Microsoft has confirmed that its new Windows Phone 7 goes on sale today, and the company is very eager to see how its highly publicized smartphone software stands up against the competition. And competition it has plenty off, between the iPhone, the many BlackBerrys and Google's extremely popular Android operating system, Microsoft has its work cut out for itself, to say the least.

But Microsoft may have underestimated something and that something is a very important detail, and it has to do with mobile apps developers.

Developers write mobile applications when there are a number of devices sold, but devices are sold when there are a lot of apps sold. So Microsoft could be facing a bit of a Catch 22 situation with its Windows Phone 7.

Microsoft's apps marketplace currently has a little more than about 1,000 apps, give or take. But that's very tiny compared to the 100,000 apps on Google's Android marketplace and over 250,000 on Apple's App Store.

Good luck to Windows Phone 7.