Six minutes per app. Ten apps in an hour. VCs, developers and journalists on the edge of their seats for one fast-paced show.
On May 23, 2012, aNewDomain.net co-founder and editorial director Gina Smith hosted the SF AppShow in San Francisco. Held every few months around the U.S., the SF AppShow is a timed app demonstration — each app maker got six minutes, and only six minutes, to demo his or her tech to the audience of media, investors and developers. Our Julie Blaustein is the show’s official photographer, and our editors Russ Johnson (with Pat Meier-Johnson), Jonathan Hoffberg were there with me and Gina.
Think of this as a hybrid of Pinterest, Stumblr and Instagram. Fergus Hurley of Radium One described Via.Me as the best way to share stories with pictures, media and video. Via.Me lets people chat on all social platforms and share photos, videos, text and other data around them. Users get unlimited video uploads of unlimited length. Via.Me is available for iOS and Hurley told Smith an Android version is coming soon.
Alexa Miller joined the show via Facetime from St. Louis. This free Apple iOS app, bootstrapped by founder Miller with $20,000 of personal funds, lets you document and share concert memories. Create a page for each concert with artist, venue, location, video of friends and picture of your concert ticket stub. An Apple iOS version is available. Stage Page has many fans in Japan. The best part. Miller said she really needed a Kanji version but couldn’t afford to build one — Smith appealed to the live audience and a developer offered to do it on the spot. For free. This was caught on video by our Julie Blaustein.
Metaio’s Trak Lord described Junaio as a free app that acts as a glue to augmented reality experiences. He took a picture of a Lego car which jumped to life on his phone screen. Junaio offers a way to interact with virtual objects in the real world and browse life in a virtual world. Junaio is in all Lego stores. Is this the future of visual search? Available for Apple iOS and Android.
Randy Adams, a serial entrepreneur, one of the original funders of Yahoo! and the brains behind FunnyOrDie, got on stage with a startling new way to do conference calls. CrowdCall takes the pain away from conference calls. You don’t need to send conference call information through email or risk people jumping on your call without your knowledge. Your mobile phone acts as the hub for the call to all your contacts from your address book. He demonstrated a call that connected with folks in China, Connecticut and London. Unlike other conference call systems, you don’t have to call in. It calls you. It’ll support up to 20 callers at a time. And it’s free — even for callers in 40 countries outside the U.S. This freeware is available now for Apple iOS and Android.
Ant Pruitt reviewed CrowdCall. Check out what he says about the app.
Slimdown iTrim
Sebastien Reant introduced Slimdown iTrim as a six-week makeover for women looking to drop two dress sizes in two weeks. The app, featuring celebrity trainers, is an extension of the company’s successful web-based service. The trainers help keep you on schedule and motivated to exercise on the go. Courtney Cox, The Pussycat Dolls and a number of celebrities, Reant said, have tried this app. Slimdown will be available for Apple iOS and Android within weeks.
Daniel Pifko, CEO at SocialNav, introduced BMW Ultimate Drive. He described it as a sort of Yelp for roadsters and BMW owners in particular. The Ultimate Drive, sponsored by BMW, helps you find good places to drive through user-generated content from other drivers. The app targets BMW owners and is essentially a way for BMW to stay in touch with customers but is great for travelers and enthusiasts. Available for Apple iOS and for Android.
Rajnish introduced what we believe is the first available retina display app for the new Apple iPad (3) at the SF AppShow. Shufflr.tv is a video curation service that helps you find videos from 150 sources, including cable, TV, movie and sources online like YouTube, based on your viewing preferences as it draws them from your social profiles.
A nice feature the Celeb Channel shows you what musicians are watching. According to Rajnish, “Shufflr helps consumers discover videos that they would like to watch anytime anywhere. We have a patent-pending approach of combining social signals and algorithms to create a simplified TV-like experience for consumers.” Shufflr.tv is available for Apple iOS, the Apple iPad natively, Android and as an app for Facebook.
Our Sandy Berger reviewed the Shufflr on her iPhone and iPad. This is what she had to say.
Elliot Goldwater, co-founder and CEO of the San Francisco startup, introduced his event-scheduling app, GiddyUp. There are vital features of client scheduling software to be aware of. Think of it as an Evite like app, but one targeting rapid-fire and informal social get togethers. No client download is necessary for recipients. Group chat. GiddyUp lets you invite friends even when they don’t have the app and it uses the contacts from your smartphone, assuming that you’re not going to be inviting people you haven’t seen in 10 years to get a drink tonight. With GiddyUp, you’re able to share the event to Facebook and Twitter if the event is marked public. It’s available for Apple iOS and Android. GiddyUp was the youngest startup at the show and told the audience he and his partner were so busy building out the app they haven’t even started raising seed capital. Sounds familiar. This was one of the big crowd pleasers at the show.
Clement Tardy of Triangle Software showed the recently revamped Beat the Traffic, a live traffic monitoring system. Check the app before you head home to see how the roads are looking. The free version lets you do that — a $20 a year premium version lets you save routes and data from Department of Transportation (DOT) cameras. Beat the Traffic is available for Apple iOS, Android, BlackBerry and WebOS on the HP Touchpad.
Greg Blackman of MEDL Mobile showed Rampage Punch, based around MMA fighter Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, the ultimate fighter. Jackson tells you how to use your Apple iPhone to punch — it uses the phone’s accelerometer to measure how fast and hard you punch. Just don’t throw your phone out with the punch. No Gorilla Glass on an Apple iPhone. Available for Apple iOS and, at last, on Android.
If you’ve never heard of Jackson, watch this Rampage! What hurts more? A punch from Rampage or a Sumo wrestler?
Video credits: Julie Blaustein and SF AppShow
Curious to see if I still punch like a girl.
Oh wait. I mean, a STRONG girl.
-RAP, II
Curious to see if I still punch like a girl.
Oh wait. I mean, a STRONG girl.
-RAP, II