Did
Santa bring you that iSomething you've been wanting? Did you have
to cash all the Christmas checks from your Aunties and Uncles to go
buy it? Maybe you'll have to wait for that fat tax refund check to
come. In any case, there are a few iApps that may be of interest
you.
LinkedIn / Facebook
LinkedIn reinforced it's "Facebook for
grownups" reputation with it's App. Nice, clean, interface
that's interactive unlike Facebook's cartoon bubble icons. It's
free too.
The Home Desktop has four sections; Updates, You,
Inbox and Groups & More. New activity pops up at the bottom,
and you can Share and Search using the top bar. Clean and crisp.
Facebook does let us post pictures on the fly
though, and that is so valuable when something really important
happens that you need to share immediately and without time for
thought. Like when you see some Leotards at "the
Walmart", and Facebook is still the App that all other Apps
write links to.
Bing
Where in the name of Scott Ramone (not his real
name) am I? I'm hungry, let's get Mexican, where's an ATM? Tap-tap,
done. I especially like Bing's Map feature. I'm a little blue dot,
on the train, and the names of everything I pass are neatly
displayed as I pass them.
Bing has a hook to Facebook and Twitter, Weather,
Local (ATMs, Night Clubs, Mexican food) News, Directions, even Movie
Reviews. It's kind of a Swiss Army Knife for the iToys. You can
also, and get this, "Check In".
Check In is scary cool. Check In lets everyone know
where you are, using your own phone to broadcast like those ankle
bracelets you get from County, so they can find and join you.
Imagine, you Check In and before you know it you have a Flash Mob
right there in the Leotard isle at the Walmart. Apparently Check In
does not work yet I don't think, because when I Check In nobody
joins me.
rMaker
rMaker is short for Ringtone Maker, and it makes
ringtones from your music library. I know, you can buy music
ringtones cheap, why bother? Maybe because you like the studio
versoin better than the live version and either one better than the
"tribute" version that you can buy cheap. Maybe you want
the chorus instead of the intro, or the other way around, or
something inbetween. Maybe you want to make a ringtone from your
saved Voice Memos. Maybe "Honey, it's me, answer the
phone.", or something else, cooed by your significant other or
giggled by your adoring children. Maybe the included ringtones just
aren't loud enough in your purse or backpack. Maybe, like in my
case, necessity is the mother of invention.
AC/DC does not sell it's music on iTunes so any
Hell's Bells ringtone you (I) buy will be tribute band muzak. So,
you (I) need rMaker.
V1 Golf
The V1 Golf Digital Coaching System will cost you
five bucks. Tap-tap, stick your iPhone in the grass, or lean it up
against the tee marker, and knock the skin of the little white
ball. Once you've done that you have a video of your swing that you
can trim, cutting out the first three whiffs, draw on, play in slow
and stop motion, and compare side by side to a library of pro
Golfers.
( A 2nd shot three off the 4th fairway at Twin
Lakes CC )
As if that's not enough, you can post all of it on
Facebook. Just select eMail Video and send it to your Facebook. You
could even post every single shot you play so that your Facebook
Friends won't miss out. I only say this because Check In doesn't
seem to work.
Club Locator
Rotary Club Locator, not Night Club Locator (Bing
does that), finds Rotary Clubs using your current location and
parameters Range (mi/km), Meeting Day or Meeting Time. Pick a club
from the resulting list and you'll have the meeting location and
time. Enter your Rotarian ID and Password, and you'll have the
names, phones, and eMail addresses of the club officers. Huge
improvement from the website which assumes you know the location of
a club prior to looking for it.
So many times I've thought; "That meeting went
well, what a swell bunch. I wonder if there's a Rotary Club nearby
that I can visit, make some new friends, network a little, and do a
make-up.". I'm stocking up on club flags to swap now that I have
Club Locator and I'll be seeing you soon.
Check them out, Check In, go to a Night Club, go to
a Rotary Club, or not, that's your call, and that's Cocktail Talk.
