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Editorial
What I Don’t Like About iPhone Apps
Wednesday, July 1st, 2009 at 3:38 PM - by John Martellaro
There is a disturbing trend in the development of iPhone apps, and I don't like it. Here's why.
On Twitter, I follow Apple's feed for new apps, @apple_app_store. Announcements come at a dizzying pace, and as of today, there are 53,635 apps for iPhone/iPod touch on the Apple App Store, according to 148Apps.biz.
The problem is that too many of these apps are simply shells for information sources that are already available on the Internet. It's easy to illustrate with a Venn diagram. If we think of the set of all information sources on the Internet, the iPhone apps are simply becoming a bigger and bigger subset. Like this:
A qualitative, not quantitative Venn diagram for illustration only
Where will it stop? Do we really need an iPhone app for Toyota Vehicles Updates or a Chess database? Many of these apps merely draw upon information already out there, accessible with Safari, reformat it, and then cram it into an iPhone display. Now, while that has occasional advantages, I doubt whether it always merits a dedicated application.
I tend to think of apps as providing a function, a utility, that helps me get my own job done or provides critical information. In some cases, very nice apps like USA Today and The Weather Channel provide a quicker, more concise look at information I need.
Of course, none of this applies to games. Games are fun, and can exist in an almost infinite variety. I'm talking about stuff that's already out there and free -- if we aren't too lazy to go look for it.
But really. If you look at the explosion in iPhone apps, people are running out of ideas for apps that are truly helpful, in some ingenious way, and exploit the iPhone's strengths. For example, G-Park -- which I consider a canonical application for the iPhone. Nowadays, though, we're just getting into excess.
The only reason for this bonanza is that everyone wants in on the iPhone Gold Rush. However, the good mines and streams have already been emptied by the early birds. Now, it's all about the feverish process finding an information source, say, needlework or birds of the Galapagos (I'm making that up) that gets an app into the system, hoping for something good to happen.
On the positive side, all this means plenty of work for Cocoa Touch developers. That can't hurt.
Overall, though, I think this Gold Rush is why we have 53,635 channels in the App Store and nothing to watch. How it will all evolve will be interesting to observe.
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