Back in the early days of non-linear video editing Avid was the king. Their software was used in pretty much every situation and they dominated the post-production landscape for film and TV.

Then, Apple came out with Final Cut Pro and things changed. Plus, Avid ended up having some issues of its own which hindered it further.

Now, with Apple having issues with Final Cut Pro X, Avid has released its first application to compete with Apple’s iMovie mobile. The app is called Avid Studio for the iPad and is currently available in the App Store for an introductory price of $4.99. After 30 days it will increase to $8.

With this app just being released, its too early to tell if it will knock Apple’s iMovie off its perch as the iOS editing app du jour. However, it does have some nice features and a few iMovie doesn’t have, so chances are people will at least give it a chance — especially at that low price point.

When word first surfaced of an App store for iOS devices, some people were probably skeptical about its potential for success. Those same people now have to concede that the store has become not just a success but an unqualified juggernaut for Apple.

Now, just over a week since Apple posted their 10 billion App Store download counter, they’ve hit that milestone and sold and/or delivered 10 billion apps to customers. Yes, that’s a lot of apps — not to mention a lot of money.

With the immense popularity of the iPad, the iPhone and its impending release for Verizon, we can only imagine that it won’t take nearly as long to reach the 20 billion mark. Apple plans to release the identity of the person who downloaded the 10 billionth app within a few days.

I wonder if it was me? That could be interesting to say the least.

Today, in an event hosted by Apple CEO Steve Jobs, the company announced a shiny new touch screen tablet computing device which utilizes Apple iPhone OS and has a host of new features. The device, dubbed the iPad, will serve as another example Apple’s dominace in the mobile computing space.

According to the announcement, the iPad is “fully customizable,” “better than a smartphone or a laptop at browsing,” will alow you to read e-books, and has a “great maps application.”

Here are just some of the specs and features:

• 9.7″ IPS screen
• 1/2″ thick
• 10 hours of battery life
• “Shut the iPad down, come back in a month and it still has a charge”
• 16-64 Gigabytes of flash storage
• Accelerometer and compass
• 80s.11n Wifi and Bluetooth 2.0
• It can run all iPhone apps, unmodified, out of the box
• New Software called iBooks along with iBooks Store to purchase and read books
• iWork suite developed expressly for the new iPad
• Syncs with your Mac and iTunes via USB cable just like the iPhone
• In addition to Wi-Fi, also features 3G service from AT&T with unlimited plan @$ 29.99/Month and 250 MB plan @ $14.99/Month

• Prices start at $499.00 for 16 GB model, $599.00 for 32 GB model and $699.00 for 64 GB model. 3G will be $130.00 extra across the board.

• Shipping in 60 days for base model. 3G Model ships in 90 days.

More on this extraordinary device as we get it.

iPhone and iPod Touch users rejoice! Are you tired of cursing the programming gods because you have to use clunky Safari in order to look up what ever happened to Jennifer Grey or remember the name of your favorite Sylvester Stallone movie? Well, the smart cats over at the Internet Movie Database (IMDb to us locals) finally decided to put their heads together and come up with a coherent, iPhone friendly app for browsing their site.

No longer do we have to backdoor through Wikipanion or Movies App. Instead, the IMDb app is slick, and one could even say that it’s easier to navigate than the site itself. Nothing is watered down either. Users get the same access in the app as they would on the regular website, including:

• Over 1.5 million movie and TV titles
•  Over 3.2 million celebrities
•  US movie showtimes
•  Trailers
•  Photos
•  US TV listings
•  Top ranked movies (MOVIEmeter)
•  Top ranked celebrities (STARmeter)
•  Celebrity birthdays
•  US Box Office results
•  Movies coming soon
•  Top 250 rated films of all time

Best of all is that the app comes 100% free (which makes sense, considering that the site itself is free). IMDb is currently available in the iTunes App Store, so go grab it now, and be grateful that we live in an age of such jaw-dropping technology.

Yesterday we posted a new video showing off the Auto-Tune The News guys and the master of the auto-tune himself, T-Pain. In the video, there is cool button on an iPhone that kicks off the song, allowing everybody to have the melodic and rhythmic styling of Mr. Pain. We thought it was fiction, but it turns out that the app is not only real, but is as amazing as it sounds.

From Smule, the developers of the highly popular Ocarina app, comes “I Am T-Pain”, a fully functional auto tuner for the iPhone and iPod Touch. The app allows you to have perfect pitch and melody just like every other song you hear on top 20 radio today, by simply pushing a button!

You can choose to go A Capella and make your own music, or use some premixed instrumentals of popular auto-tuned songs like “Bartender”, “Kiss Kiss”, “I’m Sprung”, and “Dreamgirl”, all of which are free. For $0.99, you can buy a few other premium songs such as T-Pain’s hit “Buy U a Drank”, “Freeze” and more.

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Following the Apple App Store’s 1-year anniversary this past Saturday, Apple today released the official numbers which show how well the App Store has done during its first year of operation. Remember, as impressive as these numbers are, they represent the downloads and sales of applications for only two devices: the iPhone and the iPod Touch.

Here’s the main numbers so you can see just how amazing this really is, especially for Apple:

* Over 65,000 apps available at the store
* Over 100,000 developers contributing apps to the store
* Over 1,500,000,000 downloads from the store. Yes, that’s “B” as in Billion

Obviously, Steve Jobs is pretty happy with the success of the App Store. “The App Store is like nothing the industry has ever seen before in both scale and quality,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, in the release from Apple. “With 1.5 billion apps downloaded, it is going to be very hard for others to catch up.”

Well yeah, you think? At this point, I would say its basically impossible for anyone else to catch up. Nice work Apple.

Technically, the “official” one year birthday of Apple’s App Store isn’t until Sunday, but that hasn’t stopped the company from rolling out a new page to celebrate. A new dedicated page with the banner seen above appeared in iTunes today, proudly announcing to the world that the App Store’s first birthday has arrived.

Now that this event has arrived (or will in a few days), how is Apple celebrating? By trying to get you to buy more apps, of course. Besides the colorful banner, the birthday page is replete with Apple’s “favorite apps and games” picks, all sitting right next to links to buy those particular items so you can’t help but see just how to do it. But you can’t really blame them for trying, can you?

Even with Apple’s rather blatant attempts to boost sales, there’s no denying the impact the App Store has had on the world of technology. With its over 56,000 applications, over a billion downloads and with everyone else seemingly trying to find a way to imitate its success, the effects and repercussions of the App Store have had, and will continue to have, far reaching effects on the industry for years to come.

Its a momentous event worth a bit of celebration so you can’t expect Apple not to engage in a bit of self-congratulations and promotion. Now go forth and celebrate by buying a few apps and help out Apple’s bottom line.