Nokia's much avaited application showcase the Ovi Store was launched today. The store contains both free and paid applications - "a mountain of mobile content" according to the the Nokia Conversations blog. The Ovi store is compatible with more than 50 Nokia devices, which the company believes gives them access to 50 million people. Where's The Ovi Application? Given the dominance that Nokia enjoys in the mobile handset marketplace, the Ovi Store would be expected to receive high footfalls (rather, eyeballs) than the iPhone App store. On visiting the Ovi Store website, it was suggested that I download the application: unfortunately, the application wasn't available. On visiting the Ovi store again, I couldn't find a download link for the application. Usability hasn't been one of Ovi's stronger points. Perhaps one will have to wait for many of Nokia's loyal users to replace their handsets, before the Ovi store really has an impact. Screencaps: Some Ovi Store Apps There are 1236 apps in all at the Ovi store, and navigation is, quite frankly, painful. The site is taking too long to load, perhaps unable to handle the first day traffic. If I wasn't doing this story, I would have closed the browser window long ago. Navigation of the mobile site is slow too - Nokia really does need to get its act together - discovering content is difficult too. A majority of the content available at the App store is paid, with one a few free applications. Paid content includes ringtones, mobile apps,…
