Apple’s soon to unleash its Mac App Store. Similarly to the App Store for iOS devices, it will provide a central location for Mac apps to be bought, and Apple will take a 30 percent cut. In return, Apple will deal with hosting and billing, along with potentially providing visibility for apps from a range of developers.

Lots of people have said this is the Worst Idea Ever, presumably not fully understanding that most computer users never buy an application, and many of those who do get hugely confused during the install process (often running applications from disk images that they never unmount). A one-click purchase followed by a single-click ‘update everything’ button has the potential to revolutionise software purchase and installation.

The problem I have with Apple’s plans is that the existing App Store is horrible. Ignoring for a moment its terrible search and sluggish performance, the service is a bug-ridden mess. Every single time I try to redeem a promotional code, I am greeted with six error dialog boxes. Every time I try to update my apps, I’m told the information being displayed is ‘outdated’ and that I should refresh the page. Often, I’ll find that I’m being presented with an update to an app that’s no longer available, meaning the ‘update all’ button doesn’t work. Connection errors are commonplace. If this was just me, fair enough, but Apple’s support forums are littered with people suffering from the exact same problem—and when one error is fixed in an iTunes update or ‘behind the scenes’, another appears.

For me, this is a head-banging-on-desk kind of frustration, but for the typical iOS device owner it utterly destroys the user experience. If the Mac App Store suffers from similar errors, it won’t be enough of a step-up from the existing software purchase and installation model. For most companies, that would be fine, but for Apple this shouldn’t be good enough.

There’s a lot of Apple in Microsoft and especially in Windows. However, when Apple started branching out into other fields, Redmond’s photocopier seemed to malfunction; while Apple blazed ahead with the iPod, Microsoft stalled with Zune.

Cult of Mac reports on Microsoft’s latest me-too blunder: opening retail stores across the way from Apple’s own stores.

John Brownlee:

The problem here is that Microsoft isn’t really a brand the same way Apple is: with the exception of the Xbox 360 and a few accessories, Microsoft sells software, not hardware, and so their stores aren’t showcases of their corporate inventiveness… they’re merely the same as any other big box electronics retailer.

Of course, he’s right. Microsoft is a big, successful company, and a hugely profitable one. Despite people saying Microsoft is ‘doomed’, it still has income and profits that are the envy of many in the industry. However, it’s not Apple. It doesn’t control hardware and software relating to its most important product (Windows), and it doesn’t have end-to-end product lines in the consumer electronics space, nor a strategy that’s nearly as coherent as Apple’s.

When you go to an Apple Store, you’re primarily looking at Apple products, augmented by third-party items that Apple doesn’t care to produce itself. When you go to a Microsoft Store, you’re instead largely looking at third-party products that Microsoft is somehow associated with. The Apple Store is unique. The Microsoft Store is a prettier version of Best Buy or Currys.

So:

• The new Apple TV, slightly larger than a Club bar and only £99.
• The recent iOS 4.2 upgrade, with AirPlay, enabling you to send video from your iThing to your Apple TV, just by prodding an on-screen button.
• The spiffy Air Video, enabling streaming and live conversion from Mac or PC to your iThing.

In the world of non-idiots:

• User buys all of the above, and happily plays anything stored on their computer on their TV, wirelessly.
• User also buys and rents stuff from the iTunes Store with absurd ease.
• Buyer is now hugely happy.
• Apple makes buckets of cash.
• Everyone who likes TV loves Apple.

In the world of Apple:

• AirPlay video is blocked to developers, out of pure spite and stupidity.
• Apple TV considered a waste of time by loads of people.
• Buyers left with other equally problematic products.
• Apple makes buckets of cash, but fewer buckets have Apple TV written on them in marker pen.
• Everyone who likes TV hates Apple.

Maybe iOS 4.3 will change everything, but I think it’s more likely Steve Jobs will broadcast a live video of him smashing an iPhone to pieces and announce Apple is to become an Android-based company.

Issue one of Future Publishing’s new iOS magazine, Tap!, is out today in the UK.

Editor Christopher Phin was kind enough to let me run riot on the gaming section, and so there’s a 17-page chunk of irreverent, fun, iOS gaming goodness in the mag.

In addition, there’s plenty to get your teeth into: loads of app, web-app and kit reviews, tutorials, interviews, opinion pieces and features. The entire thing looks great, is handily iPad-sized, and is packed full of fun, passionate copy.

If you’re not in the UK, the mag will soon be on Zinio and also US shelves. For more on when and where, follow @tapmaguk on Twitter.

On TechRadar, Gary Marshall asks the question “Why can no-one make an iPad killer?” His argument hinges, rightly, on the fact that most companies are looking at the wrong things.

What makes the iPad special isn’t the hardware. It’s the software.

This is key. It’s the reason Fraser Speirs has a school that arms every pupil with an iPad rather than a competing device. While everyone’s rattling off lists of specs, Apple’s continuing to enhance the user experience of its devices and ensure developers have a reasonably good means of getting product out there, meaning users have a ton of stuff to actually do with their devices. (There are shortcomings and problems, obviously, but the App Store is so far ahead of the competition that it’s almost painful. It’s telling that most of the top-selling apps on Android are admin tools, whereas on iOS they’re games, entertainment apps and productivity tools.)

However, the most important point in Marshall’s piece is this:

Apple has spent years thinking about what tablets should do, and it’s built an operating system from scratch to make the tablet experience as pleasant as possible.

Relatively few people realise the iPad came first. The device started life as a skunkworks project called SafariPad, but Apple didn’t see a market for it at that point, and so they shrank the form factor and created the iPhone. Crucially, no-one else did the same—instead, they ripped off the iPhone. The net result is we now have Android unable to scale, because it wasn’t designed to, but iOS happily works across a range of devices (including the new Apple TV).

Of course, other tablets will sell well, and others in the market will catch up (at least to some extent) next year; but until other companies sit down and design from scratch, considering the user experience key, their products won’t hold a candle to Apple’s.