My Fabulous iPhone Blog ~ Helen Crozier

Optus Sydney Festival Buddy iPhone app starts off wrong but reacts to iTunes user reviews

Summer is an exciting time for Sydneysiders - the festival that takes part in January is top entertainment. It seemed only natural that the iPhone would be asked to take a more active part in helping us all choose which events we might attend and this happened with Optus's free Festival Buddy Application released on 20th December 2009.

I downloaded the application a week ago but was horrified that upon opening it I was greeted by some rather dubious terms and conditions that I needed to accept before using the software. 

Basically I needed to agree to receiving push notifications and SMS messages from Optus and it's suppliers. I did not accept this and the feedback on the iTunes store was loud and clear - beware and do not download, accusing Optus of terrible motives (which I had to agree with).

Thankfully feedback has been listened to. The Terms and Conditions have been changed and we are now told that information will not be collected from Festival Buddy users for any marketing purposes. Phew! A crazy, careless situation has been fixed but I wonder how much damage was done? 

Let's just hope that the stability of the app has been sorted out too. This was another issue reviewers had. 

I've downloaded the app now and will test it out. Have you used it and how would you rate it? Also, how often do you review/rate iPhone apps, even ones you are not happy with? 

Download Link to Optus Sydney Festival Buddy (iTunes)

Sydney Festival Website

Sydney Festival Blog - (a nice use of posterous)

Sydney Festival Twitter.

Posted via email from iphonequeen

iPhone App: Explore the Louvre sans 'sore feet'

 

The Louvre is enormous and unfortunately on both occasions I've been there I have had limited time so have not explored the entire museum. Two nights ago I went there virtually however on my iphone. What fun! We explored the parts we had seen and discovered a few that we had missed. We even got up close and personal with some of the art which we had not of course been able to do when we were there for real three years ago.

The app is divided into these sections: Tour of the Louvre, Artworks, The Palace, and Visitor Information. Included in the application is a map of the gallery, video's and commentaries. I would hope that as time goes on the app will expand it's collection but in the meantime it is a most enjoyable way to spend 15 minutes in one of the greatest art museums of the world.

Navigation is very agreeable, the application is free and I'm happy! Which other museum applications do you have on your iphone or ipod touch?

Musee du Louvre Website
Musee du Louvre iPhone app

Coles Shopmate - doesn't find my local store!

 

 

It seems that 'retail' has finally decided that a lot of people own iPhones and therefore they should jump on the application bandwagon.

Coles say that the app will help you....

"Plan your shopping, discover delicious new recipes and stay informed of all the latest weekly specials with Coles ShopMate for iPhone.

Coles Shopmate combines the convenience and range of your local Coles supermarket with a host of powerful take-anywhere features unique to the iPhone. "

All well and good but my local Coles (around 1 kilometre from my house) hasn't hit the database yet and even though it has been open for over four months it doesn't come up in the list of local stores to choose from. That to me I'm afraid is a big 'fail' Coles and makes the application unusable. The store IS on the website database though so a tiny bit of tweaking should put me in the position of being able to properly trial the program.

I think this could be a useful program - recipes, shopping list & specials catalogue combined - has anyone used it? If they had my store would I find it useful? I'd be very keen to hear how it compares with the standard iPhone shopping lists. Is it useful or is it more of a gimmick?

Evernote iPhone App - forget those sticky notes now!

Dear iPhone

Thank you so much for being so incredibly useful! You truly are my spare brain. Today I had to race out the door and I tried after my bad experience on Friday to grab pen and paper just in case something happened while I was outdoors and would be unable to snap photos for any reason. Stupidly I wrote down the wrong phone number or wrote so badly I couldn't read what the numbers were. Hopeless! I was however completely happy when I realised that I had send the information I needed to a note in Evernote on my desktop. I went into the Evernote iPhone app, let it sync and download any changes and voila there was my note with all the information and phone numbers I needed to complete a small but urgent job while I was out.

The Evernote iPhone application has been around for some time but I am now finding the latest version the most exciting of all. The landscape view of notes is fabulous and the app seems very stable and much quicker to access important bits.

Thanks for saving my bacon this time!

Tungle - iPhone Application

via www.tungle.com

Count me in as a huge fan of Tungle. This is a free web application that makes scheduling meetings a breeze. Read more about my thoughts about it on my sister blog Keyboard Karma.

Most exciting news of my day was the announcement that Tungle have released an iPhone application which is demonstrated in this video. I've installed it and will test it out tomorrow but if you are a fan of this application then you should download the free app without delay!!

Australian GST Calculator

Thank goodness for Chris Gummer. He's taken all the headaches out of GST calculations by developing this free Aussie GST Calculator. After all these years it still does my head in so I'm loving this simple tool.

iTunes store link here.

Polarize brings back polaroids via the iphone

 

 i  really like Polarize for the genuine retro polaroid effect it gives to photos.

Tapping on the Polarize icon gives you a welcome screen with three links.

You can load a photo from your photo album to 'polarize'. You may also visit the Polarize Project Polaroid Group on Flickr or you may directly take a photo to be put into the application straight away.

You are given the option of 'tagging' or naming the shot - with a limit of 14 characters. If you are happy with the result you click 'save' and the photo is saved to your iphone.  It's simple, fast and gives a really pleasing result. It is also one of those fantastic applications that is free! Thanks so much to the developer, Christopher Comair for this one!

Sample shot below taken from my iPhone - see the nice saturated colours.