What the Android Market needs

Android Market alternatives are out there. If you are a developer who wants to avoid Google's copy protection in favor of a different flavor (or no protection at all), you could sell your apps through SlideME. They also offer the SlideME Application Manager, SAM, for browsing and buying programs from Android devices. Payment can even be made directly to a SlideME debit card so coders get paid quick.

Then there's Cyrket - a site that mirrors the official Android Market. It doesn't do much to make the catalog more navigable and user-friendly. However, each app description features a QR code, so you can take a picture and be linked to the app in the store on your Android device. This doesn't always work for me, but it's no fault of Cyrket. I don't see a lot of apps that I should be able to. And no, it's not my filter settings. Some odd quirks have popped up in the Market, and it's getting to be a bit of a hassle.

The design was sufficient at first, but now the ol' shop feels like it's bursting at the seams. I can't just check under the latest submissions for all categories to find the best stuff anymore. There's just too many products to swim through. Little bugs and hiccups (like the breaking of some updates by freshly-instated copy protection) are understandable at this stage, but I think the layout is in need of a serious overhaul.

Here are the additions I would consider a priority:

• One touch updates: I'd like to see a list of apps with updates available, each with a checkbox next to it - all of them selected by default - and a big button at the top of the screen that says, "Update All."
  

• Suggestions based on a user's ratings: As the size of the catalog grows, this will be more important. I think a selection in the menu would be appropriate. Pop-ups or an intro page might be too obtrusive.
  

• Sorting by multiple criteria: The ability to sort by date and rating would be fantastic. The popularity tab is virtually useless - the content rarely changes, and even if ratings are taken into account, number of downloads carries too much weight.
  

• Filters: If I could limit my search results to apps that only have a 3.5 or above rating, and have been on the market for at least a month, and have over 5,000 downloads, I'd have a much easier time finding what I want. It would also make finding the best new apps simpler.
  

• Screenshots: SlideMe got this right, and... it doesn't look good, Google.
  

My last suggestion isn't as much about the Market as the apps that are accepted. Programs should be required to store all images in a designated folder on the SD card. If I want to look at my photo album, I've got to get past fifty movie posters, banners, and album covers first. They take forever to load, and are a pain to delete - you have to do that one at a time. Please fix this, 'droid devs.

So there are my top suggestions for improvements to the market. None of them are absolutely necessary, but I think given any of them, we'd miss them if they were taken away. What else would you suggest? Better comment filters? Rating of raters? App trading? Audio comments so we can give shout-outs to our homies under that lame vocabulary-building game? Just kidding, I love those. I suck at them, but I love them.