Apple announced that its Mac App Store will officially open on January 6 (a Thursday). With this, Apple hopes to capitalize on the success it’s had with its App store for iPhone and iPad apps for its older Mac brand. 

Right away, the store will be available in 90 countries, and will feature paid and free apps in a variety of categories like Games, Productivity, Education, Graphics & Design, Lifestyle, and Utilities. 

Apple CEO Steve Jobs touts nearly every product the company launches as revolutionary, and the Mac App Store is not different. "The App Store revolutionized mobile apps," said Jobs. "We hope to do the same for PC apps with the Mac App Store by making finding and buying PC apps easy and fun. We can’t wait to get started on January 6."

Apple’s description of the store is as follows:

The Mac App Store lets you browse new and noteworthy apps, find out what’s hot, view staff favorites, search categories and read customer ratings and reviews. Like on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, you can purchase, download and install apps in just one click and start using them immediately. Purchased apps can run on all of your personal Macs and updates are delivered directly through the Mac App Store so it’s easy to keep all of your apps up to date. The Mac App Store is available to Mac OS X Snow Leopard users as a free download through Software Update.

Developers of Mac apps can set their own prices, and keep 70% of the sales revenue. They’re not charged for free apps and don’t have to pay hosting, marketing or credit card fees, Apple says. 

When the company first announced the store in October, Jobs noted that you can still purchase apps with an iTunes account, and that app updates will be delivered through the store.  

More info about the store here.