I don't own a fancy cell phone, but I have to admit, I'm started to experience a bit of Iphone-envy. It seems that "there's an app for that" is actually true for so many cool and useful things.
The app that intrigues me the most is "Google googles." With this application, you use the Iphone's camera to take a picture of something, and the app performs a visual search for information about the picture online. This works for book covers, business cards, advertisements, etc. To see a short video describing this process, check out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hhgfz0zPmH4. It seems like the search works best for things that include some written words as well as images, but Google googles hopes to be able to search just images in the future in order to help with things like plant identification or food.
This idea blows my mind quite a bit! How cool would it be to be able to just use your phone to take pictures of, say, tools in a shop and be able to have a name for all of them as well as being able to look up their function on the sly. Or you could take a picture of something that you like in a magazine or on TV and see if google googles can point you to a website where you can buy the object. Scarier still, what if you could take a picture of someone (even a child) and perform a google search on them to try to identify them. It would be a bit like having the "intersect" in your phone (for any Chuck fans out there).
Another app that would have helped me earn a lot of "cool points" back in high school (or really probably still!) is Shazaam. This application uses the Ipod's voice recognition software to tell you the name and artist of a song that is playing in your environment. It only needs a few bars in order to place the song.
Pretty soon, it seems like trivia games will be a thing of the past! My recently went to an adult game night party where one of the couples kept searching for answers on their phone, as if that wasn't even cheating. I wonder what this will mean for the Ipod generation? Do you think they will even bother to memorize trivia? Will it still be valued in society?
Here are some library-related apps in case these become resources that we need to start putting on our library websites!
Here are some library-related apps in case these become resources that we need to start putting on our library websites!
Free manga viewer: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/i-manga-x-free-manga-web-browser/id342797204?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D2
Comics reader, frame by frame. Download (and pay) for each comic (same as music in itunes)
Free audio books - http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/audiobooks/id311507490?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D2
Audio book package ($1 for 13 free downloads, pay for additional). Comes with a visual bookshelf to display your downloads.
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