Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg has posted first impressions of the new BlackBerry App Store that was launched today morning. According to Mossberg, RIM’s store is clumsier to use than Apple’s, but it works. The selection at launch is decent, but with some surprising omissions. App Worlds selection is broad and on first day, it offers 166 games, 99 productivity and utility apps and 69 reference and book apps.

In comparison with Apple’s App Store, Mossberg says, “The buying process is harder than on the iPhone. You have to download the store itself, then pay for apps you want with PayPal, which requires going through a couple of screens each time. On several occasions, despite my fast, strong, steady network connection, app downloads stopped in midstream multiple times, And the least expensive apps are $2.99, about triple the cost of the cheapest typical paid apps on the iPhone.”

He concludes his first impression by saying BlackBerry fans unfamiliar with the iPhone won’t care about some of these comparisons. They will, and should, just be happy that their phones are now much richer and more versatile devices.
[Via All Things D]