<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0"
	xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
	xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
	xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
	xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"
	xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
	xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/"
	>

<channel>
	<title>Preston Smalley &#187; mobile</title>
	<atom:link href="http://www.prestonsmalley.com/category/mobile/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://www.prestonsmalley.com</link>
	<description>How we can lead the eCommerce industry thru customer-centered design</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Wed, 11 Aug 2010 19:32:54 +0000</lastBuildDate>
	<generator>http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2</generator>
	<language>en</language>
	<sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod>
	<sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency>
			<item>
		<title>What&#8217;s on my iPhone</title>
		<link>http://www.prestonsmalley.com/2009/04/whats-on-my-iphone/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prestonsmalley.com/2009/04/whats-on-my-iphone/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 23 Apr 2009 19:04:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Preston</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[design]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ebay]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mobile]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[tagtest]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prestonsmalley.com/?p=156</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Preston Smalley discusses his most used iPhone apps: Facebook, NY Times, Mint, eBay and Google as well as the ones he wishes existed or were better: LinkedIn, Tom Tom, Skype, PowerPoint, and Fitbit. ]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>As a product design guy, I try out a lot of iPhone apps however the list of apps I actually use everyday is quite small. To keep things interesting I&#8217;ll skip built-in apps like Mail, Phone, and Calendar to focus on 3rd Party apps (especially appropriate as most expect Apple to hit the <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/billion-app-countdown/">1 billion downloaded milestone</a> today).</p>
<ol>
<li><strong><a title="Facebook iPhone App" href="http://linktoapp.com/facebook">Facebook App</a> </strong>- I find the user experience better than the web version as it seems to get at the essence of enabling me to keep up with what&#8217;s going on in my friends lives. It avoids all apps, advertising, and modes that plague the web version.<strong> </strong><strong><br />
What&#8217;s missing:</strong> Enabling me to phone my friends, sync with my phone contacts, and the ability to leverage my location to find my friends.</li>
<li><strong><a title="New York Times iPhone App" href="http://linktoapp.com/nytimes">New York Times App</a> </strong>- First, I&#8217;m a NYT junkie and I love that I can get my fix while on the go. They&#8217;ve done a great job extending the NYT brand into the app and formating the stories for the form factor.<br />
<strong>What&#8217;s missing:</strong> After several updates it&#8217;s still far too unstable. With OS 3.0 I hope they enable the day&#8217;s stories to be pushed down to my phone everyday at 5AM&#8211;it&#8217;s charging and on wi-fi, why not? Finally, I&#8217;d like to be able to tweet stories directly from the app.</li>
<li><strong><a title="Mint.com iPhone App" href="http://linktoapp.com/mint.com">Mint.com App</a></strong> &#8211; As we all tighten out belts, I find it extraordinarily useful to have the pulse of my balance sheet and cash flow on a regular basis. As a mobile extension of the web service, it does a good job summarizing where my money&#8217;s coming and going as well as showing me &#8220;alerts&#8221; when irregular events occur such as a large purchase.<br />
<strong>What&#8217;s missing:</strong> I&#8217;d like to be able to dig into changes in my 401K (chart of how it&#8217;s trending, which holdings are up/down), be able to re-categorize transactions, and &#8220;predict&#8221; my cash flow out a couple months based on past data and budgets.<br />
<strong>12/09 Update: </strong>The latest app adds re categorization.</li>
<li><a title="eBay Marketplace iPhone App" href="http://linktoapp.com/ebay"><strong>eBay App</strong></a> &#8211; I&#8217;m glad that with the 1.2 version of the app we&#8217;ve finally got a stable version of the buyer experience. I can check on items I&#8217;m watching, bid or buy items, as well as do quick price check searches.<strong> </strong><strong><br />
What&#8217;s missing:</strong> Disclosure: the design for this app is on my team so you&#8217;ll have to settle for&#8230; &#8220;stay tuned&#8221; <img src='http://www.prestonsmalley.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif' alt=':)' class='wp-smiley' /> </li>
<li><a title="Google iPhone App" href="http://linktoapp.com/google"><strong>Google App</strong></a> &#8211; Enables me to search the web and my contacts quickly&#8211;even allowing voice search.<br />
<strong>What&#8217;s missing:</strong> It needs to search more things on my phone, especially my email. I&#8217;d also like the app to expand on results from certain sources (e.g. wikipedia entries) similar to Yahoo Search Monkey so that I don&#8217;t have to goto the page. Safari browsing should be built into the app so that it doesn&#8217;t need to be separately launched.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.dropbox.com/iphoneapp"><strong>Dropbox App</strong></a> (added 02/10) &#8211; Syncs my files across both my Mac and PC as well as making them available in the cloud which I can access via the web or thru this iPhone app. Now no matter where I am I can access my key files.<br />
<strong>What&#8217;s missing:</strong> Search</li>
</ol>
<p>What apps would I <strong><em>like</em></strong> to put on my home page but just aren&#8217;t available?</p>
<p><strong>LinkedIn App</strong> &#8211; The <a href="http://linktoapp.com/linkedin">current 1.0 app</a> misses the point and tries to copy Facebook with a news feed approach. What I want is an app that replaces my built-in Contacts app with rich information about everyone I talk with everyday (role, history of previous calls/sms/emails, names for their spouse and kids). When I&#8217;m networking with new people, I want to be able to exchange business cards wirelessly (leverage OS 3.0 bonjour). I should be able to look up LinkedIn profiles using just a name and phone number. Finally, I&#8217;d like the app to remind me to follow up with key contacts I want to stay in touch with when it&#8217;s been too long.<br />
<strong>12/09 Update:</strong> The 3.0 version of this app shows the LinkedIn Product team is commited to building a solid app. They added the biz card exchange feature and many key features from the website.</p>
<p><strong>Skype App </strong>- The <a href="http://linktoapp.com/skype">current 1.0 app</a> is helpful (especially when traveling to make cheap VoIP calls) but is held back by two key limitations: lack of push events and VoIP only over WiFi. Time will tell if the carriers dial-back on the 3G limitation, but OS 3.0 will enable the Skype app to tell me if someone&#8217;s sending me an IM or trying to call me&#8211;a huge breakthru.  <strong><br />
</strong></p>
<p><strong>TomTom App</strong> &#8211; My TomTom 300 device is dear friend of mine and navigated me all over Italy. That said, I would part with it if TomTom could provide me with Turn-by-Turn voice directions, rerouting, and offline maps (thus enabling it work anywhere with GPS). It looks like OS 3.0 will enable this now it&#8217;s just up to TomTom to come thru with their <a href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2008/06/tomtom-announces-iphone-gps-app.ars">long rumored app</a>. I&#8217;d pay $75 for this one and would sell my device on eBay.<br />
<strong>12/09 Update: </strong>The app is now here and only $59.95 however the threat/hope of a Google Maps product with turn-by-turn directions makes me wonder if this app is now worth it and it&#8217;s supposedly a battery drain.</p>
<p><strong>PowerPoint App with Dongle</strong> &#8211; This one&#8217;s simple, I&#8217;d like to be able to connect my phone to an LCD projector via a dongle and project a presentation. Why bring a powerful laptop when a simple device like my phone can do the job. This doesn&#8217;t have to be built by Microsoft and perhaps the Slideshare or Air Sharing folks might come out with it first&#8211;or better yet a <a href="http://www.microvision.com/pico_projector_displays/standalone.html">micro-projector</a> that does it all.</p>
<p><strong>Fitbit App</strong> &#8211; I&#8217;m on the waiting list for the first <a href="http://www.fitbit.com">fitbit exercise/sleep device</a> now due out early this summer. What would make this experience one better is if I could track what I eat directly on my phone without having to remember later when I get to my computer. It also could show me a summary of key stats (like Mint) which would be interesting to check-in with daily (e.g. how did I sleep last night?).<br />
<strong>12/09 Update:</strong> I got my FitBit in Nov and after 2 weeks returned it. It didn&#8217;t offer much analysis and the sleep tracking feature was not very accurate. Good idea but mediocre execution.</p>
<p>What apps do you use <strong>everyday</strong>? What apps do you think are <strong>missing</strong>?</p>
<div id="facebook_like"><iframe src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.prestonsmalley.com%2F2009%2F04%2Fwhats-on-my-iphone%2F&amp;layout=standard&amp;show-faces=true&amp;width=450&amp;action=like&amp;font=arial&amp;colorscheme=light" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" allowTransparency="true" style="border:none; overflow:hidden; width:450px; height:24px;"></iframe></div>]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.prestonsmalley.com/2009/04/whats-on-my-iphone/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>4</slash:comments>
		</item>
	</channel>
</rss>
