He gets it:
>Just before both of these trips it struck me that the information Dark Sky provides—precise weather predictions for the immediate future—is exactly what I’d need before setting out on these (and similar) outings in the future.
I think it takes a bit to understand just why this weather app *is* different, but one you do understand it you really want it.
Cliff Kuang on the Jawbone UP:
>As is, the UP introduces just enough friction into the process that it never quite melds into your routines. Simply having to take the wristband off, uncap the end piece, plug it into your phone, load up the UP app, and then have it synch means that it becomes another chore–rather than a new feature of your constant dialogue with your smartphone.
This is a really great take. I am currently testing out the Fitbit (which he also mentions) and find that he hits on a lot of problems that I see in both devices — mostly that it has certain friction points that make it less interactive than it needs to be.
Rian van der Merwe on the lack of quality content on the web:
>I don’t know where we go from here. I just know that I’ve stopped reading sites that cater more for advertisers than for me as a reader.
That’s a noble thing to say, but I have found it really hard to do in practice — mainly because there are some great writers on terrible ad-centric sites.
Fifty percent off [one of my favorite](https://brooksreview.net/2010/11/writing-tools/) long form writing apps ($9.99) in the Mac App Store until the 28th of November.
Huge round up of discounted software for iOS and Mac.
Two new accessories for the [Glif](https://brooksreview.net/2010/12/glif-review/), a ring to attach it to you keychain, and a little bit of extra security when you are shooting on a tripod. *Ordered*.
Daedalus Touch is a pretty neat little writing app for the iPad. You can get it today for 66% off (only $1.99). This might appeal to those that find iA Writer too simple, and those that are writing a project. Best to watch the demo video [here](http://www.the-soulmen.com/daedalus/).
It’s a nice app.
Fifty percent off 1Password this weekend. This is a must have app for me.
Todd Haselton:
>AT&T said Thursday that it has withdrawn its application from the Federal Communications Commission to acquire T-Mobile USA.
And there was a collective sigh of relief heard throughout Bellevue, WA today.
On another note: AT&T is preparing to pay a $4 billion break-up fee.
Some nice links from Bare Feats, including one to get $100 off of Adobe’s Lightroom 3 — an excellent application.
Steve Lyb on what he perceives to be the “problem” with Stamped:
>The problem with this approach is that you will make the conscious effort to stamp only things that you think others might give you credit for.
I completely see what he means here because that was my initial assessment: what happens when I run out of stamps? I am addicted to Stamped, and as of right now I have 603 stamps available to me. I started with 100. I have stamped 28 things.
Now you may say: well that’s easy because you have more followers. But think about the way the service works. If you stamp something and another person stamps that thing, giving you credit, then you get 2 stamps.
Even if you only have a dozen followers you likely will never run out of stamps so long as you stamp one thing that someone else wants to stamp — that’s not very hard.
I stamp obscure things because I love seeing people adding those things as a “to-do” — what a great way to share something with people that they otherwise didn’t know about.
I am guilty of stamping things that we all love, but I am also trying to balance that with things I think you may have never heard of (my favorite Seattle locales and favorite whiskeys). Lyb’s concern isn’t unfounded, but come back in a month and I bet all the common things in your timeline (Instapaper FTW!) will not be the things you see in your Stamped list.
As the service matures so will the stamps, and as the stamps mature they will get more specific and obscure — if for no other reason than the popular things will have all been stamped.
No, the *real* problem with Stamped is the business model — or lack there of.
Good question, luckily Justin Freeman has a detailed and comprehensive answer, including:
>No two gunpoint situations are alike, and they will all be very dynamic situations. My advice is to remain calm, be as compliant as you can, be aware of your surroundings, and do what you need to in order to survive. But the obvious best case scenario is keeping yourself out of the situation that put you on the business end of a firearm[…]
Great stuff.
Count me in with Dr. Drang on stacked area charts:
>But I find them often misleading, even when their creator doesn’t intend them to be.
More than just that, I find them downright hard to read — that is if you are actually trying to understand what is happening.
Just look at the picture, it is absurd.
**UPDATED** (on Nov 26, 2011): Dell has now [released a statement](http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/371425/dell-apologises-for-misleading-graphics-card-advice) on the matter and claims to be removing the image.
Marco Arment brings up some great points on how Amazon is set to take over as the king of Android App distribution. I hadn’t thought about this before now, but I think Arment is right here.
Not only does Amazon stand to win this fight against Google, but they do so with a more hostile and less open approach towards developers. Very interesting.
I am a huge fan of Instacast, it is one of those apps that at first blush you think: “yeah but I can just do that with the built in iOS tools.” Then you use the app and you think: “pretty nice, well done.”
Then a month later you are still using it.
Then you go to another device (your iPad) that doesn’t have Instacast and you immediately think: “well this sucks.”
Today that last bit stops, today we get [Instacast HD a $4.99](http://vemedio.com/products/instacast-hd/buy) version of Instacast for your iPad. And it looks fantastic.
If you already use Instacast on your iPhone/iPod then you know what this app is. What you may not know is that on the iPad it is about ten times better. Instacast now has iCloud sync — meaning it’s seamless to run and use Instacast on two devices an important addition now that you will likely want it on both your iPad and iPhone.
Instacast HD is more than just a pretty iPad version of Instacast — it actually feels like what Instacast should have been all along: your podcast dashboard.
I love the iPhone, but when the iPad came out and I got a hold of it my consensus was: “oh, this is what iOS was really made for.” The iPad didn’t feel like a scaled up iPhone as much as the iPhone felt like a scaled down iPad.
The same is true with Instacast HD.
I never look at show notes for podcasts, it’s a step I never take. But with the way that Instacast HD presents them, it seems silly not to look at them. Making the podcasts I listen to that much more rich.
There’s one other thing about Instacast HD that makes is so very good: the developer clearly uses the app. I was a bit annoyed with the order of the podcasts on the scrolling list of icons, and I thought: “can I change this?” The most natural way would be to tap and hold, then drag them around. Sure enough, that works. These are the details that people implement when they make an app that they themselves use — these are the details that make apps go from good to great.
I don’t have much else to say, so instead let’s look at the beauty.
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](https://f3a98a5aca88d28ed629-2f664c0697d743fb9a738111ab4002bd.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/instacasthd-1.jpg)
You can also send show notes right to services like Instapaper:
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](https://f3a98a5aca88d28ed629-2f664c0697d743fb9a738111ab4002bd.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/instacasthd-2.jpg)
Instacast HD brings over its own ranking system, a nice way to find great shows:
[
](https://f3a98a5aca88d28ed629-2f664c0697d743fb9a738111ab4002bd.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/instacasthd-3.jpg)
This little volume slider is one of my favorite parts of the app, it just looks perfect:
[
](https://f3a98a5aca88d28ed629-2f664c0697d743fb9a738111ab4002bd.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/instacasthd-4.jpg)
Once you select a podcast you can switch between episodes by swiping or with this nice drop down:
[
](https://f3a98a5aca88d28ed629-2f664c0697d743fb9a738111ab4002bd.ssl.cf1.rackcdn.com/instacasthd-5.jpg)
This is a must have for any podcast listener with an iPad. It may even be the reason you need to buy an iPad if you love podcasts and still don’t have an iPad.
I really was disappointed with the design and usability of all the Android apps that I tried on my Fire — at least the ones that weren’t a popular iOS game already. I actually didn’t think a well designed Android app existed, so much so that I started to write a post about how stupid it is that one doesn’t exist.
I thought: surely it is possible and at least worth someones time.
As part of the research for that post (yeah I occasionally research) I Googled: “Best Kindle Fire Apps”. After looking through stupid slideshow after stupid slideshow ((Seriously, this is not a good way to display anything. Even *The Big Picture*, a photo blog, knows this.)) I finally found one app that looked like it might actually be decent: Evernote.
Now, I am not an Evernote user, nor am I someone who understands the allure of the app. It was however free and looked promising so I downloaded it — I used Evernote back in 2009 so I had an account and a bunch of notes in it already to play with.
I have to say, Evernote is a really great looking Android app and it works well to boot. Evernote gives you a good idea of just how good an Android app can be — that means that most Android developers either don’t care, or don’t *need* to care about the design of their Android app.
I am so happy to have found the Evernote app that I wanted to make sure it wasn’t just a clone of another UI Evernote has used on iOS or the Mac — it isn’t. In fact the iPad, iPhone, Mac and Android (Fire) all have their own UIs that make sense for each of the devices, imagine that.
This isn’t a review of the Evernote app — that app just serves as proof that you can make great looking and highly useable Android apps.
This post is about why Android developers don’t make great looking apps — generally speaking. (Though Evernote is literally the only app, games aside, that I have found to look really nice.)
### Apps Matter
One thing that has become abundantly clear after reading through all the Kindle Fire reviews is that apps matter. No matter the platform or device, what makes or breaks a tablet is the overall depth and quality of the apps that the tablet has at its disposal.
On the [episode 35](http://thebbpodcast.com/2011/11/episode-35-lunchbox-locker/) of the the B&B podcast Shawn said (roughly): “If I had to choose between only getting the built in iOS apps, or only 3rd Party apps, I would choose 3rd party.”
I agree.
That’s a pretty powerful statement too, because it says that what makes the device so valuable is not what it comes with, but what can be added to it. Apple wouldn’t ever include an app that uses a camera to deliver your heart rate, but for $0.99 I can [buy one](https://brooksreview.net/2011/11/ipad-vitals/) (it works too).
This is where most other devices get it wrong. The absolute best looking and feeling app that I downloaded for my Fire before outwardly searching for a fantastic app was: Angry Birds. Ask me the same question about my iPad and I couldn’t choose between the plethora of great apps that I have currently sitting on my home screen, not to mention the 100s of others I have yet to try that many others say are excellent.
Why? Why are these apps missing from Android?
It’s not the user base, because that is supposedly pretty high. I can’t believe it is because “[Android users don’t buy apps](http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/11/21/googles_android_market_estimated_to_earn_just_7_of_what_apples_app_store_makes.html)” because I think that is largely due to the fact that there aren’t apps worth buying.
Why?
I can think of a few reasons:
– Pirating is supposedly rampant. So developers are naturally wary about the platform.
– Copyright infringement from what I hear is not only common, but not dealt with very quickly.
– Fragmentation between screen sizes and specific Android OS builds is high. This makes it harder to make one app that is great on all the Android devices.
– More than one store on a device so picking which app store it be in is a bit of a pain.
Even with all those reasons, I just can’t believe that there is still only one Android app that I can look at and say: “yes, that’s what I am talking about.”
Even if all the above reasons for not developing for Android are true, it would still seems highly unusual that I was only able to find one good app.
The best guess I have has to be that the “market share” is just not that high, thus not making it “worth” it for developers to make amazing apps for the platform. If that is the case, then that is a shame — I think a large part of the reason Android doesn’t appeal to me is because of the lack of apps. ((There are other reasons, but the lack of apps keeps me unwilling to even consider the platform.))
Edward Domain ((Awesome name.)) noticed a bunch of higher-ups at Twitter are leaving or choosing to be “less involved” and noted:
>When this many leaders start leaving a company… it doesn’t mean the company is falling apart but it definitely raises some questions.
Add to this the fact that Jack Dorsey is [trying to split his time](https://brooksreview.net/2011/11/not-sustainable/) at Twitter with Square and it raises some good questions.
The holidays are coming up, make sure you are prepared.