Posts Tagged
social
I’ve written my fair share of articles about App.net and the clients I test out, but there’s always new ones out there that I want to try. I have yet to find the ADN client that fits every one of my needs.
I’m aware, of course, that most people are using Netbot these days; It’s free and admittedly awesome. But it’s wearing Tweetbot‘s clothes, and I want my ADN experience to feel visually unique from Twitter without losing the power of Tapbot’s app. In the past, I’ve tried Rivr (for iPhone), which was full of features and pleasant to look at, but after several weeks of use, it didn’t capture my attention anymore and I was back to Netbot (which also has an iPad app).
Zephyr is the closest I’ve come to the Netbot experience. In colloquial terms, I’m really stoked about this app. Read on to find out why. (more…)
One of my favorite things to do while traveling is sampling the local cuisine. There are times when dining at a familiar chain is comforting, but more often than not I prefer to find an establishment native to the city that I’m visiting. When it comes to finding these local favorites, there are a few apps one can employ such as Yelp or Urbanspoon. For me, though, I stick to one app in particular: Ness.
In November 2011 I reviewed Ness, which I called a “sure fire winner.” Recently, Ness received a major revamp, including a new method for finding recommendations, list creation and more. Find out after the jump if the revamp is an improvement or hindrance to an already fantastic app. (more…)
The more that I use my iPhone, the more that I believe that I can do just about anything I need to on it if I really force myself. Developers are creating apps that are making it easier for us to use our device to not only play games, take photos, or listen to music, but it is also becoming more of a productivity tool. The one thing that I have said about having an iPhone is its convenience to do something right then and there. I don’t have to go and find a paper and pen or I don’t have to have a computer with me; I always have my device with me which gives me the opportunity to use it to capture all kinds of things.
One tool that I’ve been very excited about checking out is CheckThis, which lets you easily create simple websites that you can share and interact with others. It’s like a canvas on your iPhone that lets you do a variety of things and then share it with friends who can comment on your activity. I was able to use CheckThis on the web and I really liked what they did there, so I was even more excited to hear that they were coming to the iPhone. (more…)
Last week, a friend of mine wanted me to text his girlfriend in a pinch. I said it would be no problem and was about to send her a text. I rarely text her, so I wasn’t surprised when my friend asked if I had her number. I said I did, but I was wrong. She had changed her number a couple months prior, so I had to adjust her information in the Contacts app on my iPhone before sending the text.
How many times have we all encountered that situation? It’s a giant pain. I have no way of knowing if all of my contacts in my phone are up to date unless they change their Facebook information because my iPhone has access to that. But even if they do make their phone number available to their social network, that does nothing for me. IOS wisely doesn’t automatically update contacts based on Facebook information (although it does link the contacts together, but that’s a different matter). And what if my friends move and the address I have on hand changes? Or they get a new their personal email address? These are the problems Addappt, a contact manager with (what I’ll call) simple social integration for iPhone, attempts to fix. (more…)
Over the years, the iPhone has evolved enough that I can use it as my go-to camera for both pictures and video. With my wife being a photographer and a toddler that my parents want to see in photos, I have learned that there is never a bad time to snap a picture or capture a video. There are a variety of apps out there that I can use to do this and easily send them off to my family. But most of the popular apps out there usually do one thing well: they either are great for pictures or video, but not necessarily both.
For the past couple of weeks I have been trying out Qwiki, which combines both video and images that you take on your iPhone and gives you the freedom to create a cool looking slideshow. It gives me additional capability beyond just taking pictures and video, and I can now edit them and then easily send a slideshow to my friends and family. Let’s take a look at it more and so I can explain to you what I mean. (more…)
Most of the buzz around App.net has been gone and it is not a headline anymore. However, we can’t deny its growth with the invitation-based freemium accounts and the file storage API, allowing users to store files in their own server.
Still, App.net is mostly known as a social network with an ever-growing development of new clients to host the conversations. There are so many clients being released that we could write almost once a day about them, yet after having tried Felix, I doubt you’ll ever look back. (more…)
There are more Twitter clients available for iPhone than you can shake a stick at, and some of them are quite powerful. For a new Twitter app to break through the noise, it has to do something differently. It has to make the Twitter experience feel new, fresh and unique — a tall order when the communication exchanged doesn’t change from app to app.
Most Twitter apps try to make it as easy as possible to communicate with other people online. Slices‘ priority is similar, yet different. Its primary goal is to act as both a discovery tool and a sophisticated newsfeed that allows you to easily group your Twitter feed into different categories — called “slices,” of course — that are similar to Twitter’s built-in lists feature. Let’s find out more after the break. (more…)
For the past few days I have been able to play around with Clinch, which is somewhat similar to another app I just reviewed, Qwiki, but it does things a little different. If you read my review on Qwiki, you’ll see how much I raved about it and how simple and easy it was to use. Well, I didn’t think I would say this, but I think I may have found one that is even simpler. On top of that, Clinch adds some features that I think are pretty neat.
Let me show you more about what I am talking about after the jump. (more…)
Right now, there are two huge trends in app development: Weather apps and email apps. I get more emails about weather and email apps than I know what to do with. I’m not complaining; these developers are often making really impressive solutions, but apart from great user interfaces, I fail to see what they’re really putting their tech-savvy skills to use with. Interfaces are great, but they could be outdone anytime Apple decides to update their own versions. Sometimes, these apps are short on features.
Cloze is the exact opposite. Cloze is a free universal app for the iPhone and iPad that combines email and social media updates into one centralized feed. What really excites me is that Cloze doesn’t think the problem lies within communication’s interfaces, but rather within the interface’s management of communication. Combining email and social feeds has been tried before by a few other developers, but I’ve never felt it’s been executed well. Let’s face it, making an app like this is tough. Does Cloze have the technical knowhow and design skills to make their app user-friendly and feature-filled? (more…)
I’m in front of a computer during most of the day, with my iPhone to my left and my iPad to my right. When it comes to cruising my favorite social networks, I find myself using my computer for Facebook and Tumblr all the time, but rarely for Twitter. In that case, it’s all about the iPhone and iPad, and not much else. With my wife, she’ll only use Facebook on her iPhone, bar none.
What about you? Is your iPhone your main social media tool or do you mix it up a bit? Let us know in the poll to the right!
Icon image via Nathan Lustig
