In just the past month or so, do-it-yourself app creators have created a bit of a monster, if you will, as many members of the bloggerati have released iPhone apps that are about themselves, and only themselves. Developers like MotherApp and AppMakr make it significantly easier and cheaper to make your own iPhone app that you can send a blog rss feed and Twitter feed to, making it easier for your “followers” to…follow you. These apps are becoming commonly known as “vanity apps.”
Vanity apps generally follow the same interface, with an intro screen followed by a home page, with a tab at the bottom of the page for an RSS feed of a blog, another for a Twitter feed, and sometimes a tab for a “Favorites” features or others (YouTube feed, photos, etc.). The design can be tweaked as necessary, but, for the most part, vanity apps use incredibly straightfoward and streamlined interfaces.
While this new movement in app creation only started practically yesterday, one can’t help but wonder, “What’s next?” Are we headed toward an overwhelmed App Store that features an app for every Internet socialite and Facebook fiend?
In any case, here are 10 people with vanity apps to check out (including Clerks creator Kevin Smith). There are really only a few (and many of them aren’t in English), so these are really the app’rs at the forefront of the vanity apps movment. Consider taking a cue from them when you decide to make your own app, featuring photos of your dog and tweets about what you’re eating for lunch.
Chris Brogan
You may have seen this guy’s face before, in the App Store under the “New & Noteworthy” suggestions from iTunes. Most probably reacted in the same way: “Who the heck is Chris Brogan, and why does he get his own app?!”
Brogan is the president of New Marketing Labs, a bigtime media marketing agency that helps corporations and business get with the times and integrate social media into their marketing strategies. Say what you will about this guy and his goofy picture, but he’s been blogging since 1998, back before “blogging” had even been invented. If there’s any blogger with an app to follow, it’s this guy. Keep in mind, however, that he is a marketing guy, so a lot of the blogging will be all business talk. He integrates his blog and his Twitter feed into his app, powered by MotherApp.
Tim Ferriss
Tim Ferriss is another business-type guy, most widely known for his best-selling book The 4-Hour Workweek. But when he’s not busy writing books about making your business more efficient or giving a lecture at some college (seriously, this guy is in high demand), he’s all over Twitter and updating his blog on a regular basis. His app is in the typical format from MotherApp developers, but there’s always content to look at and follow. And although most of his blogs are business-related, most of it’s fairly interesting to the everyday reader, with little stories and questionnaires with cool folks, like one guy who went from a minimum wage job to a gig as a batting coach for MVP baseball players. If you’re not already following this guy, you should start soon. He spoke at the TED Conference, for crying out loud!
Seth Godin
Besides having the most uniquely designed app out of this bunch, Seth Godin is practically a god in the marketing world. An entrepreneur who has written 20 books, Godin has plenty to say most of the time, and he does so on his blog, which is fed into the app. He used AppMakr to create his app, and its simplicity, with just two tabs (one for his blog and the other for his mentions on Twitter), is informational without the pretentiousness or “vanity.”
Brian Solis
If Godin is the god of the marketing world, then Brian Solis is probably the god of the PR-merging-with-social-media world. He, too, has written several books and lectures all over the place when he’s not busy running multiple businesses. He created his app through MotherApp, but the interface and content are much different than most in this bunch. Instead of feeding his blog and Twitter into the app, most of the content is geared toward super-fans who want to keep tabs on the guy: The features include a “fan wall” for fans to leave Solis messages about how great he is, a list of his upcoming appearances, and “news,” which is basically a feed of any tweets mentioning him. The app also has photos, videos, a biography, and a store for your fix of everything-Solis.
Markus Albers
Finally, a little change of pace. Markus Albers is a journalist and author, now living in Germany and writing mostly in German, who’s written for GQ and Vanity Fair, in addition to publishing his own non-fiction books. Albers uses MotherApp to feed his blog and Twitter into the app, writing mostly about life in Germany and other things in German that I can’t understand. He’s a good example, though, of how writers-at-heart can also get their own apps and refrain from plastering their photos all over them with great success. He’s a writer, so that should be the focus, right? Right.
Tamar Weinberg
I know what you were thinking: “Is this a boys only club, or what?” Never fear, I found a lady doing up her own app! (And there’s another one yet to come.) Tamar Weinberg is all over the Internets and social media, with her writing appearing on Techipedia and her current gig as a community and marketing manager over at Mashable. Weinberg has quite a bit to say about Internet marketing and social media, but most of it is jargon-free and suited for the layman interested in social media and the like. She sticks with the usual format of MotherApp, and even uses her own Twitter updates in the app, instead of just including mentions from other tweeters. Way to represent for the ladies, Weinberg.
Lori Falcon
In a sharp change of pace, we have a good ol’ mom from the south blogging about…being a mom from the south. Lori Falcon pens her blog, A Cowboy’s Wife, for a steady following of fans and is also the food editor for a new project from the Lifetime network called Lifetime Moms. My mom certainly couldn’t ever do as great of a job with the world wide web as Falcon does, with her posting plenty of blogs and photos reaching out to other women and moms looking to get connected. She’s even one of Walmart’s Eleven Moms, which made me wonder, “Since when has Walmart sold moms?” All jokes aside, Falcon uses MotherApp and went with a more visually appealing design than the others in this batch, carrying over her cowboy theme from her blog. Her Twitter feed is included, and she also has a YouTube feature in one of her tabs, which would be a really great one…if it worked. You get a “cache mode” error when you try to pull it up. A for Effort, Lori!
AlohaBruce
Another one powered and created by MotherApp, AlohaBruce features tips and musings about Hawaii from Bruce Fisher, a longtime resident of the area who really loves to talk about, blog about, make videos about, and podcast about Hawaii. Fisher runs his Hawaii Vacation Blog, which he uses to focus on giving visitors tips about how to have the most fun in Hawaii. He’s also all over Twitter, which is included as a feed in the usual format of a MotherApp personal app. I know who I’ll be tweeting the next time I’m bored in Hawaii.
Juan Cole’s Blog
Props must go to Juan Cole for his fantastic caricature drawing used as the intro screen for his app, instead of a glamour shot like some other entrepreneurs we met earlier. Cole is the president of the Global Americana Institute, which is a group of academics working to translate literary American works into Arabic and needs to update its website (this is 20K10, people), and also a respected authority and commentator on Middle Eastern affairs. Cole was pretty much an unknown until he started actively participated in weblogs in 2002, which, though it doesn’t sound like long ago, is well before everyone and their mother hopped on the blogging bandwagon. Whether or not you agree with his opinons on the Middle East, this guy is always on top of the news and definitely knows his stuff. He uses MotherApp and keeps it simple with both a blog and a Twitter feed.
Kevin Smith
Just had to save the best for last. Sure, this is an app for a celebrity, filmmaker Kevin Smith of Clerks fame, but it’s still a “vanity” app, so it counts. Smith has an entire app to himself with a feed of photos (photo blog?), his Twitter feed, and other fun features (fan photos, a soundboard of Smith favorites, a custom-made “ringtone” hummed by Smith himself, and others). The app is powered by DenVog and most certainly costs buckets more to make than one from MotherApp or AppMakr. This is the only app on our list that isn’t free ($0.99), but I would say the Twitter feed and custom ringtone alone make it well worth the buck.
