About a quarter of the App Store software is free, with 90% of the paid software available for $9.99 or less. , which must first approve applications before they go on sale, takes 30% of the revenue generated from paid software, but does not charge developers offering free applications. Available software includes games, educational program, mobile commerce, and business productivity tools. A third of the applications are games.

While building its next-generation computing platform, Apple has not left the Mac and PC world behind. There's lots of links between the iPhone and personal computers, such as a remote control application for controlling wirelessly, synchronization of files between the iPhone and a computer, and full support for server.

The latter is part of Apple's play for corporate adoption of the iPhone. Apple is hoping that the popularity of the device will lead to more businesspeople asking their companies to support the on their networks. "The iPhone is rapidly going to become a Trojan horse for Apple in the enterprise," Gartenberg said.

The affects of Apple's strategy are already starting to be felt. Oracle, for example, on Thursday became the for the iPhone. The Business Indicators, which are available at no charge to Oracle customers, let users of several business intelligence applications get information sent to their iPhones. Finance, sales, and manufacturing managers can get alerts and updates based on predefined business metrics, such as if sales goals are met or shipment levels dip.

In attracting developer interest in its emerging platform, Apple is getting help from Silicon Valley investment firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, which has established a $100 million fund to invest in iPhone-related software firms.

Matt Murphy, a partner in the firm, that the fund has received 2,000 financing requests in the last four months, 85% of them targeting consumers. Kleiner is serious with about 100 of those requests, Murphy said

Apple on Thursday launched the App Store for the soon-to-be-released iPhone, making a major push at becoming a key player in what's expected to be the next generation in computing.

The online store coupled with the media player-smart phone hybrid completes the company's platform for a ubiquitous connection between an ultra-portable computer and the Internet. "The iPhone is not a phone. It's a connected touch-screen that goes into your pocket and just happens to make phone calls," Michael Gartenberg, analyst for Jupiter Research, told InformationWeek

Analysts say mobile Internet devices will someday surpass personal computers as the way people connect to Web services, and Apple entered the market in a big way by introducing through the App Store about 500 applications for the new iPhone, which goes on sale Friday at 8 a.m. local time. For people with the slower original iPhone, Apple on Thursday released version 2.0, which is the same as in the new device. For $9.99, people can load the in the Touch, which is the iPhone without the phone.

People can also access the App Store by which also was released on Thursday. The latter makes it possible for iPhone buyers to deploy software from their Macs or PCs.

In being able to offer hundreds of applications on the first day the 3G iPhone is available, Apple has shown that developers are onboard, not an easy feat considering that hardware vendors typically face a Catch-22 when releasing non-Windows devices. Without must-have applications to run on the devices, people are unwilling to buy the hardware. But without lots of hardware in the hands of consumers, developers are unlikely to invest the time in building software.

With 6 million-plus iPhones sold since the device was introduced in January 2007, Apple has managed to build a developer-enticing market. "They've really responded to Apple's call in a big way," Gartenberg said of developers.