There's an App for that

I recently bought a smart phone.  For years, I carried what my kids referred to as 'the Nokia brick'.  I didn't get a flip phone until they were passe.  But when we moved to Dubai, I told DH I wanted a phone that would do 'tethering' so I would never be without Internet access (for months!) again.

So, I marched into phone stores and quizzed the very nice customer service people about the phones, plans and capabilities.  I decided to buy an Android phone, specifically for the tethering capabilities.  I know you can do a lot with the iPhone, but you do have to hack them to get to some of the more useful functionalities.  Also, over here, they are way expensive.  I'm not a hacker.  In fact, if I never had to pull the back off my phone to switch the battery, it would make me happier.  And I'll admit, I'm pretty cheap.  Or conservative, that's it.  I'm conservative.

I bought a Samsung Galaxy S, which is a pretty nice all around touch screen phone.  It takes a little getting used to--DH much prefers his Blackberry--but I'm figuring it out little by little.

Between the Android Market and the iPad Store, I've been exposed to a lot of applications, apps for short.  When Apple launched their phones years ago, there were commercials with "there's an app for that!" taglines that I mostly ignored, not having an iPhone.  Now, I find myself listening when folks discuss the apps that are convenient or make things easier for them.

Today, I updated my iPad apps.  Routinely, I just go in and download the updates and bug fixes to the apps that I currently have.  While flipping through to the screen, I passed one called TieSight.  Between the name and the icon, I just wanted to know what it was.  It's an application that uses the built in camera to project an image showing you how to tie your tie correctly.  I was really flabbergasted.  Some programmer spent hours developing this software and is selling it online.  As I scratched my head, all I could think was, "aren't Dads supposed to teach their sons how to tie a tie?"  Are applications going to replace parents?

I'm envisioning an app to show you how to shave, how to shape your eyebrows and pin on a boutonniere.

I'm guessing there's probably an app to teach you how to knit, I KNOW there are apps that walk you through recipes step by step.  So, now life and life lessons become programmatic.  I can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing?  If you spend time with your kids, they will learn these things from you.  If a kid doesn't have a good role model, he can still learn these things from apps.  So is that a benefit, kind of a 'it takes a village' mentality, or are parents sidestepping some of the milestones in their kids' lives?

Hard to say, but I'm sure I will continue to be impressed with the apps that are available for sale.  And what they do.

--Sandee Wagner