Life online is now becoming “apptastic”

Recently my colleague Rob introduced BT Life readers to technostalgia, and since then I’ve been desperate to make up words to include in blog posts.

Broadbandstand was a cool one, but I couldn’t think of practical uses and televisionary also had a nice ring to it, but applied more to Kirsty and Pawel and their programming delights.

Taking the easy cop out route and adding ‘tastic’ to the end of any words usually works, so here’s the blog post about why the future is apptastic…

 A few years ago “apps” didn’t exist as a widely-talked about concept, though they were there. I remember telling a colleague that technically the BT.com website was just a bunch of apps that let you see and pay your bills and order things.

That didn’t go down particularly well given the large amount of time and money we put into developing them, but he understood what I meant.

Apps everywhere

Now “apps” are part of most Internet users lives, whether it be via a smart phone, android or Mac OS driven, a tablet or even the collection of ‘widgets’ accumlulated on your BT Yahoo! Homepage. Wikipedia gives a good description of apps or Application Software as they call it in proper terms.  

Apps are only going becoming more ubiquitous and used in our every day lives regardless of device and interface we use. At the basic level you can get apps on most smart devices for: diaries, alarm clocks, booking cabs, seeing train times, reading news, playing almost any game you can think of, buying movie and concert tickets, previewing email, taking photos, looking up directories and auto logging in to wifi hotspots (BT Fon). The list goes on.

Here’s my pick of some of the most outrageous/strange/interesting/apptastic apps that I have come across so far in my travels:

Police Scanner

Lets you listen into police scanners from round the world! A cab driver in Dundee introduced me to this, and chuckled as we listened to police in Chicago arrest a naked man at a bus stop.

Goggles

An Android app that allows you to take photos of anything then search for that image on Google. It’s amazing for translating images to search results. Try it if you have an Android-based phone, or know someone who does.  

Google Translate for Animals

Ok, so this was an April fools joke that Google put out, but how handy would it be to know exactly what your cat is thinking of you? Check out Google Translate for Animals now.

Lucy phone

(only available in the US sadly)
This iPhone app is loaded with common phone numbers for utilities and service providers allowing you to call them, and rather than waiting on hold, when a customer service agent answers your iPhone will call you back and connect you directly! 

Hit Pad

An iPad app allowing you to enter search terms and see the latest tweets, Google news, videos and the best of the web for that specific term. A kind of web filter on your iPad.

BA.com

On iPhone. This is truly apptastic if you fly as much as I do. Book, view and check in online, and even generate the boarding pass on your iPhone so you can’t lose it. Definitely recommended for travellers.

Obviously there are hundreds and thousands of apps across all platforms and many more are launched every day. Some might argue about the stranglehold the manufacturers are putting on apps on their platforms, but I think this will be a temporary position as more developers build across all platforms and content is shared more and more across devices and screens.  

I’m not even sure I can predict the future of apps, as the ones I see coming out  tend to supercede what even I could imagine, so I’m sure there are more apptastic uses coming in time.

The only thing I’m absolutely sure of is that “apptastic” is nowhere near as cool a word as “technostalgia”.  I must think think of a better way to use Broadbandstand in every day conversation…

What do you think is apptastic? What are some of the best or most interesting apps you have come across? Let us know below