Microsoft's Windows Store is now official!

Windows Store is now official, there are 231 markets opening online worldwide in 109 languages.
For those who are using preview release of Windows 8 , you can browse the Windows Store and use the apps. While for those Windows 8 RTM users can only test some of the new apps.

According to Microsoft, the apps that you bought to the store can be installed on up to five PCs. Similar to Apple Store, the apps will show ratings and reviews. And you can share certain apps with others.

They are offering a remarkable quantity of software for download. There are 7,873 Windows 8 “Modern” apps available in the store worldwide and 4,516 in the U.S. Windows Store, according to Wes Miller, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft. Miller also added that nearly of those 8,000 apps worldwide 88% of them are free while in the U.S. Version only 83% (3,749) of the apps are free.

Some apps that you might see are Skype for Windows 8, Netflix and the universal Angry Birds (one of the first game to be available at the Windows Store).

This is a big deal for all developers, according to Miller, Developers will get a good deal from placing their apps on the Windows Store, with a revenue-sharing deal that brings them 70% for new apps. Once an app has earned $25,000 in sales, developers then receive 80% of the revenue

The store as it stands now has several issues according to GHacks.

Navigation – The only way to navigate the store is to scroll horizontally. While this may make sense on touch enabled devices, it does not offer the best user experience on desktop PCs. But even if there was an option to change the page layout and thus the scrolling direction, it would not really address the core issue: Lack of overview. How many app groups are available? You do not see that on the start page. Only after scrolling all the way to the right, and remembering the group positions. An option to jump to a specific category is missing, and Microsoft should consider adding a table of contents options to the store.
Filters – While it is possible to display only free apps (there are no paid apps yet in the store), there is no option yet to filter by app type. If you never want to buy apps, you’d probably want an option to hide all trial and paid apps automatically from the store.
New apps – This is one of the things that Google’s Chrome Web Store lacks of as well. There is no indication of new apps in the store. If you want to find out what’s new, you need to browse to the category that you are interested in, and click through to see if you can identify the new apps among the old. Why is there no new group or category, or a new filter available? Microsoft, look at the Mozilla Add-ons store to see how this is implemented well. The same goes for app versions and updates. Is there a way to see if an app has been updated if you have not installed it? Maybe you have installed it once, noticed that it has an error, removed it again and decided to try it later again when it has received an update?Update: Each category listing has a sort by newest option, but there is no option to sort all apps by newest.
Language filter – The store in its current form displays apps that are written in a language that is not the system’s default language. While you see lots of English apps in the store, you will also spot French, Chinese or German apps in the store with no apparent option to filter those out.
Confusing top lists – When you open a top list of apps, you will see them all lumped together on the screen with no apparent ordering system behind it. Apps are not sorted by rating which would be an obvious choice. Maybe they are sorted by number of downloads, but it is not clear if that’s the case. It is also not clear if top apps are listed by row, or column, or another order.
Colors – Apps are displayed in their dominating colors, which does not really make that much sense as this is not something that users consider when selecting apps. It would make more sense to give every app category its own distinct color, and use these colors instead.
Scrolling – Hiding the scroll bar after some time may make the page look prettier, but it also remove a visual indicator on the page. The user needs to move the mouse cursor or touch the screen to display the scrollbar again. Also, why is there no automatic scrolling when you move the mouse cursor to the right end of the screen.
Search – Why is there no search in the store? While you can search for apps using the Metro search functionality, you can’t select search in the store directly (or if you can, I have not found the switch or option to do just that). An option to just start typing like on the Metro start page would resolve the issue right away.
Lots of whitespace – I get it. If you are working with touch, you need reasonably large icons to tap on to activate. But desktop PCs do not have those requirements. Why are there only eight and a half icons visible on a 1366×768 screen? It does not really make that much sense to me, as it means more scrolling to see all the available apps and categories.