Ah America, the land of the entrepreneurial, where a snuggie and a dream can equal billion dollar empire of slobiness. Unfortunately, not all of these dreams are good, or even adequate. Some of them are just terrible.
The iOS environment seems to pull in bad ideas like a damn gravitational pull. People have mistakenly been lured into thinking anything made for an iPhone is going to result in mountains of cash, but in practice, the business plan equation looks like this:
Step 1: idea for an app that lets your cat use emojisStep 2: ?Step 3: Profit
Actually, on second thought, cat targeted apps are doing pretty well right now, maybe I’ll actually use this idea. anyhow, Kickstarter is the place where bad dreams go to be born. If you can get enough people to believe in your product, it becomes real, sort of a pinnochio story. so, let’s look at the best and the worst of Kickstarter for iPhone, starting with the awesome and ending in the awful.
Kickstars: The best of Kickstarter for iPhone
1. Dot 360 VideoIt still boggles my mind the leaps and bounds that iPhoneography has made. It boggles my mind that iPhoneography is actually a word. but the advances being made in this area are rad, and this is one of the raddest I’ve seen in a long time. 360 degree video – it’s not just a device but it’s an app and you can spin your way for a real view of the scene. I’m curious about how this exports and how you can fully use the technology but for the time being…awesomeness.
2. iPhone HolsterDorks aren’t tough but we sure like to pretend we are…sure we’re a computer programmer by day, but by night we’re a Level 10 Orc. RESPECT. this is a simple product, but it is one that speaks to the tough guy in any geek. It could only be improved by also coming with Gun’s Sounds .
3. The iBottle OpenerWhen iPhone first came out there were two apps we used to impress our friends. The first was Shazam, which allowed us to exhibit the tiny musical elves that lived inside our phones, and the second was iBeer . this product takes it to the next level – instead of drinking and pouring fake beers we can start using real ones.
Sickstarter: The worst of Kickstarter for iPhone
1. The Dry Erase iPhone CoverAt first reaction, I actually put this on my awesome list. Dorks and white boards go together like peanut butter and jelly. but then I started digging a little deeper. A) no one, not even the leanest, IPO-dreaming serial startup veteran needs a whiteboard so bad that they’ll need to use a 4 inch one on their phone back. B) The iPhone has fucking drawing apps that do it better. C) your brilliant idea is going to be smudged and erased faster than you can say “brainstorm.” D) this is much more than a shoddy piece of sticky material on the phone back and how it could possibly need $1000 boggles my mind.
2. Man Chair iPhone AppApple has made itself a walled garden, safe from porno and drugs, but it’s still a safe haven for the incredibly sexist – this douchenozzle is ready to join the ranks. Seriously, this app sounds like some 80s comedian’s terrible sketch about how his wife never fucks him, he has to listen to her talk about her soaps, and she drags him to the Macy’s. It wasn’t funny then, it’s not funny now, but this app sucks in more ways than one. The use case alone is just ridiculous – the amount of time men are even going to be spending on these dreaded trips is minimal and do you think these men would really rather chat with other random dudes versus playing some angry Birds? I’m sure creator Len Kendall will indeed need $10,000, but it’s more likely help fund his future divorce than his ill conceived app.
3. The Real Weather GirlsApp ideas are like assholes, everyone has got one and most of them stink. To be fair, most of the app store’s big wins are ones I never could have predicted, in fact I still can’t understand Zombie Farm, but I can pretty safely predict that the overhead costs and sheer dumbness of this app seal its fate. People create apps for a lot of different reason, but one of the saddest reasons I frequently see is middle aged men who are cashed up and think it’s a ticket to cool. I wonder just a little bit if that’s what this is..if Steve Dworman didn’t wonder if this would be a good way to get close to some hot young aspirational starlets. Weather reports and women have gone hand in hand for a long time, the hot weather girl is not a new phenomenon. but throwing in reality TV is like inviting a hunchback for a menage a trois with weather and sexy chicks. what is this monster?