10 great Android applications

Here are 10 great Android applications:

Android is the mobile platform of Google. It reached its 100,000-app milestone last week. It is about two-thirds less than the number available in Apple's App Store, but Androis ecosystem is the fastest growing mobile OS. More than 200,000 Android phones are activated daily. iPhone activates more than 275,000 per day. 


1-Intuit.  I worked for Intuit in 2000, in order to test a real time portfolio management stock market software.  It never came in the market.  But Intuit is still a real incumbent in finance software.  Intuit acquired Mint, which allows users to manage each aspect of their finances from their smartphone, is a big part of that strategy. Mint users can download their bank, credit card and other account information at Mint.com (the site uses bank-level encryption), the app displays expenses in categories like restaurants, groceries, and health and fitness. You can also set spending goals and receive notifications if you're over-budget for the month. The only functions missing on the app are the ability to display data in pie charts and custom graphs and suggestions about how to save your money, which are all offered on Mint's website. 


2-Amazon Kindle Reader 
It is the Android version of Amazon's Kindle Reader is the best thing to happen to Android users who often find themselves alone with just their phone. While the quality of an Android Kindle reading experience depends on the size of one's screen and one's ability to find a shaded area -- it's too hard to make out the words in bright sunlight -- reading one of the 725,000 books on Android is not much different from reading on the Kindle itself. Users can bookmark, add notes and highlight passages and look words up via Dictionary.com.  The app also allows books bought on Amazon to be shared between phone and Kindle at no extra cost.


3-Yelp
Yelp integrates mapping technology that directs users to locations as they walk -- in a pop-up, interactive Google map. The Monacle feature allows lost users to see a red dot on their screen as they hold their phone up on the street, helping guide them to the exact location of where they want to go. One problem: while users can draft restaurant/shop reviews from within the app, they can only publish the write-ups by going to Yelp's website.


4-Slacker Radio 
Pandora is a leader, but Slacker Radio offers a greater number of songs and playlists searched and compiled by genre artists. The resulting playlists seems to be a little more relevant to our tastes than what we heard via Pandora. Despite the annoying audio ads that come with the free version of the app, the Slacker experience -- especially the paid versions, which are either $4 a month or $47.88 a year - exemplifies what we've come to expect from Internet radio: the ability to customize our own "radio station," more allowance of song skips and the option to cache our stations, so we're able to listen to songs even when in an area without wireless accessibility.


5- Bump
Bump's technology, available for iPhone and Android users, allows folks to exchange contacts, pictures and calendar events between two phones by tapping them together. Users can also connect on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn using the app.  Additionally, Bump, downloaded so far by more than 10 million users, can be used for mobile payments, enabling PayPal app users to transfer money by bumping phones.


6-Advanced Task Killer
Owners of Androids like the Droid X and the HTC Incredible might not realize that Android apps often run in the background, draining the battery and slowing down functionality. Advanced Task Killer shuts down these programs (with a user's permission, via a checklist like the one above), but keeps the essential services running to free up memory.


7-Astrid
Astrid provides users with a customized to-do list. Users start by adding simple tasks - a wake-up alarm or "buy milk," for example - then follow up with tags that help with prioritization. Astrid tracks the time spent on a task; we like the encouraging, youthful language that pops up with the reminders, like: "You said you would do it: Edit Android App Story."  It also syncs with Google Tasks.


8-Barcode Scanner 
It is targeted toward avid comparison shoppers, Barcode Scanner lets Android users scan a product's barcode with the camera phone; the app then pulls up prices, reviews and shipping labels associated with the item. Users can discover if a book found at a Barnes & Noble store is cheaper online or at a competitor's store or website. The applications, powered by Google, can also scan QR codes - those big, square-shaped barcodes often placed on companies' websites that contain URLs, addresses and contact information.


9-Dial Zero
Dial Zero provides a directory of toll-free customer service numbers for over 600 companies, allowing users to bypass the automated recordings to more quickly reach a person.


10-Seesmic 
Seesmic allows users to manage Facebook and multiple Twitter accounts and updates in one easy-to-use interface. Founded by French blog guru Loic Le Meur, this social media-managing space is crowded with similar apps, but Seesmic seems to work a little more seamlessly and also lets users record and upload videos to YouTube, share photos on yFrog or TwitPic and shorten URLs.

Louis Rhéaume
Infocom intelligence
louis@infocomintelligence.com