App Store Finally Lands on Amazon

At the beginning of the year, rumors were flying that Amazon was preparing to launch an Android app market to compete with Google. At the time I was hopeful that it would be a solid addition to Amazon's other services, but of course it was all guesswork since it hadn't launched yet.

But as of today, that has changed and the Amazon Appstore is live. It's a slimmed down, but more user-friendly, collection of about 3,800 apps (compared to the Android Market's 200,000+). Setting up your device to work with the Amazon Appstore takes a few minutes, but once you do you're good to go.

You can download apps from the Amazon Apps mobile app or from the Amazon website, and then install the downloaded app from the Amazon app. It sounds a little complicated, but it's not too bad considering these are third-party apps outside of the native Android Market.

Two other features have helped Amazon get some strong early buzz:

1. You can "Test Drive" apps before you buy them to see if they are really what you are looking for.
2. Amazon will offer a "Free App of the Day" where an app you would normally pay for is available for free for 24 hours.

Since it is very early in the launch, I'm sure there are still some updates that we will see in the next couple of days. However, at first glance this does seem to be a good start for the Amazon Appstore, although the real test will be whether or not it is still used a few months from now.