Today while using my phone, I realize that my apps have been the same for months and they hardly ever change. After countless hours of figuring out which app does the best job of doing what I want it to do that’s that – I don’t bother looking for other apps that do the same thing anymore. Unless something seriously goes wrong with the development or something phenomenal gets released in its place, I don’t even bother looking for another app that does the same thing.
I used to download apps all day every day it seemed like, but I would also spend about the same amount of time clearing space for the same apps. I suppose at first it’s a whole new world and you’re trying to find that one app that fits perfectly to your needs. Perhaps that’s why many people consider a larger app store more convenient; more choices for apps that do the same thing. You should have options if you want options! Just because Google Maps works best for me doesn’t mean that it works best for somebody else.
Actually, one of two reasons I haven’t upgraded to iOS 6 was because I would lose Google Maps, and I wasn’t interested in finding a new GPS app (and I certainly wasn’t interested in Apple Maps either – no wilderness exploring for me, thank you) that would take more time to program my info into and may have even been faulty. If there’s one thing I know for certain about myself it’s that I’m a directionally challenged individual no matter where I go, and without a reliable GPS to guide me I’d probably never find my way home. It’s important that I have an app that’s proven to work at least most of the time, and Google Maps has done that for me.
Music and browsing the web are two other important aspects that I use on my phone, and I’ve gone through many apps to get them to where they are now. For music I’ve been through Pandora, Last.fm, and Slacker before I finally found and settled on Spotify. While radio stations are nice for randomly discovering new music, most of the time I just prefer to search for new music on my own terms. Spotify does a great job of doing that, plus provides convenient offline listening. As for my browser, I always try to use the stock browser first but usually end up downloading a third-party browser instead. Safari is actually the best stock browser I’ve had on a phone, so for a while I didn’t bother using any third party browsers. However, once Google Chrome was added to the app store I quickly downloaded it to try it out as it’s my browser of choice on my desktop. I bounce back and forth between the two pretty evenly.
As for the rest of my apps, most of it is related to social networking, banking, and a couple of games – most of which only have one variation of anyway. Honestly, after a few months of using any platform my app searching and downloading greatly decreases and only comes up every once in a great while. I’ve come to realize that while having a huge app store is nice in terms of options, I will never set sight on most of those apps and the numbers mean virtually nothing to me anymore. A huge app store used to be important to me, but I realize now that’s a silly stipulation since I really don’t browse the app store that much; in fact, the App Store is probably the only element on my phone where I’m not 100% sure where it’s located without looking at my phone. Who would have thought that the most important part of my smartphone would become one of the most dormant?
Readers, do you still use your app store regularly? Are you always open to trying new apps, or are you like me and stop once you’ve found the right one? Let me know your thoughts in the comments!
