CNET's Download.com is packed full of interesting and useful content. One of my favourite parts of the site is seeing the top 50 downloads for each week.Looking at the week ending May 23rd, a few interesting facts emerge.
For example, of the top ten most popular downloads, nine of them are free. Three of them are file sharing apps, two are different versions of ICQ, two are privacy/security apps, one browser, one utility and one media player.
Of the top ten apps, none of them have been in the top 50 chart for less than 40 weeks. In fact in the top 25, only two have been there for less than 10 weeks. And both of these are freeware.
And within the top 25, more than half have been in the chart for more than a year. Seven of them for more than three years.
The obvious conclusion is that your best chance of making it big is to make money from a hugely popular free application. Without any ads of course.
