The rumor mill has it that Apple may be coming out with a premium App Store sometime as early as this week. It’s an interesting concept and there are arguments to be made in both directions for and against it.

Among the arguments against it is the fact that the applications that do best in the App Store are those that are exceptionally inexpensive. Unfortunately the App Store has quickly become the bargain basement or "Dollar store" of mobile applications. People, mistakenly in my opinion, tend to gravitate toward the cheapest of the cheap and balk at some applications that are more expensive even if they are far superior.

Case in point, I use the iPhone application LogMeIn all the time and did so as recently as last night when I needed to pull something off my home iMac when I was out and about. The application costs $29.99 but it is worth every penny in my humble opinion.

So, as part of the argument against a premium App Store there is the fact that people’s expectations are already set in the mindset is something like — "cheap, cheap, cheap". Are people willing to spend that much more on premium applications? That would be an open question in any environment let alone during the current financial meltdown.

There are, however, a number of arguments for doing so. First, I suspect that a premium applications store would be targeted toward enterprise more than the individual. The iPhone makes a superb work device. It has far more flexibility than the vast majority of smart phones or handheld devices. The current trend toward simple crappy applications does little to help promote the iPhone as a serious device, though. If Apple wants the iPhone to become "the device" they are going to have to do something to stem this current trend. And the good news here is that enterprise is used to paying serious money for serious applications.

There are other arguments in favor of a premium applications store. In fact, there are hundreds upon hundreds of arguments in favor of a premium App Store. Here are just a few…

and…

and even…

If you are going on a job interview and want to be taken seriously you wear business attire rather than ripped jeans and a t-shirt. Likewise, if the iPhone and the App Store are to be taken seriously 97% of all app can’t be like these. As fun as some of these apps might be they don’t lend themselves to a serious device AND they make it difficult to find the really good, really serious ones.

We try to do our part here on whatsoniphone. That is why the search functionality of the site is better than ever. But a Premium App Store. That would benefit ALL of us!