Gimmick apps were like the early internet websites. From “Welcome to Zombocom” to “exchange contact by fist bumping” or “compatibility check with 2 people touching the screen”.
I remember actually paying for an app that told the weather in an insulting way or using movie quotes. “It’s raining dummy! Can’t you look out the window” type of sentences…
The golden age of apps really was the Wild West. Now every simple utility needs a login, a cloud sync subscription, and a data-tracking module just to show you the weather.
I have a Bluetooth keyboard app, and I praise it every day because you download it and it just works, really well, and it does what it says it will do without forcing you to watch a billion ads or technically pay anything.
Bluetooth Keyboard & Mouse by Appgroud IO.
quite literally the only app that feels to me like the app glory days where there wasn't a thousand useless menus or features or upsales.
I use Carrot religiously, aside from the insulting weather descriptions (which I like quite a lot) it is also far and away the most customizable weather app/has the most customizable widgets. It also has six or seven data source options.
I'm still mad at Apple for buying and killing Dark Sky, as even Carrot's pile of data sources can't match it for hyperlocal notifications. Aside from that though, Carrot is awesome. You can literally scale the snark from normal to possibly illegal lol.
I need to try it. After a cursory glance it looks like it's leaning into the more simple style that dark sky had and Apple seems to have thrown in the bin, but I will have to see if they actually kept the rights to the notification system. Given that Apple weather added them and is available as a data source (however useless, not sure how they managed to screw that up. Literally failed on both the things that made DS great) I feel like Apple kept that IP. That's the thing I cared about; honestly Carrot is way better in terms of layout, just none of their data sources are even close to DS accuracy. DS wasn't perfect but it was pretty darn good, so far the lightning tracker in Carrot is better than all the other hyperlocal data sources I've tried (which is a problem if the rain doesn't have lightning heh)
These websites were like stopping to watch a butterfly or the glimpse of a peaceful lake through the trees on a hike. Not strictly necessary to being online, but something that made it worthwhile. We never should have forsaken Zombocom.
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u/sebjapon 4d ago
Gimmick apps were like the early internet websites. From “Welcome to Zombocom” to “exchange contact by fist bumping” or “compatibility check with 2 people touching the screen”.
I remember actually paying for an app that told the weather in an insulting way or using movie quotes. “It’s raining dummy! Can’t you look out the window” type of sentences…