The Mac App Store Is Open

Well, no worries on the SEO front: using the search term “apple stall” to hunt up an image to accompany this post, Google asked if I meant Apple Store. (The image above, via the Flickr stream of the Library of Congress, shows how they sold apps back in my day, you whippersnappers. Those apps hanging from the wall are Android.)

The Mac App Store is open. Well, this changes everything, doesn’t it? For Mac users, it’s one-stop shopping for everything from core iLife products like Garage Band to thousands�and soon to be tens, then hundreds of thousands�of boutique games and utilities. Myself, I can’t shop the Mac App store yet�I’m still running Tiger, plugger that I am. I’m planning to shop up a new MacBook Pro in the next couple of days, though, so this changes everything. Wait�didn’t I already hear that somewhere?

Any Mac aficionados remember widgets? Since that early version of an app ecosystem scummed up like a biofilm on top of Tiger, Apple has learned a lot about app farming. The new ecosystem has unleashed an extraordinary wave of software creativity, even as it continues to diminish the role of users as owners of things, and gives Cupertino ever-firmer control over what runs on our machines. The Mac App Store is the logical next step in the development of this flourishing form of digital horticulture. Question is, is it a Green Revolution, or the makings of a digital Dust Bowl? It’s too early to tell. Only remember, you young-uns: the Green Revolution in farming wasn’t about Earth Day; it was about crop yields. And it involved a lot of pesticides.