Apple's App Store Turns Five

Apple's App Store has a lot to brag about as it celebrates its fifth birthday. Over the last half decade, it helped fully realize the Swiss army-capabilities of the smartphone, which could do far more than make phone calls and browse the Internet. While not the first, it set the standard for mobile application marketplaces to come. The best part: it made apps accessible to everyone.

"Nothing like the App Store existed before and it has fundamentally changed the world," Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook said last month, describing the store's launch at the company's yearly developer conference ahead of today's anniversary.

But things have changed since the App Store was first introduced by the late Steve Jobs, and Google Play has surpassed the App Store when it comes to sheer number of available apps. While Apple's App Store has always been home to the hottest big-name apps, its success over the next five years may be shaped by how well it can foster apps both big and small.