A Chorus of App Suggestions

I own an iPhone. Yes, I'm one of those people. As mentioned in an earlier blog, I was with Sprint for about a decade but they didn't have an iPhone, so once my contract ran out, I jumped ship. One of the obvious perks of the iPhone is all the apps. At the same time, one of the downfalls is ... all the apps.

According to Apple, there were more than 85,000 apps in the App Store as of late September. According to the site AppShopper, there are currently over 96,000 apps available, with more than 105,000 approved. And according to me, that's, well, a lot. I mean, how are you supposed to keep track of everything that's available, or more importantly, know which ones are worth downloading?

My best sources so far have been stumbling upon articles on the Internet or hijacking my friends' iPhones, scrolling through them and asking, "What's (random app)? You like it?" Now, I have another option.

Chorus is a new app available today. As the Web Crawler blog on CNET puts it, Chorus is "basically its own App Store meets social network." You sign up, find friends via your Facebook or Twitter contact list (or search for people by username), and let the system know which apps you have and like. Then, once more of your friends start to join, you can find out which apps they have and like without having to "borrow" their iPhone or iPod Touch each time you see them. In addition, Chorus has editors offering recommendations for apps.

One nice option is the Content Gobbler, a tool that goes through the iTunes library on your computer and lets Chorus know which apps you've downloaded. If you'd rather not share all of your apps, Chorus allows you to choose which ones to hide. And much like Apple's Genius service, Chorus recommends apps based on what you like. Oh, and it's free.

Photo courtesy of Apple