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Yahoo tackles app store overload with free discovery solution

June 16, 2011 — 10:28am ET | By Jason Ankeny

Yahoo is introducing AppSpot, a free solution that helps consumers more efficiently identify the best apps in Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) App Store and Google's (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android Market. The new solution is in response to the growing number of applications available for download---Apple's App Store now offers more than 425,000 applications for iOS devices and Android Market boasts another 200,000-plus apps.

Yahoo's AppSpot will highlight daily personalized download suggestions for iOS and Android users.

Available for download from both the App Store and Android Market, AppSpot is highlighted by Daily Personal Picks, which refreshes personalized download suggestions each day. The solution also includes a Related Apps recommendation tool and search results that show matching app titles as well as related keywords as the user types in a query. In addition, AppSpot corrals pricing details, user ratings, screenshots and app descriptions in a single screen view, and supplies direct download links to specific apps within the Apple and Google storefronts.

Yahoo also released App Search, a similar solution targeting PC users. It is unclear whether the company will eventually extend AppSpot to other mobile operating systems such as BlackBerry and Windows Phone.

In late April, Yahoo acquired IntoNow, the developer behind a popular iOS application enabling users to identify television content and interact with other viewers in real time. Introduced in January 2011, the IntoNow solution spans five years of indexed U.S. television programming data, identifying content down to the airing, episode and time within seconds--the solution suggests a TV-centric version of the Shazam music discovery app, capturing snippets of a broadcast to pinpoint the show in question. IntoNow also enables viewers to "check in" to social media conversations around a broadcast.

For more:
- read this Y! Mobile Blog entry