The iPhone application I cannot live without
Syncing things has been the bane of my digital existence since the moment I started using a cellphone. Suddenly I had two damn addressbooks and I needed software to sync them. I got a Newton, and the problem sucked because the developer market for the Newton never materialized. I bought a Handspring Treo and it got worse. Once I ripped all of Sarah’s and my CD collection I had a 50 gigabyte pain in the ass.
I don’t like syncing. It’s a kludge at best and a nightmare at worst. So I picked up the SimplifyMedia plugin for my iPhone and also installed it on the media PC at home that is plugged into my television and holds our entire music collection. Now when I’m out and about I can listen to my home music collection without having to remember when I last synced anything. It streams music from my music collection on my machine at home. I can access the playlists or navigate the library in all the expected ways.
I use this most at the local card room, where I can sit for almost 90 minutes folding hands if I’m having a run of cold decks. To fill in the boredom I listen to music. Sometimes I’m a little tired and need a pick me up, and I need something fast. Sometimes I need something a little slower to mellow me out. It’s all there though, streaming to my phone, so I don’t have to worry about not having planned for it.
What’s cooler? Party shuffle mode reminds me about music I have but probably forgot about. I use Simplify’s plugin along with my Pandora radio channels to basically have all the music I might ever want at my fingertips. It doesn’t help you if you’re out of network connectivity range, but that happens to me very rarely anymore, and I usually have enough podcasts loaded on the thing to keep me happy until I get out of the subway.
The greatest testament to the success of the SimplifyMedia product is that I’m consistently burning through an entire fresh battery charge on my iPhone when I go to play cards because I’m enjoying exploring my music collection. Anything that allows/facilitates/encourages such quantity of usage is probably a really useful app.
PS Yes, I’m in the market for extra iPhone/iPod battery packs. If you have a favorite, let me know.