“Every commercial product which competes directly with an Apple product (particularly the iPhone) gives me (and many others) the distinct impression that “where it is original, it is not good, and where it is good, it is not original.”
Stanislav Datskovskiy in Non-Apple’s Mistake, in which he blames the current situation of Apple’s Golden Cage on the rest of the industry and the complete lack of anyone else creating good products.
Brilliant.
I’ve known about the apps and good repute of the folks at Overcommitted Apps for a while, but had never used their offerings myself until recently. By chance, I recently purchased two and have been really pleased with the quality.
As always, it’s the little things that make the difference.
TripMix
I love iTunes and the iPod app on my iPhone. But TripMix has been a welcome addition to my phone. It selects artists randomly and then plays 3 consecutive songs from each. It’s a great way to listen to some of the music that doesn’t come up in your handcrafted playlists.
The aesthetics of the app are also extremely well done. It’s not all good though — the app has to be running at all times, which is inconvenient at times.
Ember
An iPhone client for your Campfire account(s), Ember is another beautiful app. And there is a nice touch that makes it easier to use on the iPhone’s small screen, seen here:
Being able to quickly refer back through the day’s conversation and then instantly pop back to the latest update is well implemented — almost a necessity to make a service like Campfire usable on a small device.
Highrise
Lastly, the guys at Overcommitted were hired by 37signals to create an iPhone app for Highrise. It has all the polish you would expect with these names behind it.
The ability to add a voice memo is handy, making good use of the phone’s hardware.
(One caveat: I am in no way associated with Jordan Chang)
See For Yourself
Why take the time to write about these three different apps? Companies like Overcommitted are exactly why I love the Mac community and indie devs — they pour their hearts into what they do and the results speak for themselves.
