Nokia announced Monday the Ovi Store, an online store for applications and media content for Nokia series 40 and S60 phones, as well as for new models the company also unveiled. Nokia said its service can tailor its offerings based on your location, what your friends are viewing and buying, and your own habits.

Content will include applications, games and videos to widgets, podcasts, location-based applications and personalization content. Because it is backwards compatible with phones Nokia has offered for some time, it will be initially available on some 50 million phones in various world markets, according to Nokia.

The announcements came at the same Mobile World Congress 2009 event Microsoft used to unveil its Windows Marketplace for Mobile service, My Phone, and Windows Mobile 6.5. Apple did not make any announcements related to the event.

The Ovi Store will consolidate three existing mobile services called Download!, MOSH and WidSets, and Nokia said that developers will be able to upload content to the Store beginning March. Content publishers can sign up for publishing access beginning today.

Nokia, the world's largest phone developer, is trying to differentiate its online offering from Apple's enormously successful App Store and iTunes Store by adding in social-networking features, and by billing the Ovi Store as being smart.

If activated by users, the social networking aspect of the Store will show users what their friends are buying and watching through the Ovi Store. The company said that the Store will also learn from the buying habits of its users, and tailor offer content based on those habits. Content and applications can also be offered based on location.

"From this point on," the company said in a statement, "the media you consume is no longer just about 'what' you're buying, but also now about 'where,' 'when,' 'why,' and 'who' bought what."