Tough Topic: The App Conundrum
Posted by SmallTimeDrinker in Tough Topics on September 12, 2011 10:30 am / 1 comment
Looking into new Android beers apps for my phone. I have also chased down a number of articles both in print and on other websites. I have found a bunch of central flaws in the market, and I hope just one developer out there may learn a thing or two from my experiences.
Platforms
The first issue is there are more mature Beer Apps for the iPhone such as Brew Vault which warranted a write-up in Issue #53 of BeerAdvocate. What’s The problem with Brew Vault? iPhone only. With more and more people becoming users of Android I believe iPhone Apps will suffer. Android is now 48% of worldwide market share, and Apple with 19%. Brew Vault like many of the other apps are user driven databases. This means without people entering in beer information the database will not be complete. If you have a cross-platform app there is the potential to have more people entering data.
Network
An initial Android app I like is Brewster, but there is a con. Brewster requires a network connection. Even in Chicago many of the bars I go to lack a strong data signal. Brewster becomes difficult to use without a solid data connection and honestly I do not want to have to remember a beer to enter into Brewster or any other app. I have enough on my mind. I do not need to keep track of beer lists.
Adding Your Own Beer
This is my problem with Pintley. Although I was excited about Pintley it just does not work to track beer that is homebrewed or is it efficient for tracking beer from smaller operations that you may frequent. I am constantly trying new beer and logging in everyday to suggest a new beer is not going to be an efficient option for me and I doubt it is efficient for many people. If you buy all your beer in bottles from medium to large breweries then I would say Pintley is a good app for you.
The Export
Can you export data out of the app? Can it go to a new phone? Most people I know who are serious about their beer have some sort of record system in place. An ability of the app to synchronize or share information is a must.
Database
In my opinion a database is important, but probably the least important. The nice part about a database is it eliminates the cumbersome entering of brewery, style, ABV etc. If you are able to enter your own beers, and the database is synced this could go a long way in not only growing your database but also the commitment people have to the app. One App I am using a lot lately is Remembeer. Remembeer solves all the above problems, except database. It seems to have a pretty small database however. I started adding beers to the database at a rate of two a day. After a few days I had friends download the app to see if the beers I entered were in the database. They were not. To be honest I was disappointed. Remembeer seemed to be pretty East-Coast centric with its database, and I thought a regular Chicago entries would really beef it up.
The Paid App
There are apps that are ad supported and therefore free, but there are also ad free paid apps. I have no problem with a paid app marketplace. In fact if all apps had a fee I would probably pay for the ones I like, but you need to offer a free trial or ad based version. I find the The Beer Expert app intriguing, but they want three dollars to try it out. Android has support for a trial basis, and I would assume iPhone supports this as well.
Next Steps
I see a lot of great ideas out there, but can we please start to merge some of the concepts? I know it may take you awhile to build an app, but I truly think if you build it they will come. Do a solid job and they will come even more.
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Tags: Android App, App Review, iPhone App
0 Comments
I use a spreadsheet in Google which then can be accessed from any computer and can exported.