing we’ve ever seen before,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “The revolutionary App Store offers iPhone and iPod touch users an experience unlike anything else available on other mobile devices, and we see no signs of the competition catching up anytime soon.”

Fascinating.

I think it’s interesting that Apple chose today to make their announcement. If the rumours are to be believed, we won’t have any direct news about the iPhone platform for some time — indeed everyone I’ve spoken to reckons June is the key month. The 3 billion download stat is something you’d expect to see in 400 pixel letters in a Steve Jobs presentation — so the fact they’ve made this news public indicates it won’t be dwelt upon in the upcoming ‘iSlate’ presentation shortly.

3 billion is a super statistic. I do feel that the Apple platform is (intentionally) limited (until Apple cross the $49 iPhone Nano rubicon). If you think 3 billion is a big number today, wait until the mass market gets involved through the likes of Nokia, Sony and Android.

And speaking of Android… today’s Nexus One day…