Back in September, Amazon announced that they were developing their own Android application marketplace. While it's not yet ready to launch, Techcrunch reported today that Amazon has launched the developer-facing part of the store. So, I figured this would be an appropriate time to give some thoughts on what we're likely going to see changing in the app store space in the next 12-18 months.

Alternatives to Android Market: Everyone praises Google for keeping an entirely open app store where any developer can upload any app without fear of rejection. In theory, being completely open is always great. When you apply that to downloadable mobile applications however, it can often be very frustrating. Tons of apps in Android Market crash upon launch and have loads of bugs that would never get past the hawks at Apple. The Amazon Appstore provides an alternative for Android users looking for a more "curated" application browsing experience. I think we'll see this trend continue. The Android Market will surely remain dominant for the foreseeable future though.

Alternatives to Apple's App Store: While Android is too open, Apple is obviously too closed. Eventually they'll succumb to pressure to open up their restrictions (at least a little bit, right?). I think even Apple knows it's absurd that they block apps with "satire" involved and they'll need to relax their standards if they want to keep developers heavily involved in their platform. I bet most of you disagree with me on this but a guy can hope right?

Curation will be key: GetJar recently released a report in which they stated that there will only be 6 major app store players in five years. While I think they may be right in the long term, I think in the short term we're going to see a trend towards curation. An example of this would be today's launch of Funzoo - a web based app store specializing in games. It's my belief we're going to see a lot more of this moving forward - likely even services allowing individuals to create their own app storefronts.

Experimentation with app discovery: If you've read any of my previous posts, you probably think this is all I talk about (you're probably not wrong about that). But, I think this topic is another appropriate opportunity to say that we'll likely see tons of experimentation with app discovery in the app store space. I believe that this will not only become a focus for a lot of upstarts launching alternative app stores, but also for the big players (Apple and Google) themselves. Note - I played around with the "Genius" functionality on my iPhone last night and I was semi-impressed. Hopefully Apple knows it's still got a long way to go though.

"Coupon" app stores: This is a prediction that's a little more out there - we're going to see alternative app stores that are only focused on driving massive downloads at deeply discounted prices to consumers. The group buying model is being applied to almost every vertical imaginable - I see no reason why it won't be applied to mobile applications as well (especially since it makes sense to do so).

Got any additional thoughts? As usual, comments are welcome.