The download counter on App Store is about to reach 50 Billion mark. And to celebrate that Apple is offering $10,000 in iTunes gift card to the lucky person who manages to download the 50 billionth app.

Apple has celebrated such milestone earlier as well. Previously, when the app download counter reached 10 billion and 25 billion, Apple generously awarded $10,000 iTune gift hamper. But this time, there is more to just $10,000. If you miss the 50 billionth app, you still have a chance to win. Any one who manages to downland among first 50 apps after 50 billionth download, will get $500 gift card.

And all this is bound to happen tonight (or today, depending upon your geo-location). Interestingly, app download hit is increased exponentially. 10 billion download milestone was reached on 14 January 2011 and it hit 25 billion mark on 2 March 2012.

If you don’t know when you should buy/download the app, check the real time counter at Apple store which is running at a speed of more than 1000 downloads per second (at the time when this article is being written).