A couple of months ago I was developing a mobile site for the No. 4 retailer, trying to create a way for users to pick many objects and extra functionality without forcing a page load.

With the flood of developers, brands and marketers developing content for Android, research firm research2guidance predicts it will reach 425,000 apps by August, surpassing the Apple App Store.

Worldwide mobile device sales to consumers exceeded 1.6 billion units in 2010, a 31.8 percent increase from 2009, with smartphones leading the way, according to Gartner Inc.

What are the key trends with mobile applications and what will Apple, Google, Microsoft, Research In Motion and others do that will affect brands in their marketing and commerce?

Mobile entertainment agency skyrockit’s commerce-enabled music remix application, Romplr, cracked the top five free applications in iTunes two days after its relaunch.

Apple will not be the undisputed king of mobile application downloads in five years time, according to an Ovum report.

ABI Research found that 291.1 million mobile devices were shipped in the third quarter of 2009, which is evidence of how attached consumers are to mobility.

A new book on digital branding includes a 2D mobile bar code on its back cover that connects directly to the title’s page on Amazon’s mobile Web site.