A few days back I wrote about the impetus for a Verizon iPhone launch in early 2011, mostly citing John Gruber from Daring Fireball. NPD just gave us a little information that could very well serve as more evidence of the impending release. The iOS market is actually shrinking, while Android is exploding. You don’t have to be a genius to see how a Verizon iPhone could change that, or at least help Apple’s position.

It’s not that Apple isn’t doing well – its market cap proves that it is – but Android is on so many more handsets now. From Peter Kafka at AllThingsD:

So how did Android gain share? Because it’s on so many other new phones. Canned quote from NPD’s Ross Rubin: “The HTC EVO 4G, Motorola Droid X, and other new high-end Android devices have been gaining momentum at carriers that traditionally have been strong RIM distributors, and the recent introduction of the BlackBerry Torch has done little to stem the tide.”

Today, Apple saw fit to hit us with the cold hard numbers about the App Store, and they are big. Big like 2 billion downloads. Big like 85,000 apps. Big like a half billion downloads in the last quarter alone. That’s insane growth, and the App Store is now available to some 50 million customers across 77 countries, meaning that growth isn’t likely to slow down.

AppleInsider did a breakdown on the numbers, which includes some staggering statistics on daily download rates. The App Store has averaged 4.1 million downloads every day in its first year. Since April, that number is up to 6.3 million daily downloads. The staggering growth is something Apple obviously hopes to continue, and likely will as more and more carriers adopt the iPhone and more apps become available to iPod Touch users.