Windows Phone Marketplace Clears 30,000 Apps

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You know, it seems like only yesterday we were bringing you word about how the Windows Phone Marketplace was looking to open the floodgates and allow a whole array of new Mango-driven apps to enter in. It seems like only yesterday because it was, you understand. Now we’ve got reports of a whole new milestone to hit the Windows Phone Marketplace: 30,000 apps are now available. But that’s not the biggest surprise to the whole thing.

See, the last time we were talking about specific numbers with the Windows Phone Marketplace was back in July, when our own Robert Nelson kicked off the month not with barbecues or fireworks, but by bringing us tales of the 25,000th app to cross the Windows Phone Marketplace’s threshold. That was about seven weeks ago. Interestingly, the previous milestone to be crossed, the 20,000 mark, was back in May, and the entire Windows Phone Marketplace itself is only around nine months old.

Naturally, most folks are looking at the comparatively anemic scores posted by the Windows Phone Marketplace with some disdain, considering that its main competitor, the App Store from Apple, packs in what some estimates peg as better than half a million total apps, (the Android Market contains about half that) but the gains are significant. 5,000 apps in a month is no small gain, especially for an app vendor not even a year old.

Still though, it’s quite clear that gains will have to be made–and much more significant gains, too–in order for the Windows Phone 7 platform to really compete on the smartphone market. Even at the respectable rate of 5,000 a month, it would still take five years to be at the Android Market’s level. And almost ten for the App Store! Plus, both are also expanding regularly, so without a quality app vendor to compete, Windows Phone 7 may never get off the ground.

So what do you guys think here? What does the Windows Phone Marketplace need to truly compete with the current frontrunners? Can it even pull off such a feat? The comments section is waiting for you below, so head on down and tell us what you think!