Everywhere you go these days, you see them: distracted looking people staring into hand sized oblongs of glass and stabbing at them with their fingers. These gadgets are almost like religious icons. They are mobile phones – but not the ones we once used merely for calling people. The Apple iPhone, launched in Britain only two years ago, does far, far more than just that.
Indeed, thanks to the iPhone’s revolutionary ‘Apps’ – applications – which users download from the internet for, mostly a few pence to a pound or two, an iPhone can be converted into 85,000 different devices – some useful, some entertaining, and some downright bizarre.
Apart from being a phone, an internet-surfing pocket computer, a camera, a video camera, a tape recorder and a device that stores and plays songs, films and TV shows, your iPhone can also be a satellite navigation system for your car; pockets tenpin bowling alley; a spirit level; a scrabble or chess opponent; and a barcode reader that tells you if you can buy an item cheaper elsewhere.
No wonder the iphone has become a cult unlike any gadget before. Indeed, many experts regard it as the greatest electronic gadget ever made.
More than 50 million iPhones have been bought worldwide, almost two million of them in Britain. And that number is bound to explode now that mobile operators Orange and Vodaphone have agreements to sell the iPhone – previously, O2 had the exclusive deal.
The iPhone has its faults. Battery life is not fantastic. Your voice can be sound tinny when you call on one. And a lot of people find the digital keyboard rather tricky to type on.
The Apps have made up for such shortcomings. More than two billion have been downloaded worldwide – 500 million in the past three months.
But are iPhones and their ubiquitous Apps insidious diversions that are wasting a generation’s time? Well, there are plenty of truly moronic Apps – and a lots of game Apps that are worryingly addictive. But the iPhone’s sheer usefulness has made it a global sensation whose history is only in its early stages.
BEST APPS FOR....
Consumers:
RED LASER: Came out a few weeks ago and could change the way we shop. It reads the barcode from almost any product and tells you if and where it is available cheaper. Ideal for taking to John Lewis to test its ‘never knowingly undersold’ claim.
Commuters:
NATIONAL RAIL ENQUIRIES: Updates the departure and arrival boards at any station in Britain every few seconds.
Motorists:
TOMTOM: One of the most expensive apps available at £60 – but much cheaper than a real car satnav system.
Travellers:
LONELY PLANET: Converts your iPhone into a speaking Chinese, Japanese, French, Spanish or Italian phrase-book.
Pedestrians:
GOOGLE EARTH: Pull up an aerial view of where you are, and go into Google Street View to match the address you’re looking for with the streetscape as photographed by those mobile Google camera cars.
Children:
SMACKTALK: Big in Japan and now big over here. This oddly named app converts your voice into an adorable, lip-synched hamster, puppy or kitten. Once children get their hands on it, they will do all they can to run down the parents’ already over stretched iPhone batteries.
Foodies:
QYPE RADAR:Want to know where to eat? Qype lists all restaurants and cafes and bars close by. Features restaurant reviews from real people – and if you disagree, you can log your own criticisms from your iPhone while you’re still eating.
Music Lovers
SHAZAM: Can identify any song you hear when you are out and about. Shazam needs only to hear a 20 second snatch of pop or classical music. It sends this to its central computer, which contains most of the world’s music. It matches what it’s heard with its records and sends you a text within a couple of seconds identifying the track. If you then want to buy the music, it will download it to your iPhone.
Book Lovers:
STANZA: Turns your iPhone into an electronic book. There are thousands of books to download, and many classics are free. You turn the ‘page’ by touching the bottom right-hand corner of the iPhone’s screen.
Star-Gazers:
STARMAP: Using satellite technology, this locates exactly where in the world you are and helps you identify stars and constellations precisely as they appear in the night sky.
Radio-Fans:
WUNDERRADIO: Converts your iPhone into an internet radio. You can listen to your local station when you are hundreds of miles from home – or to any one of thousands across the world. The App works by using the 3G phone network to connect to the internet. The result is that you can be walking along a British street nonchalantly listening to a live radio station broadcast from Sydney or New York.
Game Players:
SCRABBLE: A proper, official Scrabble game that pits your wits against your iPhone’s – or you can play with a friend who is thousands of miles away, live.
DIY- ers:
ihandy LEVEL: Converts you iPhone into a spirit level for carpenters, people putting up shelves – or those just fussy about getting restaurant tables level.
Lovers of Peace and Quiet:
DECIBEL: Transforms your iPhone into a noise meter that registers red when sound around you is at a harmful level.
AND FINALLY – Perhaps the iPhones’ biggest market.
People with Nothing to do:
OCARINA: Converts your iPhone to an ancient form of flat flute. Phone flautists hold the iPhone horizontally while blowing into the microphone and fingering virtual holes on the screen.
The sound is quite pleasant, and your tunes can be heard as you play, by fellow flautists around the world.
ISTEAM: Turns your iPhone into a simulated steamy window on which you can write messages with your finger.
KALEIDOSCOPE: Makes your iPhone a kaleidoscope. Shake it and the coloured but reform, just like the real thing.
www.MessageMakers.co.uk
Daily Mail, Wednesday, September 30, 2009
