# First & 20 - full archive content > An archive of the iPhone home screens of designers, developers and writers who shaped the golden age of the App Store, 2009-2015. Independent restoration of the 2009-2015 site by Tory Hobson. All home screens (c) their respective contributors. Contact: curator@firstand20.com --- ## Home screens (65) ### Adam Engst URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/adam-engst Bio: Adam C. Engst is the publisher of TidBITS, one of the oldest and most-respected Internet-based newsletters, distributed weekly to tens of thousands of readers. He has written numerous technical books, including the best-selling Internet Starter Kit series, and many magazine articles - thanks to Contributing Editor positions at MacUser, MacWEEK, and now Macworld. Apps on this home screen: AIM, Dropbox, Epicurious, Google, Instapaper, Navigon, Stanza, Take Control, Twitterrific, WeatherBug, Wikipanion Phone: Although I don’t use the phone much, I’ve left Phone on the home row because it’s my only phone number - I ported my landline to it as a way of justifying the iPhone’s monthly cost. With three days left in this month, I’ve used only 78 minutes out of the 700 that my wife and I share via our family plan, and I’ve saved up nearly 3,000 rollover minutes. If only they were redeemable for credits in the iTunes Store! iPod: I seldom listen to music on the iPhone, since I hate earbuds and far prefer the decent speakers attached to my Mac. However, I listen to podcasts (On the Media, Planet Money, This American Life, Radio Lab) whenever I’m driving (via the car stereo) or doing yardwork (with the cursed earbuds), and sometimes when cooking dinner (via a Griffin Technology AirCurve acoustic amplifier). Clock: I love Clock, and I use it multiple times every day. It’s my alarm clock for getting up in the morning, and other carefully scheduled alarms remind me when it’s time to go running, when I need to pick my son up at school, and when I should leave to fetch him from his fencing lesson. I also use the timer when cooking, since it alerts me even if I’ve become distracted and wandered away from the kitchen. WeatherBug Elite: The only third-party app on my home row, WeatherBug gets use every day. As a runner, and as someone who grew up on a farm where the weather really mattered to our livelihood, I care deeply about the weather around me. WeatherBug’s combination of full-text forecasts (icons are worthless for weather forecasts, which often change throughout the day) and constantly updated and animated radar maps make it my weather app of choice. App descriptions from the top-left: Settings: Since the iPhone is my alarm clock, I plug it in by my bed every night, and the GSM interference with the elderly iPod and speakers through which we play audiobooks as we go to sleep is a problem. (And yes, I know I could play the audiobooks through the iPhone too, but the old iPod works fine and has no other purpose in life.) To eliminate all GSM interference, along with the possibility of being woken up by a call or, more likely, a Boxcar-generated push notification of a Twitter message, I put the iPhone into Airplane Mode every night, which requires easy access to the Settings app. Photos: Honestly, I’m not entirely sure why Photos is still on the home screen. I suspect it would be heartbroken if I separated it from Camera. Camera: With the improved camera in the iPhone 3GS, I’ve found myself using the Camera app more and more. It’s nowhere near as good as my Canon PowerShot 870SD, but all too often, I don’t have the Canon with me, and the iPhone is good enough. Calendar: Since both my wife and I work from home, we don’t have truly complex schedules, but when you add up all the usual doctor appointments and dinners with friends and everything our 10-year-old son does, having access to our shared calendar is important. Shared? Oh yes, on the Mac we use BusyCal to share calendars properly since Apple doesn’t seem to understand the concept of sharing (as opposed to showing) with iCal. Dropbox: We’ve become Dropbox addicts on the Mac for sharing files with each other and with our Take Control authors, so when Dropbox released a free iPhone app, I jumped on the download. It’s not in constant use, but when I want to look at something in one of our many ebooks, I know that the Dropbox app will give me quick access to all the titles I’ve put in the appropriate shared folder. Stanza: In an attempt to compare the act of reading on the iPhone, the original Kindle, and the Kindle DX, I downloaded some old science fiction books from the Baen Free Library (thanks, folks!). I used Stanza on the iPhone to read them, and you know, it was totally fine. As with the camera, it wasn’t the best reading experience ever, but it was there when I wanted to read for a little while, more so than the Kindles, and it had pros and cons over both the Kindles and paper books. Nowadays, my usage goes in fits and spurts; I use Stanza a lot when I’m reading something electronic, and then not at all for weeks or months as I read something in print. Instapaper: Some people play games when killing time in waiting rooms, I read. And specifically, I read stuff that I didn’t have time to read while doing my real work and saved to read later in Instapaper. And even better, since it caches the data, it works even if the lack of connectivity is preventing me from reading something more pressing, like my email. TCoMobileMe: We’re just starting to publish our Take Control ebooks in the App Store, or rather, our friends at O’Reilly are doing it for us. This is our first title, and it’s on the home screen because I’ve been looking at it a lot as we think about how our ebooks should be converted into iPhone apps and what, if anything, we should change about our process to facilitate that. Epicurious: I’m a fairly serious cook, at least as judged by my Twitter peers, and this is my favorite recipe app so far. It has decent searching, a good recipe layout, and a massive database of recipes from good magazines (as opposed to the truly random recipes on some Web sites). Navigon: I’m in the middle of testing CoPilot, Navigon’s MobileNavigator, and Ndrive, and while I haven’t yet picked a winner, Navigon is currently getting the most testing. Overall, I’m pretty impressed with these car navigation GPS apps - the first couple I tried were fairly weak, but the second crop are nearly as good as the standalone GPS devices from Garmin and Magellan. AppGmail: I’ve become a big fan of Gmail and its Web interface, so this little app, which encapsulates Gmail, rather than requiring me to use Safari, provides just a bit more screen real estate by eliminating Safari’s controls. Gmail via its Web interface is far better than Mail on the iPhone, which is at least five screens to the right. Twitterrific: I know there’s serious competition between the iPhone Twitter clients, but Twitterrific seems to do all I want, so I haven’t had the energy to try out any of the other major contenders. I’d like to mention Boxcar here too, since although there’s no need to put it on the home screen, its push notifications of @ mentions and direct messages is extremely important to me, since I’m utterly offended at the cost of SMS text messages. I can’t even find Apple’s Messages app on my iPhone. AIM: Mostly I do instant messaging on my Mac, but when I’m out and about, or if I need to be cooking dinner while work is being done on the server, or something like that, I like having the AIM app readily available. Wikipanion: With an intellectually curious 10-year-old in the house, I use Wikipanion constantly, since dinner table conversations often verge into subjects where my knowledge isn’t as deep as it could be. Recent searches have answered the questions of whether giraffes are related to horses (no), whether cyclamens are edible (yes), how large the populations of several nearby upstate NY cites are, who was competing with the Wright brothers in the race to create a heavier-than-air aircraft, and how you make Welsh cakes. And no, extreme accuracy doesn’t generally matter in these areas - the Wikipedia articles are just informing conversation over a meal. Google: At this point, I have a fairly good sense of what I can find (or should even bother looking for) in Wikipedia, and for everything else, I use the Google app. Although it can do voice searching, I almost never use that feature, because it’s often socially awkward to be talking at my iPhone with other people present. Safari: Last, but certainly not least, is Safari. Despite Apple’s excellent work in providing a full-featured Web browser on the iPhone, I still find Web browsing on the iPhone to be quite awkward. It’s impressive that the bear is dancing, but it’s still not Swan Lake. Nevertheless, since I use the iPhone largely to retrieve information that’s relevant to whatever location or conversational context I’m in, I’m glad that Safari is as good as it is. --- ### Adam Lisagor URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/adam-lisagor Bio: Adam Lisagor has eggs in many baskets, metaphorically speaking, which is to say he went to college. After a career misstep in the film industry, working as a visual effects artist and commercial editor, he branched out into the highly lucrative worlds of podcasting and iPhone development. He does a pseudo-monthly podcast called You Look Nice Today with his friends Merlin Mann and Scott Simpson, and an iPhone app with his partner Cameron Hunt which is called Birdhouse: a notepad for Twitter. In his spare time, which is most of the time, he maintains a site on tumblr called lonelysandwich and consults for such clients as his dog Diggy and the biotech firm Genentech. He is available for speaking engagements and dance recitals. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Birdhouse, Dictionary, Instapaper, Pianist, Tumblr, Tweetie, Wikipanion I keep the top row of apps just as Apple intended: Messages, Calendar, Photos and Camera. I’ve always had a problem with Apple’s choice to use the same color green for Messages (or Text as it was formerly known) as for the Phone app. The iPhone ships with Phone in the left of the Dock, and that used to consistently screw with me because I’d go for one icon, intending to use the other. I wasn’t about to jailbreak and use a different icon, so I could only move Phone so that it’s no longer vertically aligned with Messages. This, and two years with the iPhone have trained the confusion out of me. Also of note, I’m fascinated that Photos and Camera are really two icons for the same app. It makes complete sense, of course. You wouldn’t want to get carried away with multiple icons per app, but one thing that I wish Apple had done with the iPhone 3GS and OS 3 would be to add an additional icon to launch Camera in Video mode rather than Photo mode. Of course, it’s a minor inconvenience to flip the switch once Camera is launched, but I think that the applications (Photo and Video) are different enough that they could warrant two different access points. I moved Settings up to row 2 because I don’t use it as much, and I like the more frequently-used apps toward the bottom of the Home screen, closer to my thumbs. Then there’s Clock, Maps and Voice Memos. I know the Voice Memos icon gets a lot of crap, and it might seriously damage my reputation to say this out loud, but I don’t mind it at all. I actually quite like it. It’s got the element of HAL 9000 and the classic mic is pretty handsome. Haters, stand down. Of course, Voice Memos is the least-used of all apps on my Home screen and has even caused sync errors, but I like to know it’s there in case I need to record myself whistling or something. It happens. Row 3, I get custom. Pianist has been where it is since my first iPhone. I certainly don’t use it that often, but it makes me feel warm and comfy to know there’s a keyboard within reach at all times. Is that cheesy? Yeah, it’s cheesy. But if having a keyboard on my Home screen and piano tie around my neck for even the least formal of gatherings is wrong, then I don’t want to be right. Next to it is tumblr, but a Web Clip to the tumblr Dashboard in Safari, not the actual official tumblr iPhone app (which lives on page 2). I like the tumblr iPhone app, but I like the Dashboard in Safari just a little bit better for its access to every feature of the Dashboard, not just the major ones. And I’m on my tumblr Dashboard constantly, almost as much as Twitter. Then there are my two favorite Twitter clients: Tweetie and Birdfeed. I use them for different purposes, really. When Birdfeed came out, I switched to it as my full-time go-to client, but I still use Tweetie for quick things, like searching, checking recent updates, and looking at images. Birdfeed feels really good to use, so I’ll go to it when I know I’m going to be reading for a while. They are both so wonderful and I want very much for neither of the developers to hate me because both apps are made by wonderful, brilliant people, one of who recently put me up in his apartment for three nights. Dictionary, I started using because it has a Thesaurus and I need synonyms as often as I need definitions (prior to that, I was using the also-capable Dictionaire). Wikipanion serves my hunger for knowledge, and I have a tiny brain that fills up fairly quickly, so I enjoy having wikipedia close by at all times. Instapaper, I consider a close second as a contender for the best iPhone App in the World, beat out only by Shazam, which I still consider magic and possibly the reason the iPhone was made and possibly developed secretly by Apple itself in order to most efficiently and directly convey the AHA! experience of the iPhone. I have no inside information to back this up, it’s just a theory. And last, an app near to my heart, an app with what I consider the prettiest icon of them all, an app I spent 5 months developing with my partner Cameron Hunt, Birdhouse. Sure, I swell with pride a little bit every time I see it there on my Home screen. Sure I love to touch it and to stare at it in a dark room because it manages to appear to be three dimensional in a way I’ve never seen in any other app’s icon. Also, it’s a great app. It’s a notepad for Twitter. I use it often. Your readers might enjoy it, too. Then there’s the Dock. Nothing special there, just the usuals. I enjoy using Safari for looking at sites on the web. --- ### Alex Payne URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/alex-payne Bio: Alex Payne is Platform Lead at Twitter, where he develops services that enable programmers to build atop the popular social messaging service. Alex has previously built web applications for political campaigns, non-profits, and early-stage startups, and supported information security efforts for military and intelligence customers. In his free time, Alex studies, speaks, and writes about the history, present use, and evolution of programming languages, as well as minimalist art and design. Apps on this home screen: Foursquare, Groceries, Things, Tweetie, Yelp I’m as surprised as anyone that after all the success of the App Store, most of what’s on my home screen are apps that Apple provides. Essentially, what I keep there are tools for planning my time, navigating, and communicating. I’m tentative about foursquare, which hasn’t proven particularly useful but is fun to update. I’d also prefer not to have Yelp on my home screen, but I do use often enough to warrant the placement. Tweetie 2, Groceries, and Things are all brilliant examples of the best of what an iPhone app can be and I couldn’t have them anywhere other than up front. Trainspotters may note that I keep my apps alphabetized. --- ### Armin Vit URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/armin-vit Bio: Born and raised in Mexico City, Armin is a graphic designer and writer now living in Austin, Texas. He has written for AIGA’s VOICE, Emigre, Eye, Creative Review, HOW, and STEP magazines, among others. He is a former faculty member of Portfolio Center and currently teaches at the School of Visual Arts. He has lectured on topics ranging from typography to branding in locations ranging from San Diego to Berlin. He is co-founder of UnderConsideration and its myriad sites. His last employment position was at Pentagram. He now runs UnderConsideration’s Department of Design. Apps on this home screen: Facebook, Google, Labyrinth, Weather Channel, Twitterrific, WhatTheFont The usual suspects are there, but I rearranged them based on where I can put my finger the quickest. The camera icon, for example, is isolated at the top corner so that I can whip out the iPhone and take yet another adorable picture of my daughter without missing a beat. I have two weather forecasts, because you can never trust a single source. Twitter and Facebook are next to each other, since they go together like peanut butter and jelly. The WhatTheFont app is right up front for any on-the-go type identification needs. And at the end of the home screen is the addictive Labyrinth game, which I think is one of the best showcases of the iPhone’s ability to make simple games newly fun. --- ### Benjamin De Cock URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/benjamin-de-cock Bio: Benjamin is a freelance software interface designer from Belgium specializing in iOS and web applications. When not pushing pixels on Fireworks, you’ll probably find him Tweeting random geeky things or Dribbbling shots. Apps on this home screen: Gowalla, Reeder, Things, Tweetie I love to keep my homescreen light and uncluttered. I used to display only applications with great icons but that was… well, idiotic. I’m pretty happy with the following selection since I use almost all of them daily. --- ### Bryony Gomez-Palacio URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/bryony-gomez-palacio Bio: For Bryony, life seems like one endless trip. Having lived in Mexico City, Atlanta, Chicago, New York and now Austin you can usually spot her as the one with the camera and the multiple questions. Curiosity, determination and passion are what define her work and her unique approach. Creativity and the brain being key interests, she lectures and conducts workshops on the subject around the country. She is co-founder of UnderConsideration and the notorious Speak Up, The Design Encyclopedia, Brand New and most recently Quipsologies. Currently, she divides her time running UnderConsideration’s Department of Design, writing books, and pursuing her own ventures. All of this while taking care of daughter Maya. Apps on this home screen: EccoNote, Facebook, Free RSS, Weather Channel, Twitterrific What is there to say about my main screen? It is basic, similar to millions of others and it reveals nothing about me - just the way I like it. Should you have access to my personal belongings then I would give you access to the more revealing applications I conceal behind the second and third screens. --- ### Buzz Andersen URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/buzz-andersen Bio: Buzz Andersen is the author of PodWorks, Cocoalicious, and other assorted Macintosh software. Before leaving to go indie, he worked on Mac OS X and Soundtrack Pro at Apple. He now lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where he develops iPhone software. His latest project is Birdfeed, a very nice Twitter client for your iPhone. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, CityTransit, Foursquare, Simplenote I debated submitting my home screen here because I feel it’s a bit light on third party apps compared to a lot of other people’s phones. A big reason for this is that I’m an adherent to the “empty bottom row” philosophy of Springboard organization. I like this approach mainly because it’s easier for me to find stuff when my brain doesn’t have to process quite so many icons, but also because it’s nice having an empty space for swiping. All of that said, I do think the four third party apps on my home screen say a lot about me. First off, I’m sure it’s not surprising to see Birdfeed occupying a coveted dock position, since it’s my own app. It’s also by far my most frequently used app, which is helpful, since I’m always running a bleeding edge build and if I’ve broken something or left a feature in an incomplete state, I’m punished by having to live with it until I fix it. Number two on my frequently used list would have to be Foursquare. I live in New York City, Foursquare’s birthplace and headquarters, and one of the best things about being here is access to one of the greatest food and drink cultures in the world. The city is constantly changing, and consequently discovering (and bragging about) the latest and greatest experience is a bit of an obsession for New Yorkers. I suspect that’s a big part of the reason Foursquare is gaining a lot of popularity here. I think it says a lot about how integrated into my life Foursquare has become that I just spent two weeks in Hawaii (where there is no Foursquare) and had to constantly ignore my reflex to check in at restaurants. The next app is another bit of what my friend Kellan and I call “New York-ware”: CityTransit, a nice NYC subway map app by my friends and fellow New York iPhone developers, Magnetism Studios. It’s nicely designed, and easy to use with one hand when you’re carrying a grocery bag or holding onto a subway pole. Lastly, we have Simplenote. I find that the iPhone is an ideal note taking device, but I’m not a huge fan of its standard Notes app. It’s mostly an aesthetic issue, I guess (I’m not such a fan of the Marker Felt font and the faux legal pad design), but Simplenote, with its unfussy, native design, just feels better to me. Also, Simplenote does have one killer feature that is missing from Notes: synchronization of your notes to an equally simple-but-nice web service. In the past I’ve tried other apps, such as Evernote, that provide a similar service, but found them all to be a bit heavy feeling and inelegant. For my needs, Simplenote is just right (although, note to Birdhouse guys: if you were to make a general note-taking app like Birdhouse, I would buy it in a second). --- ### Chris Bowler URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/chris-bowler Bio: Chris Bowler is a Christian, a husband and father of five, and a co-founder of Fusion Ads. He loves software, good design, strong, black coffee and simple country living. He produces typos at log.chrisbowler.com and wastes too much time on Twitter. Apps on this home screen: Bible, FlipTime, OmniFocus, Simplenote, Tumblr, Tweetie As a Shawn Blanc disciple, I also don’t like a full home screen. So I keep the bottom row clear and filled the Dock with the 3 apps that I spend the most time on. For most of the past two years, I only owned an iPod Touch and used the device more for entertainment than business. But as the need for cell access increased, I finally plunged into a 3 year contract and upgraded. I have to say that I previously was of the opinion that a Touch was an iPhone without the phone. However, having access to a network at all times - rather than just when in wifi range - has made more of a difference than I had imagined. It really increases the usability of the device and lends weight to the iPhone as a satellite device to my main working computer. Although I sometimes toy with the idea of ordering my apps by color or function, the librarian in me will not allow it. Alphabetical it has to be. Bible: the iPhone version of the web app YouVersion, this app allows me to read the Bible when I need unexpectedly and has my yearly reading plan included. It is well thought out application overall. Camera: Another aspect of the iPhone that the Touch owner in me did not appreciate. I take a lot more photos now, because the best camera really is the one that is with you all the time. Calendar: this app is the one that first made me fall in love with the platform and admire what a great job Apple had done. Flicking through the slot machine interface when creating a new appointment time was my “Aha” moment. Ego: the essential narcissistic inclusion. Garrett Murray is a genius for putting all the stats in one spot, and I use this on my iPod rather than looking at numbers in my desktop browser. Fliptime: when my iPod is sitting on my desk beside me as I work, this is always running. It’s attractive and useful in its simplicity and is probably my most used app. OmniFocus: I was a faithful user of Things for the past couple of years, but I switched to OmniFocus because of the ability to nest tasks. And when I’m out of the office, the @errands context is my best friend. Safari: I actually don’t surf the web much on the device. I only use it as my feed reader, loading the great mobile interface for Greader. I just haven’t found a feed reader that suits me. Simplenote: As a faithful Yojimbo user, I needed something to fill the void on my iPod - this is it. Plus, it has great ads. Tumblr: It’s partly the engine for my personal site, partly a feed reader (for the Tumblr sites I follow). It’s also likely another big reason I don’t use mobil Safari a lot. Tweetie: the Twitter client that defined Twitter clients. Indispensable on my Mac and iPhone ... I can’t wait for the desktop version to catch up with the iPhone version. I feel for Android users who have to use something other than Tweetie. Voice Memos: This is a capability I always wished my 1st gen Touch could do. There’s nothing worse than having inspiration strike in the middle of a run. Now I can talk to myself. Weather: I always like to know the forecast, even for places I don’t live. It’s weird, but I indulge in this whim. And the apps in my Dock, the ones I use the most when away from my Macbook: iPod: Well, it is an iPod after all. Music is a big part of every day for me and I love the entire iTunes ecosystem. Phone: The phone in iPhone. As a recent newbie to the iPhone, I’m still amazed at how well Apple designed this part of the package. The phone application is simply intuitive and fun to use. Mail: I use this constantly to stay on top of customer inquiries and team updates. But I usually wait until I’m on the laptop to reply. A few other apps that almost make the home screen: Birdhouse, Clock, Dropbox, Fare City, GeoDefense, Nike + iPod, Orbital, and everything from Tapbots (see, alphabetical). Overall, my iPhone is very much a satellite device. It hasn’t changed my computing experience the way it has for many iPhone owners, who can go days without their primary computing device. But it’s definitely the best satellite device I’ve ever used and perfectly fills the entertainment role in my life. I’m so curious to see if the iPad take that place for someone like me. --- ### Christina Warren URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/christina-warren Bio: Christina Warren is a writer, speaker and podcaster (and sometimes vodcaster). She is a Staff Writer for Mashable.com, where she covers social media, technology culture, mobile news and of course, Apple. She’s also a contributing editor to AMC Entertainment’s Script To Screen Blog, where she covers movie news, rumors and behind-the-scenes info. She’s also the resident News Girl for Dan Benjamin’s podcast, The Conversation at 5by5.tv and a talking head on AMC’s Script To Screen Video Podcast. Christina makes geek chic. Apps on this home screen: Birdbrain, Camera Genius, Dropbox, Ember, Fever, HippoRemote, Kindle, Simplenote, TripDeck, Tweetie I’ve started doing something new with my iPhone home screen this year - I’m trying to keep changing it more frequently, based on what’s going on in my life and what kinds of apps I find myself most accessing while on-the-go. The upside is that more stuff is accessible without scrolling. The downside is that I often forget where something is because I’ve memorized the old location. My dock is pretty standard - Phone, Mail (my most used program), Safari and the App Store. I end up reviewing a lot of iPhone apps and keeping the App Store in my dock lets me download updates, check for alternatives, etc. In going with my new plan of eschewing apps I don’t use much, I’ve moved many of the built-in apps to the second page. This includes Weather, Compass, Voice Notes, iPod, Photos, iTunes, Stocks and Calculator. It’s just as easy for me to go the the second page and get to that stuff. Still, Messages, Calendar (another frequently used program) and Contacts are all at the top of my phone. I’ve replaced the standard Camera application with Camera Genius because I like the extra options and it pretty much has the same features as the Photos app and Camera Roll built-in. I like having the Settings easy to access, because I often find myself turning stuff like WiFi on and off, depending on the connection with my crappy Wireless-G router at my house. I hate that I can’t use my iPhone with Wireless-N on my Airport Extreme. Maps is one of those apps that’s just indispensable, and one of the best mobile implementations of a mapping app around. Based on Gruber’s constant accolades, I tried Simplenote last year and fell in love. It’s replaced Notes as my go-to Note taking app. The fact that I can sync it with my Mac makes it that much better, because I like the option of working on stuff from multiple places without a lot of mess. I really appreciate a good built-in alarm application and Clock more than fits the bill. One of my most long-standing beefs with my BlackBerry (yes, I was a Mac using CrackBerry addict before finally relenting and agreeing to give AT&T money just so I could have an iPhone) was that you could only have one alarm clock at a time. That’s crazy. I love having multiple alarms for different purposes that I can turn on and off. TripDeck is a fairly new member of my Home Screen, mostly because I’ve got a few trips coming up and it’s a really good way to keep track of everything in one place. It syncs with TripIt, has a trip-wide note system, a great interface and will do plane arrival status checks. When I’m not traveling, it’ll likely move to another page. Fever is my RSS reader of choice. Google Reader is fine, but I cover tech news and movie news. Think about that for a second. Just one of those categories is total overload, but both? If I didn’t have something like Fever that could sort stuff for me, I would be in no-way as productive. I’ve really become hooked on Amazon’s Kindle app. I don’t have a Kindle myself (and don’t plan on getting one unless they do actually give them to Amazon Prime members for free), but the ease of buying and consuming books is really terrific. I can’t wait to use the iPad and both the Kindle app and the iBooks app to really start reading more. Dropbox is a big part of my personal productivity system and I like to have files and info on my various Macs accessible from my phone. HippoRemote is hands-down my favorite remote control app for the iPhone. I’ve tried about a dozen of them and lots and lots of them are great, but HippoRemote is really slick. It also works well with Windows 7 Media Center, which my fiance uses to power the projector screen in his office - so it’s a total Home Screen stalwart. Ember was a bit pricey ($10) when I bought it, but if you want to access 37Signals Campfire from your phone, it’s the way to go. We use Campfire at Mashable and this app makes it possible for me to check in or leave a quick note when away from my primary computer. Birdbrain was actually an app I discovered after reading Tim Van Damme’s First & 20 profile and I love it. I long ago set-up a rule to archive and move any of my Twitter new follower notifications and this is a great way for me to see who has followed me/unfollowed me, retweeted things I’ve said, etc. Love it. Tweetie almost goes without comment. It’s still the best Twitter client around and I love it. It’s just fantastic. --- ### Craig Hockenberry URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/craig-hockenberry Bio: Craig Hockenberry has been working with images and software for over 30 years. He is currently a principal at the Iconfactory, a company that has been changing the face of the computer desktop since 1996. Their work includes the design & production of icons for Microsoft, Apple, Adobe and other leading software companies. He’s also responsible for the secret control panels at Iconfactory.com, a website that gives away about 2 terabytes of pixels every month, and keeps many fellow designers informed and entertained. He also loves writing cool software, and thinks that Cocoa and Quartz (for the desktop and iPhone) and Ruby and Rails (for the web) are the greatest things since sliced bread. In past lives, Craig has built robots, processed satellite imagery, and created effects filters for Photoshop. Apps on this home screen: Groceries, NetNewsWire, PCalc, Ramp Champ, Twitterrific, WeatherBug The built-in Weather app is functional, but lacks any great detail. Hence WeatherBug, which despite a clumsy UI gives me the information I want. Likewise, PCalc replaces the built-in calculator with a MUCH better version. I love RPN and use the hexadecimal mode often. I do most of the cooking in our family, so Groceries makes it very easy for me to stay on top of what we need in the kitchen. It’s also responsible for quite a few messy fingerprints :-) NetNewsWire is getting a little long in the tooth, but I know that Brent is working on a new version. Can’t wait to see it! (I beta tested version 1.0 before we had Ad Hoc provisioning.) The bottom row is apps that we’ve written. Twitterrific, of course. Then there’s a small web app I call “Laguna” that displays the local surf and dive conditions and shows the webcam of Main Beach in Laguna Beach, CA. Ramp Champ is for beta testing. Yeah, that’s it. I’m beta testing. All the time. Testing. Testing. Testing. And trying to test the fricken’ black ducks in Clown Town. Pickin’ Time is still a secret. An awesome one, at that. --- ### Craig Mod URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/craig-mod Bio: Craig Mod is a writer, designer, publisher and developer concerned with the future of publishing & storytelling. He is co-author of Art Space Tokyo, an intimate guide to the Tokyo art world. He is also co-founding editor and engineer behind TPUTH.com, co-founder and developer of the storytelling project Hitotoki, and frequent collaborator with Information Architects, Japan. He’s lived in Tokyo for almost a decade. Which is why his iPhone screen says ‘Softbank.’ Apps on this home screen: Birdbrain, Gmail App, Google Reader, Japanese, Instapaper, Simplenote, TiltShift, Tweetie, Web Trend Map 90% of activity on my phone takes place in Tweetie, SMS or Gmail. I don’t use iPhone’s Mail.app at all. I’m too addicted to Gmail’s threading and Softbank’s delivery of mail to Mail.app I find unreliable. Here in Japan we can map an email address to our SMS address. It works great and you get reliable, instant push notifications. It also lets me keep phone correspondence and Gmail correspondence happily separate. Tabelog (2nd row from top, 2nd from right) is another app I use daily. It’s basically Yelp for Japan with a very efficient interface. You can do a quick scan of your surrounding for any hidden cafe or bar gems tucked away down easily overlooked alleys. Japanese is the worlds best, worst named Japanese dictionary application. I’m a word lover so I’m constantly looking for proper Japanese analogs to my favorite English phrases, and this app never fails to deliver. Also, it’s a goldmine of bizarre Japanese nuggets like, 脱がせ屋 (“nugaseya”) ― ‘persons who convince female celebrities to pose nude for photoshoots.’ Birdbrain I use to spy on my followers ― who’s recently followed or unfollowed me. WTM is the iPhone edition of webtrendmap.com’s trending topics. TiltShiftGen is a great photo app that I use for brightness / contrast / saturation adjustments to photos. It also lets you, as the name implies, produce those tilt-shifty style thin-line-of-focus images. Weathernews is a probably the best Japanese weather app (that I’ve been able to find anyway). Instapaper is always loaded with a dozen new articles for the rare train ride I find myself on. And Google Reader is just that. I’ve tried a couple native RSS readers but, again, I’m a Google UX whore ― I just like Google’s usability flow better than any native app. And I don’t have to worry about syncing. --- ### Dan Lyons URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dan-lyons Bio: Dan Lyons is a technology columnist at Newsweek and the creator of Fake Steve Jobs, the persona behind The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, a leading technology blog. Before joining Newsweek, Lyons spent 10 years at Forbes. Over the past 25 years Lyons has written for a wide range of publications, including the New York Times Magazine, GQ and many technology trade publications. Apps on this home screen: Facebook, Google, Remote My fave apps in no particular order are Facebook, Camera, Remote and Google Maps. I must confess I don’t spend a lot of time downloading new apps and looking around for apps. I love the video capability in the new iPhone 3GS, and use it constantly - I’m always making movies of my kids. (We have 4-yr-old twins.) It’s great to have a video camera right in your pocket whenever you need it. --- ### Dan Mall URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dan-mall Bio: Dan Mall is an award-winning interactive art director, designer, and developer. He is an enthralled husband, Senior Designer at Big Spaceship, technical editor for A List Apart, and former singer/keyboard player for contemporary-Christian band Four24. Dan writes about design and other issues on Twitter and his industry-recognized site, danielmall.com. Apps on this home screen: Amazon, CityTransit, Harvest, HopStop, Pianist, Rolando, Weather Channel, Tweetie, Urban Daddy In general, my home screen is set up with the apps I use most. The next screens’ app usage drops significantly. Here are the ones I use regularly: --- ### Dan Moren URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dan-moren Bio: Dan Moren is a Senior Associate Editor at Macworld, where he writes about the Mac, the iPhone, and all things Apple. In the spare time that he finds under the sofa cushions, he also writes (yet-unpublished) novels, plays games, and does a killer Sean Connery impression. Apps on this home screen: BeejiveIM, NetNewsWire, Remote, Rowmote, Tweetie, WeatherBug Home is where your apps are-or so Apple would have you believe. For me, the apps that I usually want to access quickly reside at the four corners of the screen, so I can pull them up practically without looking. I don't text a whole lot-unlike my fifteen year old cousin who can crank out what seems like a couple hundred in a day-but I do so enough that Messages needs to be on the home screen. If for no other reason than to be able to clear that annoying red badge. As I pretty much always have my iPhone with me, I guess that means it's the best camera I've got. So whether it's snapping a shot of my cousin's kids or recording a video of my friends' wacky hikjinks, it pays to have quick access to the Camera app (and for all of that, I still wish it started up faster). Photos is for showing off pictures or, more commonly, e-mailing iPhone screenshots to myself. Phone-I mean, it's right there in the name, isn't it? Usually, I'm fielding calls from my mom (hi, mom!) or trying to find contact information, but every once in a while, I actually make a phone call. (Sadly, that phone call is usually to navigate the treacherous reaches of a robot-voiced phone tree.) Sure, Settings isn't exactly sexy, but as someone who constantly has to fool around with settings, whether it be to check where a particular feature resides or to make sure to switch on Airplane Mode, I figured it was worthwhile to give it a permanent home on the dock. My other two dock applications are Mail (because I check my work and personal accounts constantly), and Safari for (mainly for looking up facts on IMDB or Wikipedia). Like my friend Adam Engst, I'm a bit of weather aficionado-comes from living mostly in places where it seems to change at the drop of a hat. I actually just installed WeatherBug Elite after seeing it on his home screen-it replaced AccuWeather.com, which has some good functionality, but an absolutely terrible interface. I still keep Apple's default Weather app around, though, for when I just want a quick glance at the current temperature or the week's forecast. Regardless of whether I'm traveling or at home Maps is indispensable and, despite all the nifty things that have come later, still one of the most-used programs on my iPhone. When I'm traveling, Clock makes sure that I wake up in time to make my flight or show up at a press event. I don't use the iPod application that much since I still carry a 30GB fifth-generation iPod with me most places (Crazy? Well, it's easier to use without having to peel off my gloves in the cold winter air, and it holds all of my music). That said, I've been using my iPhone's media features more, especially since I can easily download music and podcasts via the built-in iTunes application. There are a number of apps on my home screen that are related to work. NewsGator's NetNewsWire Premum lets me keep up with my RSS feeds when I'm on the move. As someone who writes a lot about iPhone apps, I'm always downloading new problems from the App Store. As the only East Coast member of the Macworld editorial team, I use IM to keep in touch with my far-flung colleagues and BeejiveIM is unquestionably the best instant-messaging app around. Calendar tracks both my personal appointments and work schedule, and it's synced with both BusyCal on my Mac and Google Calendar. Twitter is my social network of choice, and Tweetie the best way to use it. I was a die-hard Twitterrific user for the longest time, though, and the blue bird still resides on my second home screen. And finally, some pure relaxation. At home I have a Mac mini hooked up to a stereo system and 40-inch HDTV. I use Apple's Remote to control iTunes on the mini and Evan Schoenberg's Rowmote Pro to control just about everything else, such as the Plex media center app and DVD Player. Of course, there are 47 other applications on my iPhone right now, and I try out new ones practically every day-making them fight for my amusement, striving to win a place on the coveted home screen or die trying. Really, when you think about it, it's a bit like gladiator fights in ancient Rome. Except, I guess, with fewer lions. --- ### Dan Rubin URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dan-rubin Bio: Dan Rubin is a published author, teacher and practitioner of user interface design and web standards. When he isn’t busy Twittering, his work, writings, and various side projects can be explored in and around the vicinity of Sidebar Creative and SuperfluousBanter.org. Apps on this home screen: CameraBag, Flickr, Things, Tweetie I’ve been using and loving the iPhone since day one, and with the exception of moving YouTube and Stocks off the first page (and more recently Voice Memos), I prefer to keep the other default apps in their original, pre-3.0 positions - partly due to my belief that Apple got it right the first time, and also because if I move one of those apps at this point, I will invariably launch something I didn’t mean to. Things and Tweetie get the best access positions of any non-default app (closest to my right thumb) because I spend more time in them than any other app aside from Safari and Mail - they are also brilliantly designed, and their icons feel right at home with the Apple-designed defaults. Flickr mobile is one of my favorite iPhone-optimized sites, and I spend a lot of time on Flickr when I’m not Twittering, so the webclip gets some homescreen love. CameraBag remains one of my favorite apps, and of course not only do the Flickr webclip and CameraBag take the places of YouTube and Stocks respectively, but also give me four photography-related icons in close grouping. This makes me smile. As you can see from the 9 pages worth of apps, I have a bit of a problem with app consumption. It isn’t so much that I use all the apps and webclips I have installed, but more that I love having examples of great interface and icon design on my phone. The only true way to evaluate and experience the design of an app is to use it, and I can’t seem to get enough. That said, I can stop anytime I want - and if I can’t, I’m sure there’s an app for that… Speaking of having a million apps (alright, it’s more like 140 at this writing), it’s downright irresponsible of Apple not to have provided us with a way to reorganize our pages of apps via iTunes - including some sort of categorization. As it is, I’ve given up on dragging apps around and now use the new search feature in OS 3.0, which is now my favorite way of launching apps that don’t reside on pages one and two. While I’m bitching, I should also mention how ridiculous and unnecessary those diagonal stripes are on the Messages, Phone and iPod icons in OS 3.0. Perhaps whoever approved those changes also signed off on the Snow Leopard packaging… But I digress - there are a few other apps I use on a regular basis that deserve mention: I feel like I still need to list a few more apps, games (and one web app) that I love to use, and which I would recommend to anyone: Frenzic, Flight Control, Ramp Champ, Tap Tap Revenge 2, GoWalla, ConvertBot, Typography, and Neven Mrgan’s excellent Glyphboard deserve consideration by all - you should probably just add them to your iPhone now and get it over with. So there you have it, my 20 favorite iPhone apps at the moment - not a day goes by when I’m not amazed at what this little piece of the future can do, and as such it has secured the title of That Which Must Be Pried From My Cold, Dead Fingers. --- ### Daniel Brusilovsky URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/daniel-brusilovsky Bio: Daniel Brusilovsky is currently the founder and CEO of Teens in Tech Labs, a company dedicated to providing tools and resources to entrepreneurs world-wide. He also works at JESS3, a creative agency specializing in data visualization, working as a Strategist. Much like my iPhone, I take it almost everywhere I go. The way I look at it, I use my iPhone for quick tasks, my iPhone for tasks that take 10 or so minutes, and if a task takes longer then that, I’ll take out my laptop. Since the iPad was released, my biggest use has been with video. From Hulu, to Netflix, to YouTube, I consume it all on my iPad, usually before I go to bed. And when I wake up, I use the iPad to consume the morning news. It comes very handy, especially on the weekends when I am especially lazy. I keep my iPad very organized. All of my apps are pretty much all in folders, except for Calendar, YouTube, Contacts, Settings, and the iPod apps. In my dock, I keep Mail, Safari, Flipboard, Outpost, App Store, and Twitter. I try to keep my iPad very basic, and organized. --- ### Dave Caolo URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dave-caolo Bio: Dave Caolo is an editor and lead blogger at The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW.com). He lives on Cape Cod, MA with his wife, dog, rabbit and two kids under 7. Despite this, his heart still beats for Scranton, Pennsylvania, home of anthracite coal, Dunder Mifflin and the best damn chili dogs you’ll ever eat. You can find Dave’s personal blog at davecaolo.com. Apps on this home screen: Billings, Birdhouse, Daylite, Outside, Trip Cubby, Twitterrific, WriteRoom When you add an app to your iPhone, the audition process has only begun. The apps that get used most frequently eventually migrate to the first page for quick access. The most beloved among those chosen few are clustered towards the center of the screen where they’re easiest to reach. As a righty, the far left hand column is the most difficult to reach (I have short thumbs), so the least-often used among the front page apps are placed there. I’ve been using an iPhone since launch day in the US, and I’ve always kept the bottom row empty. Otherwise it’s just too crowded. On my iPhone’s home screen, the apps I have are: Messages: For years I failed to see the point of text messages. I mean, it’s a phone. Sending a text message with a phone seemed like sitting at a desk with a typewriter, lifting the whole thing up in the air, dipping it into an ink well and using it to write on a sheet of paper. Then I learned how efficient it is to send a message that doesn’t warrant a phone call. “En route to gymnastics pickup.” “Will call at 6:00.” “Under something heavy. Please send paramedics.” I’m a convert. Calendar: As a happy MobileMe customer, I sync iCal across my two computers, my wife’s iPod and my own iPhone. It does exactly what I need it to do reliably and I’ve found no reason to replace it. Photos and camera: These apps are indispensable for me. I take photos of the typical things like my kids, pets and local scenery, but these apps are so much more useful than that. I shoot phone numbers and business cards. My location in Boston parking garages. Gift ideas. While waiting for a sandwich I once shot a two-page article in a magazine for later reading. Having a tiny camera in your pocket at all times is tremendously handy and goes far beyond snapshots with a little thought. Outside: We spend a lot of time outdoors. Geocaching, swimming at the beach, hiking and otherwise distracting the kids. It’s great to get information like the UV index (should we pack sun block?), predicted amount of precipitation, sunset time and so on. Plus, it looks so darn good. If only they’d add a high and low tide chart, it’d be perfect. Maps: Of all the available apps, Maps is the most like magic. I’ve used it to find coffee shops, get travel directions (both on foot and in the car), look up phone numbers and more. Before traveling, I bookmark points of interest so I’ll have them ready to go before I even arrive. I love it. Birdhouse: When Birdhouse was introduced, I thought it was a practical joke. Twitter for writers? Surely they’re putting me on. But now I get it. Twitter demands brevity, and brevity requires creativity. It often takes effort to convey a thought in 140 characters, and Birdhouse allows me to capture the idea while I’ve got it and save it for further refining. Plus, one-liners like “Now is the printer of my discontent” don’t just happen. Twitterrific: I’ve tried nearly every iPhone Twitter client there is, and Twitterrific has come out on top. It’s beautiful, handles multiple accounts and does what I want in a way that I enjoy. Daylite: From blogging at TUAW to supporting Mac-friendly businesses here on Cape Cod to managing a family of five, there’s a lot to keep track of. Daylite is the project management solution that works for me. I’ve got Daylite Server running on an old G4 iMac which syncs to my MacBook Pro and iPhone. It’s tremendous to be miles away from home with access to all of my projects, actions, files and more. Billings Touch: When out on support calls, it’s so very handy to start a new timed project right where I stand. Plus, it’s fun to see those little bar graphs climb as I earn more. Finally, Wi-Fi sync with the desktop version on my MacBook Pro “just works.” WriteRoom: WriteRoom is a part of a solution that starts on my MacBook Pro. I’m using Notational Velocity to create and store notes and bits of text, which SimpleText then syncs with WriteRoom. This combination has been tremendously useful. I can take notes at a meeting with either my computer or iPhone and know that both will be kept in sync. Notational Velocity has such powerful search features that finding exactly what I want is incredibly easy, just as it is with WriteRoom. The combination of these three apps is irreplaceable. Trip Cubby: My work requires that I keep track of mileage, which Trip Cubby makes simple. Previously I used a pen and paper which I often lost or left in the house when I needed it. Trip Cubby lets me track every inch I drive, backs up to App Cubby and lets me export all of my data to a .csv file. I wouldn’t want to track mileage without it. In the dock I’ve got Phone (the app I use the least, actually), Mail, Safari and iPod. Of those four, Mail and iPod see near constant use. --- ### Dave Pell URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/dave-pell Bio: Dave Pell writes Tweetage Wasteland, Confessions of an Internet Superhero. He has created several sites including Addictomatic and has invested in and/or advised more than fifty startups. He lives in San Francisco with his wife and two kids all of whom are significantly more attractive than he is. Apps on this home screen: Balloonimals, DIRECTV, Google, GrubHub, NFL Superfan, NPR Addict, NYTimes, SalesCast, Tweetie My first reaction to most technology is to ask the question: How can this further enable me to go home and watch more television? This philosophy is represented on my home screen by the DirecTV App which allows me to schedule my DVR from anywhere in the world (translation, my couch or my chair) and the unthinkably wonderful NFL Superfan, which allows me to watch any NFL game on my phone. I keep my NFL app on my home screens during the off season to remind myself of the upcoming reward I’ll get for following just enough baseball and NBA action to pass myself off as a dude. The greatest icon on my home screen belongs to the newly released Splendora SalesCast app that gives me a curated list of the best sales from all the major private/flash sales on the web. The program was created by my wife. And what can I say, the lady gives good icon. I also have an icon that links to my own blog, Tweetage Wasteland. I never really use it, but it took me awhile to make and I’m pretty sure the only folks who have seen it are me and my friend Mordy. So it stays. GrubHub provides a list of all the restaurants that will deliver food to my current location at that very time. I am an investor in the company and an obsessive eater, so there is a pretty significant indentation in the glass above this icon. I use NPR Addict to listen to web streams of Terry Gross while joining the off-hour crowds for some buffet-as-sport action at my local Sizzler. I rarely read on my iPhone, but I’ll check out the NYT in a pinch. Balloonimals is one of my kids’ favorite games. They blow into the microphone to inflate the balloon and then shake it to get a animal shape. My only complaint about the envisioning of this tool is that most really young kids don’t blow, they spit. I’d recommend Balloonimals even more highly if it came with a roll of paper towel. I keep Google Earth on my home screen because I’ve convinced my son that I can use it to zero in on him and see what he’s doing no matter where he is. When I double-click the home button, Beyonce brings me a beer. --- ### David Chartier URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/david-chartier Bio: David Chartier is the Chief Media Producer for Agile Web Solutions (the 1Password folks) and a Macworld Contributor. He’s been around the tech writing block, and you can find his previous words at Ars Technica, Wired, TUAW, and Download Squad, where he got his start. David lives in Chicago, IL with his high school sweetheart of a wife and two delightfully intelligent blue heeler mix dogs. David writes about tech, culture, and subtlety at davebc.com, and tweets at @chartier. Apps on this home screen: 2Do, Attic, Evernote, Instapaper, MobileRSS, NPR News, NYTimes, Pastebot, Snapture, Tumblr, Things, Tweetie Home screen spiel: Like many of my peers, I consider the actual “phone” aspect of my iPhone to be a secondary feature, so I removed that app from the Dock. Since every app and its mother has a built-in browser now, I find that I need Safari less and less, so it got yanked too. My not-so-trusty Earphones with Remote and Mic (“a reliable source” tells me that Microsoft’s branding department got to moonlight on that one) let me control the iPod most of the time, so the only default app that got to stick around in my Dock is Mail. For the sake of muscle memory, I keep Phone, Safari, and iPod in their respective columns on the row just above the Dock. I don’t use most of Apple’s other built-in apps very much either, so I moved some that I use infrequently to the second page (App Store, Google Maps), and the others to the last page to get them entire out of the way. The other three apps that I keep constantly available in the Dock are 2Do, a non-boring task manager that syncs with iCal and other services, Tumblr, a great client for my favorite blogging service, and Tweetie, a very capable champion of the cut-throat iPhone Twitter client market. I also tied my Home button double-tap to the built-in camera, so I replaced the Camera app with Snapture, which has some handy photo tools and lets you selectively save shots. Four apps on my home screen are dedicated to reading, especially current events. I’m trying to read more away from my Mac, and that includes books (yes I pre-ordered an iPad Wi-Fi+3G) and politics. Instapaper is a great service (I use the Pro app) for saving stuff to read later, and lots of other apps work with it now; integration is rad. Mobile RSS Pro is a good, fast client for Google Reader, though I echo others’ sentiments in that the service still doesn’t have one or two truly knock-out clients yet. Evernote, for lack of a better non-marketing elevator pitch, really is a useful “external brain.” I collect shipping addresses, jot down story ideas, and collect links on the Mac client, then have easy OTA access to it all while I’m out. In addition to using 2Do, I use Things to collect more free-form projects and ideas that I don’t necessary need a Push Notification for. I always keep one or two new or experimental apps on my Home screen. Sometimes it’s a game, but right now it’s Attic and Pastebot. Attic is fun because I’m a music nut and it’s a blast to rediscover albums I haven’t touched in a while. I flipped on iTunes’ “fill this iPhone’s free space with random music” feature, and Attic became even cooler. It’s a truly clever app. Finally, I’m sure First & 20 readers have heard enough gushing about Pastebot, but that’s just too bad: it’s fantastic. It’s one of those apps which reminds me that we live in the future. I used it to paste my Home screen shot straight into this piece while drafting. It certainly isn’t my most-used app, but as far as the iPhone’s potential, utility, and pure “the wow is now!” factor, I can’t think of many better examples. --- ### David DeSandro URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/david-desandro Bio: David DeSandro is a front-end developer at nclud in Washington, DC. He runs a side-business, Metafizzy, developing delightful web resources. I’m not an iPhone power user. You can tell as my home screen resembles the default. Looking at it now, I’m wondering what Calculator, Photos, and iPod are doing there considering how infrequently I use them. Maps is my killer app. It’s my favorite reason for owning an iPhone. As such it gets premier placement in the corner office where bitchfaced Pete Campbell sometimes comes by and says something asinine and creepy. Maps just stars him down in a cloud a smoke. With vodka on his breathe, Maps makes a reply in three words that alludes to a solution for Pete, while simultaneously expressing a post-modern axiom that concisely explains 1960’s culture. I don’t like folders. Compared to grouping apps in pages, they are an ugly, less elegant solution. Sean Sperte knows what I’m talkin’bout. Black background is still the best. Backgrounds cause more clutter. --- ### David Kaneda URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/david-kaneda Bio: David Kaneda has over eight years of experience designing in a variety of fields, from architecture and fashion to education and software. He is the primary developer of jQTouch, a Javascript framework for iPhone development. David also maintains WebKitBits, a site about the browser engine in Safari, Google Chrome, and the iPhone. David currently serves as creative director at Ext, and is responsible for the look and feel of Ext’s websites, software, and community engagement. Apps on this home screen: Facebook, Things, Tumblr, Tweetie My iPhone is running 4.0, so it uses a background image - I’m currently using this excellent one from Marcelo Marfil. It’s important to find something dark and low contrast for this. With the apps, there’s something I like about keeping the home screen pretty default. That said, you’ve obviously got to break out here and there: Facebook - I tried taking this off my homescreen, but Facebook wouldn’t let me. Tweetie - Swoon. Everyone knows this rocks. Now Twitter. Things - The best to do app I’ve used to date, my only complaint being its dire, dire need for a cloud-based syncing method (I also use on my laptop and iPad). Tumblr - I run quite a few blogs on Tumblr, the biggest being 9-bits, WebKitBits, and Ext, so it’s nice to be able to check in on notes and comments pretty easily. In regard to the organization of apps: The first row is mostly communication, with the exception of Things - I explicitly set Tweetie and Things to be top-right as their my most active apps hitting and I find top right easiest to hit with my thumb when holding the phone (a bit anal, I know). The second row is Date/time and Photos. Third row is writing and live info, last row are the two stores. The dock is totally default. I’d feel remiss if I didn’t also mention just a few of my favorites past this screen as well, like Gowalla, Ego, Boxcar, and iTeleport. --- ### David Lanham URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/david-lanham Bio: David Lanham is a designer at the Iconfactory in Greensboro, NC where he designs and illustrates icons and user interfaces for apps and games. He also keeps up with his personal art and toy design on the side at dlanham.com. Apps on this home screen: Pickin' Time, Brushes, Frenzic, Ramp Champ, Tris, Things, Twitterrific For the most part I keep my home screens organized by type of application, with some screens only getting a row or two on them. The exception is the first screen though, where I like to keep a mixture of apps I use daily, apps I’ve worked on or am currently testing, or other generally useful apps like calculator so I know where to find them when I need them. For some reason I also despise having a fourth row of icons, I feel much more at peace when there room to breath between the apps and the dock. The fourth row is also the most constantly changing area of my iPod, I’ll move apps there that I’m currently working on, enjoying or like showing off. The dock has the apps that I open more than once a day, except mail which I quite like at the top left of the homescreen for easy access and the unread count doesn’t stick out as much. Music keeps me entertained and when I have wifi I’m most likely to be checking the web with Safari. Although I don’t tweet a ton, I often check Twitter with Twitterrific to keep in the loop on what’s happening. Then on the right of the dock, Things has all the lists of what I’m actually supposed to be doing instead of checking Twitter and browsing the web. In the main area of the homescreen I keep the ‘just in case I need them’ Apple apps, except for Clock which has my morning alarms in it and Photos where I keep test mockups and other pictures. Then there’s Tris on the end of the second row. It seems that no matter what other games I play, Tetris is just always great fun and I was lucky enough to get Tris before it left the App store. Unlike the official Tetris app, it loads quick and gets right to the game to most efficiently waste my time. The third row starts off with Brushes, which is a fairly new addition to my homescreen. I generally have my sketchbook with me so I haven’t really felt the need to use it, but I’m finding it a lot of fun to poke around some digital paint when I have a few minutes rather than breaking out a quick game. The last three apps are all games I’ve developed at the Iconfactory with the other designers and programmers there. Frenzic was developed with Artis Software and is in a similar vein as Tris as a quick and enjoyable puzzle game when I have only a few minutes that I want occupied. Ramp Champ and Pickin’ Time are not only fun games, but also what I launch when people ask me what I work on for the iPhone. And that’s my homescreen! --- ### Ethan Marcotte URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/ethan-marcotte Bio: I work as a Senior Designer at Happy Cog West who blogs occasionally and swears profusely on Twitter. Beep. Apps on this home screen: Eucalyptus, Kindle, Shazam, Things, Twitterrific, WordBook, Zen Bound In general, I only keep apps installed if I use them with some frequency. As an extension of that, I try to limit my home screen to the apps I use the most frequently. So while my home screen changes from time to time, this screenshot’s pretty representative of what’s usually on there. A few current favorites: --- ### Garrett Murray URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/garrett-murray Bio: I’m Garrett Murray. I make films, websites and, recently, iPhone apps. I guess I’m what you might call a workaholic. Years ago I wrote xPad. Apps on this home screen: AIM, Birdfeed, Byline, Ego, Things, Wikipanion The first thing I did a long time ago was move iPod from the dock to the top left of the screen. I send more text messages than I listen to music (which is saying a lot, since I listen to a lot of music). Otherwise, the dock is pretty standard. Turns out I do use Phone, Mail and Safari the most so it made sense to keep them there. Most of my home screen applications are first-party. I use Calendar daily, Photos sparingly (but I change my wallpaper frequently enough that I didn’t bother moving it) and Camera semi-regularly. I used to use Darkroom as my camera on my iPhone 3G, but when upgrading to the 3GS I wanted the video and focus features so I switched back to the standard Camera app. I use Clock as my alarm clock every day, and Maps and Weather nearly every day as well. Settings is there because ATT’s 3G coverage is not so good and I’m regularly switching it on and off when I’m out (it would be fantastic if someone could create a one-off app that did that, but I don’t think it’s possible). The third and fourth rows are where we get into my most-used third-party apps. Things, of course, is a great task manager and syncs with the desktop app. Wikipanion is a fantastic Wikipedia application with tons of amazing features I wish Apple would incorporate into Safari like a browsing queue and orientation locking. Byline is a simple but nice feed reader that synchronizes with Google Reader. Birdfeed is a fast and awesome little Twitter client by my friend Buzz Andersen. AIM Pro is, of course, Instant Messenger (without the ads). And, last but not least, the app I wrote, Ego, which allows you to check all your various web stats (Twitter, Mint, Feed Burner, Google Analytics, etc) all in a single glance. A little bonus info: The next (2nd) page of my home screen is all secondary apps. It contains things like the Facebook app, Deliveries (a great package tracker), iPhlix, Ninjawords and Birdhouse. The third page is all games, including FlightControl, HoldEm, StarDefense and more. And the fourth and last page is all non-essential apps like YouTube, Stocks, Remote and Compass. --- ### Harold Emsheimer URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/harold-emsheimer Bio: Harold Emsheimer is the designer behind Overcommitted, makers of iPhone OS applications like Ember, Tripmix and Skitzy. He lives in California with his wife and three kids. Apps on this home screen: Ember, Evernote, Gowalla, Groceries, Instapaper, Reeder, Tipulator, TomTom, Tripmix, Things, Tweetie My home screen stays pretty consistent with the exception of one or two spots that I use as a revolving door for my newest favorite app. The top row and dock are pretty standard. I’ve got the double-click-on-home-button gesture assigned to open the Camera app. Clock: I work remotely most of the time, but when I have to head into the office I set this baby to 4am to beat the traffic to SF. Tipulator: I used to wait tables in college and since then have always tried to tip well. Tipulator helps keep me on track. I notice when I pull this out the waiter normally cracks a smile. Groceries: Somehow between my house and the grocery store stuff falls out of my brain. Groceries helps me come home looking like a super star. Gowalla: I’ve caught the Gowalla bug. It’s one of my new favorites. It continues to get better with each release, I find it super useful to discover new places through friends. My kids love the scavenger hunt aspect of it. Things & Evernote: These help keep my life in order. Between them, I know what I need to work on next. TomTom: You have no idea how much I need this. Instapaper: Probably my most used app. I personally hate reading on a computer screen. I used to print out everything I wanted to read. Instapaper + iPhone changed all that. Thanks to Marco, Tree’s around the world rejoice. Reeder: This spot rotates my favorite RSS reader. Right now that’s Reeder. It’s fast, simple and plays nice with Instapaper (a must). Tweetie: I won’t bore you with another haiku praising Tweetie, you know it’s good. In fact you probably already have it. Tripmix: This is our app to play a road trip mix with a single click. I use it all the time. Randomly chooses an artist and plays 3 songs before moving onto the next. We wrapped it up nicely in retro interface. In fact, Tripmix is being featured in the App Store this week under New and Noteworthy. Ember: Another app by Overcommitted. It’s a client to use with 37signals’ group chat service, Campfire. We’re a remote team so we live in Campfire all day long. We built Ember for ourselves first, but other’s seem to find it quite useful. Apps I use often that didn’t make the home screen cut: TouchPad, Brushes, Ego, Hipstamatic, LiveView and all three Tapbots apps. --- ### James Thomson URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/james-thomson Bio: James Thomson is the developer of the PCalc calculator for the iPhone and Mac, as well as the veteran dock app DragThing. In a former life he used to work for Apple, but now he runs TLA Systems full time with his wife in Glasgow, Scotland. Apps on this home screen: AIM, BBC iPlayer, Facebook, File Magnet, PCalc, RedLaser, Skype, Twitterrific The two third-party apps I use the most are the official Facebook app and Twitterrific. Both are expertly tailored to the phone, and enable me to obsessively check up on what’s happening in the wider world. Typically, I use Facebook for keeping in touch with friends, and Twitter for more professional matters, but the lines between them are getting increasingly blurry at this point. I have AIM on there, until the very second an iPhone version of Adium is released. Sadly, other than my attempts to will it into existence, I don’t know that it’s coming anytime soon. I would also confess that I have never actually used Skype to place a real call from the phone, but I have it on my homescreen as a kind of telecommunications insurance policy. I use FileMagnet for storing a collection of useful text and PDF documents. I have an export of my DVD database, subway maps for a variety of cities, and so on. RedLaser is an amazing barcode scanning application. Even with the awful camera on my original iPhone, it easily scans any barcode I’ve thrown at it and produces a useful product description. The BBC iPlayer isn’t an app as such, but it’s still very useful. It’s a link to the BBC’s video on demand service - think Hulu with a British accent. Finally - and I know it looks like blatant product placement - but I really do have both versions of PCalc. I do development using my phone, and it’s much easier having them both on there than having to scroll to some random page when I want to test the Lite version. --- ### Jason Hiner URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/jason-hiner Bio: Jason Hiner is the Editor in Chief of TechRepublic, where he manages the editorial department and writes the blog Tech Sanity Check and hosts the weekly podcast “The Big Question.” Before joining TechRepublic in 2001, he worked in IT for a successful startup in the healthcare industry. You can find him on Twitter as @jasonhiner. Apps on this home screen: B&N eReader, Evernote, Facebook, Flickr, Google, Kindle, Tweetie My home screen is pretty fluid. I regularly move icons out and move new ones in. My general rule of thumb for putting something on my home screen is that it needs to be an app that I use daily or one that I want to access quickly. As for the Dock at the bottom, I keep my most valuable apps there. Mail and Tweetie are the two that I use the most. I run both my work mail and my personal mail through the Mail app. Tweetie is by far my favorite Twitter app. I’ve experimented with almost all of them – Birdfeed, Twitterific, Tweetdeck, Twittelator, etc. – and I always come back to Tweetie. I also keep the Phone app on my Dock (for quick access) and I keep the iPod app there because I regularly listen to lots of audiobooks and podcasts. My top row is for utilities – Calendar, Weather, Maps, and Clock. I don’t use all of these every day but they are all valuable enough that I want them there so I don’t have to go looking for them when I want them. My second row is for photography stuff – Camera, Photos, and Flickr – with the Settings app being a spillover from the utilities row on top. The next two rows are the most dynamic. These are the ones where I move apps in and out a lot. The Google app has been moved out and moved back in several times. Same with the Facebook app. The app I use the most from these rows is the Amazon Kindle app and that’s why it’s in the bottom right, the fastest spot to access with your thumb, for a right-hander. I never thought I’d want to read books on this screen, but I do. That’s why I also keep the Barnes and Noble app right above the Kindle app. I don’t use it as much, but the B&N store has some ebook titles that aren’t available in the Kindle store. My other favorite app in this area is Evernote, which is a journalist’s dream. I recently used Evernote on the iPhone to take notes at an off-site interview. By the time I got back to my desk Evernote had already synced my notes and they were ready for me to pull up from the Evernote Windows app. --- ### Jason Snell URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/jason-snell Bio: Jason Snell is editorial director of Macworld, publishers of Macworld magazine, Macworld.com and Mac OS X Hints.com. He’s been covering the Mac for 15 years. Apps on this home screen: Accuweather, AIM, Instapaper, MLB At Bat, Slingplayer, Things, Twitterrific I don’t like crowded home screens, so I try to leave the last row on every screen blank. I’ve set up my first screen to give me quick access to the stuff I might need on a moment’s notice, including Safari, Mail, and the Camera app. Maps and Weather (in my case, the AccuWeather app rather than Apple’s) are musts, as is Settings. Beyond that, I’ve been taking advantage of AIM’s push notifications feature, so it’s moved to the home screen - for now. I use Cultured Code’s Things as a to-do list manager only in fits and starts on my iPhone, but it’s still clinging to a spot. Similarly, I use SlingPlayer enough that it resides on the home screen, but like Things, it’s in line to be knocked off as soon as something else takes its place. (I actually play a couple of games all the time on my iPhone, but have opted to file all my games on a single screen rather than migrating the faves out to page one.) Firmly ensconced on my home screen is MLB At Bat 2009, with live scores and game audio and video, and Instapaper, where I store all sorts of web pages to read when I’m on the go. And of course Twitterrific gets a coveted place in my Dock, next to Calendar. --- ### Jeff Scott URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/jeff-scott Bio: Jeff Scott is the founder of 148Apps and a certifiable iPhone nut. Apps on this home screen: 1Password, BeejiveIM, Birdbrain, Facebook, Instapaper, OmniFocus, PCalc, Reeder, Snapture, Tumblr, Tweetie My iPhone has too many apps installed. Well too many for me to actually find them all. There’s a trick that you can do on non-jailbroken OS 3 iPhones to get more than the usual 11 pages. I’ve currently gotten mine up to 17 screens or 276 apps. Yeah, that’s too many. There are just too many great example apps. I may not use them all that often, but I like to be that guy that shows you a great app that you’ve never heard of. So, I’ve got too many apps installed. Though the apps on my home screen and an ever changing list of new apps I’m checking out on the following 3-4 pages are where I spend most of my time. The archive apps are in the later pages. Needless to say, I use the Spotlight search to find most apps. On the home page I keep the apps that I use most on the left and right columns. The ones in the middle are less used but still important enough to be on my home screen. The tray is pretty standard built-in apps. Inbox Zero be damned. OmniFocus - what can I say about this app. I live in it. I organize my life, my business, I keep reminders, I write blog posts in it. It’s amazingly useful for me. Not sure what I would be doing if it didn’t exist. Next come the communication apps Tweetie 2, Beejive, and Facebook. These are the apps I use to keep connected. Tweetie 2 is my favorite Twitter client. Though I’m always trying out new ones. I use BirdBrain to keep my OCD satisfied. Beejive keeps me connected on IM while away from my computer. And Facebook - it’s a love/hate thing. Information apps like Instapaper and Reeder keep me informed. Instapaper has been a favorite since it’s first release. Love it and the execution is just perfect. Reeder is my current RSS reader of choice. It’s not perfect, but it has some of the features I need like Delicious posting. There are no end to great photography apps for the iPhone. Snapture is my current favorite. Particularly like the rapid picture taking capabilities. --- ### Joe Hewitt URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/joe-hewitt Bio: Joe Hewitt is the author of the Facebook iPhone app, and in a former life created the Firebug extension for Firefox and helped make Firefox itself. Apps on this home screen: AIM, Birdfeed, Facebook, Google Reader, MLB At Bat, Pandora Really, I wish I weren’t chained to my desktop programming most of my waking hours so I had an excuse to use more iPhone apps. My iPhone usage takes place mainly while I am eating meals or taking long walks. So, reading and listening to music primarily. I don’t make phone calls or send text messages unless absolutely forced to by loved ones. I don’t play games. 80% of my iPhone usage is Google Reader. I’ve tried every Google Reader app there is and I keep coming back to the web version. Somebody, please make a Google Reader app that isn’t slow as molasses running downhill! The remaining 20% of my usage is mostly spent checking Mail, Facebook, Twitter and the score of the Yankees game. Oh, and the Camera. I own a Canon 5D Mark II but I still take 99% of my photos with my iPhone. --- ### John Gruber URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/john-gruber Bio: John Gruber writes and publishes Daring Fireball, a web site for Mac and web nerds. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife and son. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Birdhouse, Mint, MLB At Bat, PCalc, Remote, Simplenote, Tweetie PCalc and Simplenote are replacements for the built-in Calculator and Notes apps. I wrote extensively about Simplenote here, and I recommend PCalc very highly as well. I love Apple’s Remote app. I use it with my Apple TV all the time. “Mint” is a shortcut to the Mint web stats for Daring Fireball. I’m a baseball fan and MLB’s At Bat app isn’t just informative, it’s a really well-designed and well-made piece of software. After the Yankees win the World Series in October, I’ll probably replace it with the Voice Memos app. I’ve got two and a half Twitter clients on my home screen. I use Birdfeed so much I’ve got it in my Dock. But I use Tweetie too, depending on my mood. Birdhouse is a wonderful “notepad for Twitter”, but I’ve included it in this screenshot mainly because Adam Lisagor is a sensitive young man and I know his feelings would be damaged if it weren’t there. For what it’s worth, I’ve got the double-click-on-home-button gesture assigned to open the Camera app. --- ### John Siracusa URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/john-siracusa Bio: John Siracusa is a programmer and freelance technology writer. He writes for Ars Technica, Macworld, and hosts the weekly Hypercritical podcast on the 5by5 network. I don't have an iPhone, but I've been a big fan of the iPod touch since the first version. We have several around the house, but I'm currently using a second-generation iPod touch with the latest OS that it'll run: 4.2.1. It doesn't support multitasking, and for whatever reason, it didn't install a wallpaper image when I updated to iOS 4. Even if it had, I would have changed it back to black. I find most backgrounds distracting. Maybe if I had an iPhone, I'd be more motivated to tune my home screen for efficiency. But as you can see, more than half of the icons haven't changed since the day this iPod came out of the box. I don't think I've touched the bottom four stationary icons at all. I know you're supposed to put the applications that you want to be able to reach immediately down there, but I just find it awkward to move my thumb to hit any of the icons in that row. The most comfortable position for my left thumb to hit is occupied by my most frequently launched applications, starting with Twitterrific. It is by far my favorite Twitter client. I've tried and purchased many other Twitter clients, but Twitterrific was my first love, and I've always come back to it. Next to it is the game I play most frequently, Words with Friends. It's buggy, it occasionally crashes, and its servers are slow, but it's still leaps and bounds better than the official Scrabble app, with which I've never managed to actually complete a single game. (Each time I tried, my game in progress disappeared without warning and never came back.) Instapaper also has a permanent home in my thumb's favorite row. I bounce back and forth between it and Safari to do my web browsing. Safari is in the upper left-hand corner because that's where I thought I should put the application I'm going to use most frequently. In reality, I spend more time in Twitterrific and Instapaper than Safari, but "upper left" has come to mean "Safari" to me. It's the only icon on my home screen that I don't think I'll ever move. I use the Gmail and Google Reader web interfaces rather than a native mail app and newsreader. With little memory and no multitasking on my iPod, having those two tasks within a single application makes muddling through the web UIs worthwhile. My two most frequently used e-book readers are on the bottom row, though I have several more on another screen. I used to work for the company that created the eReader app, and it's still my favorite e-book reading application. But these days, I find most of the content I want to read at Amazon. The Kindle reader is simplistic and inflexible, but it gets the job done. Whatever game I happen to be playing at the moment gets the spot to the left of Instapaper. Right now, it's Tiny Wings, which is a perfect example of the type of game I like to put there: relaxing, and fun in short bursts. I never launch Calendar, Contacts, Maps, or Calculator. I do use the Mail app to check one or two special email accounts. I occasionally use Notes to jot down some idea that pops into my head as I drift off to sleep. When I wake up, I sometimes check the weather with the AccuWeather app. I've got photos of my wife and kids in the Photos app, a few random TV shows and movies under Videos, and about 20 GB of tracks under Music. I very rarely buy anything from the iTunes Store, and I don't think I've ever used my iPod to make a purchase. So there you have it, a monument to inefficiency and wasted space. But sadly, I've gotten so used to my home screen looking like this that any time I try to move a new icon onto the page, I find the new look of the screen off-putting. This is especially true for apps with ugly icons. It took me a long time to accept the Words with Friends icon, for example. I spent months with it on one of my other screens, but eventually just could not stand constantly swiping over to launch it. (The new AccuWeather icon is pretty darned ugly too.) I suspect icon aesthetics have an undue influence on many iOS users' home screen arrangements - more than most people are willing to admit. I'm glad you didn't ask to see all my other screens, some of which may or may not be arranged by color… --- ### Jon Hicks URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/jon-hicks Bio: Jon Hicks is highly regarded web and print designer based in Oxford. Jon is most widely known for his personal website - Hicksdesign - where he regularly writes about web standards, CSS and browsers. As well as producing a range of successful browser resources, Jon has also produced logos for Firefox and Thunderbird. Towards the end of 2008 he joined Opera Software as Senior Designer. Apps on this home screen: Air Sharing, Boxee, Pano, Remote, Rolando 2, Things, Tumblr, Tweetie, Wikipanion Quite simply, the apps I use the most go on the home screen, which tend to be for when I’m travelling. I used to have strict layouts, such as all camera apps in a row, but nowadays I don’t. I just know where to find the most used apps, and anything off the home screen is found with the 3.0 search facility. --- ### Jonathan Stark URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/jonathan-stark Bio: Jonathan Stark is a mobile and web application consultant who the Wall Street Journal has called an expert on publishing desktop data to the web. He has written two books on web application programming, is a tech editor for both php|architect and Advisor magazines, and has been quoted in the media on internet and mobile lifestyle trends. Jonathan began his programming career more than 20 years ago on a Tandy TRS-80 and still thinks Zork was a sweet game. I do a lot of mobile development, so I literally have a box full of phones on my desk. I never know which I’ll be using or when I’ll need to reset them all to factory settings, so I don’t waste much time tweaking my home screens. That said, I did recently organize the first screen on my main phone. My approach was to remove all the icons and move apps back as I used them. Once the screen was full, I organized them by color. By far, my most used app is Safari. In fact, 5 of the 20 icons on my home screen are links to web apps. Since I’m always shifting between phones, laptops, desktops, etc… it’s unrealistic for me to try to keep my data in sync across all devices. Three cheers for the cloud, baby! My most used web app is Gmail. As far as I’m concerned, it blows away the built-in Mail app and sets a standard that web apps developers should aspire to. Next most heavily used apps are Google Calendar, Remember The Milk, and Kilo. Not much to say about these - they are excellent, useful, and I launch each at least 10 times a day. I like Foursquare and Gowalla but I don’t use them all that much. I originally installed them because I’m speaking at Where 2.0, and I figured I better get familiar with the poster children of the space :) Still deciding whether either will graduate from fun to useful. I’m on Twitter a lot (shocker) and Tweetie 2 is my client of choice (again, shocker). iT3 is a drop dead simple photo sharing web app that I built and use frequently. Think Flickr without a login. Settings is in the tray because I’m constantly turning WiFi and the Safari Debug console on and off. So annoying. I rarely listen to music, but the iPod app gets used regularly because I’m addicted to podcasts. Boagworld, TWiG, Skeptoid, and various NPR shows are in heavy rotation. Facebook, Photos, Camera, and iVideoCamera are all present because we just had a baby and I’m incessantly recording the most minor facial expression and uploading for the g’rents. I recently set up Google Voice to hijack my native voicemail and email the transcripts to me. Since then, I have hardly launched the Phone app. I’m just starting to dork around with the Google Voice web app so I don’t really have an opinion on that yet. --- ### Joshua Topolsky URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/joshua-topolsky Bio: Joshua Topolsky heads Engadget as Editor-in-chief, overseeing the creative and editorial content for the tech news site - the flagship brand of the Weblogs Inc. network. He also manages sister-sites Engadget Mobile and Engadget HD, and supervises the growing pool of Engadget foreign arms, including hubs for Spanish, Japanese, and Chinese. In all, the stable of properties sees millions of visitors a day, and is widely considered to be the definitive source for consumer electronics and gadget news. Apps on this home screen: Air Mouse Pro, CityTransit, Colloquy, Engadget, Shazam, Tweetie, Wikipanion The first thing you’ll notice about this homescreen (if you’ve got an eye for these things) is that my iPhone is jailbroken. Frankly, I don’t know how anyone uses a non-jailbroken iPhone, but maybe I’m just weird. So a couple of things to start with - I have an app called Backgrounder running here. You can see on Phone, Mail, and Safari they’ve got those little black discs - that means they’re running in the background. I also use an application called Kirikae as a task switcher and manager, which is accessible via a long press on my home button. Incredibly helpful. A few more jailbroken items: my Weather icon actually changes its image and temp to show the current weather conditions (thanks WeatherIcon!), and it also shows the temperature wherever I am on the phone up in the status bar. So onto the apps. Clearly a lot of Apple’s native applications are present here - and for good reason. I do wish there was a native Gmail client on this phone, because I regularly struggle with Apple’s ideas about how mail management should be done. As far as third party apps go, up top I’ve got CityTransit, an NYC subway app. I’ve lived here for about 8 years, but I’m still regularly confused as to which train to take - this is seriously a lifesaver for me. Of course the Engadget app is present, as it’s obviously the best application ever created for any mobile platform in the history of mobile platforms. Air Mouse is killer - I use it to navigate my HTPC. It’s definitely one of those applications that kind of blows your mind the first time you use it. You think, “How did I live without this?” I know how - I had a huge IR keyboard I used! Shazam is a no-brainer. I hate not knowing what a song is. But still, it’s not nearly as knowledgeable is it needs to be. More often then not it doesn’t know the track I’m hearing, but it’s nice if you want to know what that song on Z100 is. Wikipanion is another killer app for me. Anything that lets me get an answer to a question faster is great, and its formatting and handling of Wikipedia’s content is superb. Finally we’ve got Tweetie and Colloquy. Tweetie is my fallback Twitter app, though I have a jailbroken app called qTweeter which is accessible from anywhere on the phone by swiping downward from the status bar as well. I use both, but you can’t match qTweeter’s convenience. Colloquy is an IRC client I use to stay connected with Team Engadget when I’m out (or on my couch) - it’s actually best when combined with Backgrounder, so I can get other work done while a conversation is going on. Oh, double tapping the home button brings up my starred contacts. Huzzah! --- ### Justin Williams URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/justin-williams Bio: Justin Williams is the guy behind Second Gear. Maybe you use his apps: Elements, Today and Check Off. You may have also heard of him from his various former projects like PocketTweets and FuckingNDA.com or as the organizer of Indie+Relief. He also writes about Mac and iPhone development on Twitter or his personal site, carpeaqua. While on my iPhone I leave the bottom row empty, I don’t have the same discipline on the iPad. Part of it is because rotating the device changes how many apps are in a row but also because I still haven’t gotten the feel for how I want to use my iPad. I use my iPhone for hours a day and have it down to a fine science. My iPad and I are still in the courting phase. My dock has the four applications I use 90% of the time. Safari mobile is my preferred way to casually browse the Web now. It’s so good that I no longer feel the need to take my MacBook Pro off the desk. MobileMail is nice, but still lacks the unified inbox and ability to move messages to folders between accounts. Because of that, I usually just read and compose short emails, but not much else. Twitter for the iPad is my Twitter client. I don’t love it, but it strikes a decent balance between Twitterrific’s minimalism and Osfoora’s chaos. Instapaper was made for the iPad. In fact, if you look at my homescreen, it’s really designed for reading. I own a Kindle, which I use primarily for reading, but the iPad is much better suited for reading at night before bed. Reeder is my RSS app of choice presently. I prefer the UI of the iPhone version, but the iPad version is still top notch. The new NY Times app is fantastic. If only it supported Instapaper. Elements is my notes and writing app of choice (given that I am the developer of it). It coupled with Dropbox on my Mac have changed how I use the iPad for creation. Being able to edit a file on my iPad and then have the changes automatically synced to my Mac when I get back is awesome. Penultimate is another app I like, and wish I could use to sketch out UI wireframes rather than my stack of notebooks but my finger doesn’t give me nearly the precision I’m used to. Now I just use it to draw juvenile pictures that make me laugh and my wife question why she married me. The IMDB app is great on the iPhone, but even better on the iPad. Since my iPad is by my side when I’m watching TV I’ll frequently look up a movie or television show I’m watching if I want to see what an actor previously appeared in. As a sports junkie, I use the Sportscenter XL app to check on scores for the major sporting events going on each night though I don’t use it nearly as much as I do on the iPhone since ESPN.com works so well in Safari for iPad. The MLB At Bat app has been a great companion to the baseball playoffs. OmniFocus is my task management app of choice. I love being able to sync my tasks lists over the air from my Mac and have it up-to-date on my iPhone and iPad. I don’t really use the iPad version too much, but it is nice to be able to jot down something quickly when I need to get it out of my head. When I’m not sitting in front of my Mac, I attempt to do some light cooking. I’m not very good at it, but the Epicurious app at least gives me lots of great ideas on how to fail at my newfound hobby. Seasonality Go is my goto app for checking the current weather conditions. It has the most iPad like user interface of any of the apps and also has a ton of really geeky weather data as well. I have no idea what half of it means, but it looks nice! --- ### Karl von Randow URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/karl-von-randow Bio: Karl von Randow is the author of Birdbrain and Mobile Fotos for iPhone, and Charles Proxy for the desktop. A Java developer by day, he expects the removal of the Cocoa-Java bridge will turn out to be a temporary oversight. The first row on my home screen is organized by how I start my day. First, I catch up on overnight Twitter – at GMT+13 a lot of things happen while you’re asleep – that puts Tweetie in the number one spot. Next, I update my friendly WeightBot or read my feeds with Byline, not necessarily in that order. I tried several feed reading apps and Byline ended up my favourite. Finally I check my Calendar, and then I’m ready to go. The second row is apps I use during the day. Remote to control my Apple TV; still one of the best things about the iPhone. Things to keep track of my todos. Stocks for checking the all-important-for-foreign-iPhone-developers USD exchange rate. If you didn’t know, you can enter NZDUSD=X as a stock ID (substitute NZD with your own currency). The third row is blatantly dominated by my own apps. As a convenience when developing, and because I run them all the time, you understand. Mobile Fotos is a Flickr uploader and browser. Birdbrain tracks your Twitter followers and other stats. Hallokitty is a joke app that I like to have at the ready seeing it is coming up to Halloween. The final row completes what is accidentally an entirely Apple final row and column combo. It was quite a challenge not including the App Store and Settings, but they’re numbers one and two on the second page. Not seeing an update badge on the App Store keeps my productivity up, and who’s in Settings these days anyway? I admire people who can drastically change their dock. I’ve simply replaced iPod with Messages, bumping Phone out of the left-most spot. I’m tempted now to move Phone off the home screen entirely, just to see what would happen. On the suggestion of my friend and colleague, Matthew Buchanan, I now have double-click to launch the iPod so it isn’t on my home screen at all. I actually don’t use my iPhone as an iPod very often, as I’m trying to eek the last of the value out of my 1st gen nano, so this may change back to launching Favorites (sic). Overall, I was surprised by how hard I found it to move Apple icons off the home screen (and even harder to move them past page two), but once you start you can’t stop. --- ### Keegan Jones URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/keegan-jones Bio: Keegan Jones is a designer at Alamofire, makers of the iPhone application Gowalla. He lives in Austin and likes to longboard, take photos, and tweet. Apps on this home screen: Bible, CameraBag, Facebook, Flight Control, Gowalla, Mint.com, Things, Tweetie, Yelp I’ve been using the iPhone since day one, and it has truly changed the way I do things. How did I survive without Google Maps in my pocket? The apps on my dock will never change. Tapping those has become muscle memory, and I’m OCD about keeping those in the default order. Also, I like having one blank slot on my home screen. I know, it’s weird. Here is a rundown of the third party apps I use: Yelp - I just moved to Austin and have been using this to locate places to eat. It’s all about the yummy foodz. Facebook - I prefer the iPhone version of FB to the website. Tweetie - Solid, well designed Twitter client. I’m a fan of the “dark” theme. Gowalla - THE BEST IPHONE APPLICATION EVER MADE. I’m a bit biased since it’s what I work on every day. It’s a great app for discovering new places, sharing places you go, and seeing what your friends are doing. If you have an iPhone, you should already have Gowalla installed. No excuses. Download it now. Camerabag - Cool effects for photos. It’s fun to play around with. Bible - I feel awkward using this at church, but it’s got big readable text and tons of translations. Mint.com - Good money app that ties in with [www.mint.com]Mint.com. Flight Control - Don’t buy this app. It’s addicting, sucks way too much of your time and may result in throwing your iPhone through the wall. Things - Well designed to-do list app. I mainly use this for making grocery lists. --- ### Leah Culver URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/leah-culver Bio: Leah Culver was a co-founder and the lead developer of the social network and micro-blogging website Pownce, which was acquired by blog juggernaut Six Apart in November 2008. Now a software engineer at Six Apart, Leah uses her experience with Pownce to develop large scale social applications for future Six Apart projects. While creating the Pownce API she co-authored both the OAuth and OEmbed open API specifications and now maintains the popular Python OAuth library. Leah promotes open source, APIs, and the Django web framework on her blog at leahculver.com. In her free time she likes to play around with new technology and try new restaurants near her home in San Francisco. Apps on this home screen: Flickit, Foursquare, Google Calendar, Google Reader, Subway Shuffle, TypePad, Yelp Phone: First of all, I think I may be the first person on your site who doesn’t have the phone on their home row. For me, the iPhone isn’t a phone at all. It’s an SMS / email / GPS / MP3 device. The only people I call on the phone are my parents. Mail: On the web, I use GMail to combine my many email accounts. On the phone I rely on the native mail app since it’s a lot faster than the mobile GMail site. SMS: Duh. This is the whole point of a phone. I love the chat-like interface! I’ve unlocked emoji and often attempt to construct and send entire meaningful messages out emoji icons. Maps: I live (or die) by the San Francisco transit directions on Google maps. I’m curious to find out if Apple is going to make their own Maps application and how it will compare to Google’s. iPod: I actually listen to music on my iPhone a lot… especially on the bus. My home button double-click brings up the iPod controls. Google calendar: This is a link to the Google calendar mobile site, which has gotten significantly better over the past year. I used to use a 3rd party app to sync my Google calendar with iCal but I don’t really sync my phone with my computer enough for this to be useful anymore. Google reader: Another link to a Google mobile site! Mobile Reader is horribly buggy but I love my feeds so much that I keep it on my home screen. Photos and Camera: I don’t even have a “real” camera anymore. Clock and Weather: Every time I visit a new place I set my clock and weather. I keep each place stored in my iPhone as a sort of travel memento. Currently I have the time and weather for: San Francisco, Austin, Minneapolis, Amsterdam, Miami, Toronto, Portland, Chicago, New York, Berlin, Los Angeles, Prague and Las Vegas. Subway: This is my favorite iPhone game. More about it here. Yelp: The Yelp app is great for finding nearby businesses and super handy for finding out business hours. I love trying out new restaurants and the Yelp app helps me find them on the go. Flickit: This is my favorite app for uploading photos to Flickr. TypePad: I started using the TypePad iPhone app for posting to my Awesome Blog. I think it’s one of the better mobile blogging apps. Foursquare: I love Foursquare! I was a long time Dodgeball user and all my friends now use Foursquare. I’ve served as Mayor of such fine establishments as Nova, 3rd Street Grill, Hotel Utah, and Six Apart. --- ### Leslie Camacho URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/leslie-camacho Bio: I’m a father, husband, nerd, and the President of EllisLab. I love life and help people. Apps on this home screen: 1Password, BeejiveIM, Facebook, Fever, FluxTunes, Instapaper, Ninjawords, OmniFocus, Tweetie, WriteRoom My iPhone is white, but you wouldn’t be able to tell. I’ve got it encased in a black & red cover from SwitchEasy. I call it the “Horde” case (from Warcraft if you’re familiar). The six apps at the “corners” are the ones I use most often: Safari, WriteRoom, Clock, Voice Memos, Phone, Camera I put these apps in the corners because that’s where its easiest for me to hit them if I’m on the move. I don’t have to scan the screen or carefully aim a finger jab. I just point to the corner I need, most of the time without having to look at the screen. I find it surprising that out of the hundred million billion apps available 5 out of 6 most useful to me are “out of the box.” The 6th, WriteRoom by Jesse at Hogbay Software, is an elegant app I use quite often that invites me to write as opposed to just taking a note (but I use it for that too). Facebook, Tweetie 2 (not the most used but possibly the most beloved), iPod, and Omnifocus round out the Top 10. Shaun Inman’s Fever is a web based, self-hosted feedreader with a rather nice iPhone interface, so its not a true iPhone app. Fever opens an iPhone optimized version of Fever from my server. Between Fever and Instapaper I never lack for worthwhile reading material. Ninjawords makes it fun to look up words I don’t know. I work in a distributed office and a lot of our communication is done via IM on a protected Jabber server. This makes BeejiveIM a lifesaver when I’m out of the office but still at work. Flextunes is great for listening to the iPhone in the car and 1Password is a must to keep the hundreds of sites I need access to available when I’m on the go. The one thing I don’t do with my iPhone is game. I’m an avid gamer but the iPhone is strictly a work, communication, and thinking device. I do my best to keep my app collection focused on things that will engage me with people, not provide isolation. That’s what the Macbook Pro is for! --- ### Loren Brichter URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/loren-brichter Bio: Loren is the founder of atebits, makers of the popular Twitter client Tweetie (which is now the official Twitter client for iPhone, iPad and Mac). He founded atebits after leaving Apple, having worked on the original iPhone. Background pictures are easily abused. I’m still trying to find the perfect one. I took a shot of my floor – it’s warm, not distracting, not too bright. Might stick with it. As for apps, a few more third party apps have been promoted to my home screen. Messages, Calendar, Photos, Camera is the only line that hasn’t been violated. Textie is pretty close to killing Messages, most people I text have Textie anyway so it’s perfect. Plus the send button isn’t right next to the keyboard. There’s a big bucket of fun stuff in “Utilities”. Weather, Clock, Stocks. I can’t say enough nice things about My Measures. It’s the kind of app that makes me giddy when I think about how awesome and clever and perfect and useful it is (I’ve been renovating a house). TestFlight has me super excited, should make other developers really happy. Mint keeps track of my money, because I’m lazy. calvetica is really interesting, I think the visual design is still up in the air, but the interactions put Calendar to absolute shame. Words with Friends is the shittiest app I tolerate. I have to force kill it after every few moves. It sucks sucks sucks but is fun. I don’t use iMovie much but play with to remind myself that we’re living in the future. The new Instapaper icon makes me really happy. I use and love Reeder on iPad, and even though it FINALLY has a proper black status bar on the iPhone, Byline still feels right. It’s something about tan. I prefer iBooks because it’s so pretty, but Kindle has a much better selection. The new Simplenote is fantastic, but I really miss the old lined-paper icon. Twitter kicked iPod out of my dock. Even though it’s three blue icons in a row. Yeah. It’s blue. Deal. --- ### Lukas Mathis URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/lukas-mathis Bio: Lukas Mathis is a software engineer and user interface designer for a swiss software company creating workflow management software. He writes about design, technology and more on his blog, ignore the code. I really wish I could turn off the unread count badge on Apple’s Mail app. What is it good for?Absolutely nothing! Conversely, I wish Calvetica could display the current date in its icon. I have a tendency to forget the date, so I need a calendar that shows the date in my iPhone’s Dock. But I also want a calendar app with a good weekly view. So I use both Apple’s calendar app, as well as Calvetica. Apple’s weather app is mostly useless to me. I hardly ever want to know weather predictions for the next days. Instead, what I want to know is, say, whether it’ll stop raining if I wait another twenty minutes. So I use iWeather.ch, because it has precipitation radar maps for Switzerland. I’m not a huge Twitter user, and I’m not really ecstatic about any of the iPhone Twitter apps. I like Weet best right now, but I’m not sure how long it’ll stay on my first screen. I use Kinetic to keep track of my running. It has an interesting UI that is different from a typical iPhone app, but works really well. I don’t use task lists to manage tasks. I do, however, use TaskPaper to keep track of what groceries I have to buy. Instapaper. There’s really nothing to say here. Look, if you don’t have Instapaper on the first page of your iPhone, we can’t even be friends. It’s a requirement. A while back, I was unable to synchronize my iPhone with my Mac for a while, so I started looking for a good podcast client. I think I bought all of them. Some crash all the time. Others look horrible. I ended up settling on Casts. It has a funky UI, but it works. Using a podcast client is so much more convenient than going through iTunes that I stuck with it even after I was able to synchronize again. If you live in Switzerland, you need SBB Mobile. It’s a timetable for trains, busses and trams. It also tells you if there’s a problem with your connection, and if you need to, you can buy tickets from within the app. It looks a bit like somebody ported a DOS application to the iPhone, but it gets the job done. For a long time, I’ve used iCab on the Mac, simply because it had a ton of useful features. As other browsers started adopting these features, I eventually switched away from it. But now I’m in the same situation on the iPhone. iCabMobile does a ton of useful things. But some of its user interface decisions could have been made differently. --- ### Mandy Brown URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/mandy-brown Bio: Mandy Brown is a Creative Director at W. W. Norton & Company, where her work involves everything from book design to web design to writing about design. She writes about books and the reading experience at A Working Library. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Birdhouse, Ego, Fever, Instapaper, NYTimes, Satchel, Typography, WhatTheFont I probably use Instapaper more than any other app. The simple, readable design makes for a really nice experience. The New York Times app aims for a similar simplicity, though I find the ads kind of intrusive. In both cases, being able to read while offline (meaning, on the subway) is a major plus. I’m using Birdfeed as my twitter client right now, though I think I like Tweetie just as well. Birdhouse is great for writing down things you think you want to tweet, only to realize later it’s not such a good idea. Satchel hooks me up to my Backpack account, which I use to keep track of all the various projects I have going on at any given time. It also helpfully works while offline, so that I can dash off notes while commuting. I don’t love the UI, and it can be slow to synch up, but I’m confident these things will improve in time, and I’m too addicted to my Backpack account to give up on it. The Typography Manual is a beautiful little reference manual; just being able to rapidly look up the HTML character entity for an em-dash makes it worth every penny. And it’s a great model for how “book” content can make for a usable, readable application. Next to it is What The font? which allows you to take a picture of a font in the wild and identify what it is. It doesn’t always work, but when it does it’s like magic. Ego allows me to peek into the stats on A Working Library from time to time to see how many people are reading. Helpful for any writer who needs regular assurances that she should keep writing. --- ### Manton Reece URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/manton-reece Bio: Manton Reece is the founder of Riverfold Software and works at VitalSource building e-book software. He has two independent Mac products, Clipstart and Wii Transfer, and also co-hosts the Core Intuition podcast with Daniel Jalkut. Instapaper - One of the few iPhone apps that significantly changed how I work. Any blog post or news article that is more than a paragraph of text gets shuttled into Instapaper to read later. The iPad version of Instapaper gets the most use now, though. Pastebot - Handy app for keeping track of multiple clipboards and bits of text. I like to think of this as a tiny content management system. I’ll use it as a quick scratchpad for notes that are going to be thrown away, and also to keep snippets of common text that are helpful when responding to support email from customers on-the-go. Darkslide - I also have the official Flickr app and Mobile Fotos installed, both of which are good, but I prefer Darkslide for browsing Flickr contacts. Reeder - Just like Twitter clients, I often swap RSS readers on and off the home screen. Reeder is the current favorite, but most RSS goes through NetNewsWire on the iPad these days. I sync with Google Reader and no longer have a news reader running on my Mac. If it comes to me via RSS, it gets read on the iPhone or iPad. Ninjawords - Convenient for quick lookups. I expect this’ll get even more use when multitasking hits in iPhone 4.0. Ember - Excellent native client for 37signals’s Campfire chat web app. I’m in Campfire every day with colleagues, and it’s nice to be able to keep up with the conversation even when out running errands. TaskPaper - My to-do list and project management app of choice because of its simplicity and unstructured approach. I use this on the Mac and sync with the iPhone so that I can add ideas when I’m not at the computer. Gowalla - I didn’t expect this to become one of the most-used apps on my phone, but it is. I love the design and personality of this service. I work from coffee shops a few times a week, and use Gowalla to check-in and occasionally meet-up with nearby friends. Birdfeed - Tweetie, Twitterrific, and Birdhouse have all been in this spot in the past, and I still switch between any of them depending on what I need. There’s something about the Birdfeed design that feels very natural and well-planned, though. It’ll drop off my home screen soon when Twitter switches to OAuth and breaks old clients. iPod - Not picture, but the iPod app is wired up to a double-press of the home button. --- ### Marco Arment URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/marco-arment Bio: Marco is the lead developer of Tumblr and the creator of Instapaper. He excels in brewing coffee and mispredicting Apple product releases. Apps on this home screen: Google Reader, Instapaper, Tweetie, Wikipanion The built-in Apple apps dominate my home screen because they’re that good. I don’t use a lot of third-party apps frequently, so I hardly ever leave this page. I’ve tried many third-party weather apps, but I keep going back to the speed and simplicity of Apple’s. Since I need to test both versions of Instapaper, I keep both on my home screen. Instapaper is, by far, my most-used app. I know that sounds arrogant, but it’s simply because I made exactly the app that I wanted and needed for myself. I love Tweetie (the icon does it for me), but I find myself using the desktop client more frequently. I should bump Birdhouse to the front page since, when I use it, I need fast access to it after getting a quick idea on the go. Wikipanion is frequently useful for solving quick lunch-table debates or satisfying curiosities. Google Reader’s web icon is on there, but only for sync-service unification until NetNewsWire 2.0 is ready, at which point it will take that spot back. Sums is an app that I’m really excited about. It’s not available yet - I’ve been beta-testing it, and they gave me permission to talk about it here. It’s essentially an iPhone port of Soulver, my favorite calculator replacement. It should be ready in the App Store soon. --- ### MG Siegler URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/mg-siegler Bio: MG Siegler is a writer for the technology site TechCrunch. Previously, he was a writer for VentureBeat. You can usually catch him using more swear words on his personal blog, ParisLemon. He lives in San Francisco with his 4 Macs and 6 iPods. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Boxcar, Facebook, Foursquare, Instapaper, Tweetie, Yammer Recently, I moved my Phone app out of the main bottom dock and into the top left spot. I realized that I rarely use the iPhone as a phone anymore, and AT&T helps quite a bit with that thanks to its awful service in San Francisco. I text much more than I actually make calls, so I added that icon to the main dock. Obviously, I use Twitter quite a bit as I have not one, but two Twitter apps on my main screen, Tweetie 2 and Birdfeed. I use Tweetie 2 most of the time but keep Birdfeed there because it has a much nicer geolocation implementation (which Twitter will hopefully be formally launching soon). The location-based service Foursquare is another main dock app for me as I’m hopelessly addicted to it. Anywhere I go, I must check it, earn my points, get my badges, take my mayorships, and move on. There are two applications on my main screen that I use primarily to help me with work throughout the day: Yammer and Boxcar. Yammer is what we use at TechCrunch to talk to one another, while Boxcar is a push notification app that can send me alerts for various searches on Twitter, as well as ping me when new Gmails come in. I keep it on the main screen because I often will miss a notification and Boxcar has its own notification inbox to show you what you’ve missed. Instapaper is a site I use religiously to bookmark everything I want to read but can’t during the day because I’m usually just writing. With the app, I can sync everything up that I missed and read it while lounging around or on the go. The rest of the apps are pretty standard. I include Facebook in this list since it’s a no-brainer. When I double click the main button it goes to the iPod, which is why I took that out of my main dock as well. --- ### Mike Rundle URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/mike-rundle Bio: Mike Rundle is a designer and developer living in Raleigh, NC. He’s been designing and building websites since 1996 but has recently learned Objective-C and Cocoa and has been working on Mac, iPhone & iPad software in his spare time. My home screen is really sparse and I only stock it with good-looking icons. I won’t even download an app that has an ugly icon because it uglies up my otherwise really cool-looking device. I don’t download or play many games but the ones I do I tend to keep playing for a long, long time. As for apps, I don’t use many apps but I do try to support fellow indie developers. I’ve bought hundreds and hundreds of apps over the years but I delete them often and re-download later on if needed. I’ve kept this background image the longest and I use it on my lock screen as well which gives a nice slide-in effect since there’s no transition from one background image to another. --- ### Neven Mrgan URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/neven-mrgan Bio: Neven Mrgan is a designer at Panic Inc. I use all the apps on my home screen regularly. I can’t imagine moving the camera icon since it’s in the place of the actual camera now. I use reader because it syncs nicely and it lets me read through multiple feeds without tapping in and out - I just scroll on until there’s no more left to scroll. I almost never read this on the desktop; I prefer to visit the actual websites there. But on the iPhone, it helps to have a stripped-down view. I don’t use Flickr on the iPhone that much, I just think I should! Tumblr is quickly becoming an alternate Twitter. Their excellent Dashboard web app is helping this. Birdfeed is my most used app - I launch it pretty much every time I pull out my phone. Birdhouse comes in handy when you least expect it, so I need quick access to it. I use the “Big Four” apps all the time. --- ### Nik Fletcher URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/nik-fletcher Bio: Nik Fletcher works for independent Mac developer Realmac Software in sunny Brighton, England. Alongside working at Realmac, he’s been known to string sentences together for TUAW (The Unofficial Apple Weblog), Download Squad and (on a couple of occasions)The Guardian newspaper. Not content with all that, he recently launched an iPhone app of his own - Happening - that brings nearby events from Yahoo’s Upcoming service to your favourite mobile device. You can keep up with his exploits on Twitter, or via his blog. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Ego, Facebook, Gowalla, Happening, Jamie Oliver, Ramp Champ, Reeder, The Guardian It wasn’t until very recently that I actually changed the homescreen on my phone. I’m not one for homescreen clutter (even now I could fit all my apps, including the default Apple ones, into two screens) and don’t leave applications on “in case I need them”. There’s a fair amount of mental reasoning behind the placement of my apps - and even on the second and third-screens, I’ve typically placed the default apps (or apps similar to the default apps) in the locations they’d be found on the original homescreen. So, for example, whilst I use the default camera app on my lowly iPhone 3G, Hipstamatic is in the top right-hand corner of the second screen. SMS, Camera, Maps, Phone, Mail, Safari and iPod I’ve grown so used to the arrangement of these apps (and, bizarrely, their colours on the homescreen) that I’ve barely moved them. Whilst the camera isn’t necessarily my favourite of the camera apps out there (I’m a completely sucker for Hipstamatic and keep Cinder around for uploading to Ember), the slower speed of the iPhone 3G combined with my need to snap something quickly means I have to fall back to the Apple app. I’m so used to the positions of the four original dock icons that, no matter where I placed them, they felt wrong anywhere other than docked and in the default order. Ego This is an easy one: Ego’s style, simplicity and at-a-glance display of handy little stats has long justified its place on my homescreen. In fact, this one’s been on my homescreen since it launched. Ramp Champ The Iconfactory’s iPhone apps are always so well designed (Frenzic, another favourite of mine, is on the second screen), and Ramp Champ has been on my homescreen since it launched. The style, the music, the beautifully designed items you can redeem your points for in-game: it’s all brilliant. Facebook I may not spend a great deal of time using Facebook in general, but if I do it’s nearly always via the iPhone app. It’s always been a great native app - and allows me to avoid much of the hell-annoying nonsense found on the Facebook website whilst keeping in touch with friends. Gowalla I’ve been using Gowalla and Foursquare for a fair while. At first, I was hooked on Foursquare, but the Foursquare app and Web site pales in comparison to the slick style of Gowalla - and with their recent update, Gowalla continues to be my favourite. It may lack the vanity-based gameplay that I’m a sucker for on Foursquare (which remains on my phone), but the slick design and fun gameplay continues to make Gowalla my favourite location service and I don’t see that changing. Reeder I’ve used almost every RSS reader out there (NetNewsWire, Byline, Google Reader’s Web UI) and discovered Reeder a while back. The thing I love about Reeder is that whilst it uses a tonne of the standard iPhone controls, they’re styled so slickly that it’s a pleasure to browse and read articles. The ability to share via Google Reader (which many clients omit in favour of Twitter & Instapaper, which are also in Reeder) seals the deal for me. To boot, version 2.0 just hit the App Store and is another stellar update. Birdfeed Much like RSS reader I’ve tried pretty much every Twitter client out there, and despite continually looking at what’s available I’ve always found myself coming back to Birdfeed. It’s a genuine shame it’s no longer available - now Brizzly, it’s tied to the Brizzly service - as I loved the style, simplicity and the icon. Jamie’s 20 Minute Meals There’s a tonne of big-name brands on the App Store, with celebrities launching apps - and most of them are mediocre at best. However the Jamie Oliver app is astounding. It oozes style, with lots of great recipes and a tonne of stunning photos to satisfy foodies everywhere. The app also has a tonne of videos, along with a handy shopping list feature that offers both menu-based listing as well as aisle-based listings. Happening It’s probably unsurprising that a developer would have their own app on the homescreen, however Happening started as a personal project and an app that I wanted for my own use - it’s a location-aware client for Yahoo’s Upcoming service to help you find nearby events. I’m always running a cutting-edge build fresh out of Xcode - using the app on a daily basis to find out what’s going on in Brighton (and farther afield), whilst at the same time putting the previous evening’s work through its paces. The Guardian Most of my reading is done via Reeder, however for non-tech related news I actually prefer The Guardian’s app. The customisable homescreen (complete with galleries of photos) makes it great to keep up to date on what’s going on outside the tech bubble. Combine that with the ability to favourite sections and full offline support, it’s a great little app. The Others I’m forever toying with filling the bottom three spaces on my homescreen - however I find that keeping the bottom row as clear as possible makes the device seem far less cluttered. If I weren’t so pernickety about that space, it’d be filled with Instapaper, Tumblr and Articles (in that order). --- ### Noah Stokes URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/noah-stokes Bio: Noah Stokes is a web developer/designer and owner of Two By Two, a small web shop in California. He is married with two sons, a dog, a goat and seven chickens. He’s not sure what happened to the eighth chicken, so don’t ask. He writes online at Es Bueno and tries to score clients with his 1995 homepage. No, it doesn’t work that well. My iPhone: 4GB model (yes, no joke), Silverback. I should say that the only reason I’m still using this piece of Apple history is that I’m stingy. It’s only $20/month for unlimited data and texting. Yes, it takes 15 seconds to load the SMS app. Yes, that’s right. Everything is dog slow. But somehow, in some small way, I feel like I’m sticking it to the man by only paying $20/month. The apps on my homescreen: Photos: I’ve taken about 300 photos in the nearly 3 years that I’ve owned this phone. I have no idea why this is still on my homescreen. Probably to remind me that I can take pictures of things. iPod: This has music queued up for doing yard work. Plug in my custom molded ear phones and I can’t even hear the lawn mower. Again, I have no idea why this is still on my homescreen, since I rarely mow the lawn. Maps: I actually use this a lot. Over Edge it’s barely doable though. Camera: Read the Photos blurb. Stocks: I fire this up every time I want to remind myself that I bought APPL at $16 back in 2000 and sold it way to early. Weather: Current cities I’ve got loaded up - Danville, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, Bass Lake and Austin, TX (SXSW this weekend) Settings: I use this a lot actually mostly to work with WiFi networks or turn Bluetooth on/off. Calendar: This just shows me the date. I’m not even sure how to work anything else on it. App Store: I find it fun to browse apps when I’ve got free time, see what’s new and popular out there. Rarely do I download them what with the combination of the oldest iPhone ever plus the Edge network, it’s just too painful. Ego: This is like a shortcut for Google Analytics. Stats straight to the veins, quick and simple. Chase: I hate Chase. I loved WaMu. But WaMu didn’t have an app, and Chase does. It’s actually an app that works really well. I count all my millions with it. Things: Clearly, I’ve got stuff to do. Tweetie: Probably my most used app. What can be said that hasn’t been said already? Google Voice: I use this web based app for dialing clients. It’s quick and slick. Billings: One of my favorite features of Billings Touch is that you can see on a daily basis how much you’ve billed. I would kill for that in the desktop version. For now, this will have to do. Phone: No one ever calls me. Mail: No one ever emails. SMS: Txting is so l337. Safari: Mmmm, internet. Honorable 20th App: Ramp Champ used to be on here, but I’ve managed to beat all the levels and they’ve been slow to release others so it’s been moved back a page. --- ### Patrick Haney URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/patrick-haney Bio: Patrick Haney is not a sausage. He does however enjoy design, typography and talking about himself in the third person. When he’s not working as a web designer, he sometimes writes about stuff on his website and can be found at many conferences, often wearing a KERN sweatshirt. Apps on this home screen: Classics, Ego, Gowalla, Tweetie While I’m constantly tweaking my iPhone screens (yes, all 5 of them), the home screen doesn’t change all that much. I’ve kept a fairly similar look to the initial view for the longest time, including some of the original default app arrangements and the 2 empty app spaces, which I feel give me a little “whitespace” (or is it “blackspace?”) in an otherwise cluttered device. My iPhone’s dock is fairly straightforward. I’m not a fan of checking email on the go, as I’d rather untether myself from it when I’m not near a computer, so it moved off the dock a long time ago. Messages, one of my most used apps, sits on the left under Tweetie 2 for obvious reasons. While I don’t actually use my iPhone as a phone most of the time, I hesitate to move that functionality off of the dock. Safari and the iPod app round out the 4 apps here, though recently I’ve moved the Phone app to the far right in order to break up the 2 green icons that sometimes throw me when I’m in a hurry. In the upper left corner is my ode to Garrett Murray. I love checking stats, and Ego is perfect for aggregating them all in one place (plus the icon is gorgeous and isn’t it ironic to have the first app on your iPhone named “Ego?”). As mentioned before, Mail isn’t a priority on my phone, but I do use it every few days. Photos and Camera remain in their usual spot, which make them easy to find, though I typically go to the Camera app much more than the Photos. Other apps in their original default positions (before the Compass and Voice Memos apps were around) include Maps (which I use constantly), Weather (an app I rarely use and would be much more useful if its icon displayed the current weather, similar to how the Calendar icon shows the current date), Settings (which I find handy here for the ability to switch on/off wifi and Airplane Mode), and the App Store (I’m always checking for app updates or new things I can spend money on). The Clock app, which I still use for my daily morning alarm(s), and the Notes app, which is great for jotting down quick ideas, are in slightly different spots. And while I don’t use the Calendar app all that often, I like seeing today’s date on the home screen. So how about the other 3 apps? For a long time I had both Gowalla and Foursquare on my home screen and would use both to “check in” to a location, but grew tired of the effort involved. I’ve moved Foursquare off to another screen and stick with Gowalla exclusively due to its attractive design and fun gameplay. Classics is an app I don’t use all that often, but the icon is one of my favorites and it’s a nice reminder that I have books I can read while I’m on the go. Last, but certainly not least, is Tweetie 2. While I could go on and on about Tweetie 2 and how it doesn’t really live up to the hype of its release, I will say that it’s the best option I’ve found for a Twitter client on the iPhone. While its UI is fairly unimaginative and can seem overly complex, I spend a lot of time running it on my iPhone. The addition of push notifications for direct messages and @ replies would make me forget any issues I ever had with it though. Lastly, this screenshot is a bit of a farce. I always have unread mail messages due to the fact that I hardly ever check it on my iPhone and that I just don’t care. And by 5:20PM of any given day, I typically have less than 64% battery left. Maybe if I could just put the damn thing down once in a while… --- ### Phil Coffman URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/phil-coffman Bio: Phil Coffman is an art director at Springbox, an interactive marketing firm. He lives in Austin, TX with his wife and son. Phil writes about design, photography, music, and practically anything that inspires him on a daily basis on his personal site, http://www.philcoffman.com. Apps on this home screen: Facebook, Gowalla, Hipstamatic, Mill Colour, Photoshop, Weather Channel, TiltShift, Things, Tweetie Tweetie: My default Twitter app hands-down. I enjoy it’s simplistic UI and appreciate how easy it is to use. I do miss the dark theme from Tweetie 1.0, but it’s absence in Tweetie 2.0 is more than made up for by the indispensable “Pull down to refresh” feature. Gowalla: I love using this app, especially at this early stage of it’s life. The thrill of discovering unclaimed spots and collecting items never gets old. Plus it’s made by a local firm and we’re big on supporting the locals here in Austin. Facebook: Even though my visits and posts to Facebook are becoming less frequent, I still use the app to keep up with my “non-techy” friends, you know the ones you actually know in real life. Camera: I love taking photos with my phone. The fact that I have a camera with me at all times that also allows me post-process (more on that in a bit) and then publish them to various sites and networks is incredible. I placed this icon in the same corner as the physical camera because that felt the most natural to me. TiltShiftGen, Mill Colour, and PS Mobile: These apps need to be mentioned together since they’re part of a photography workflow I use. I’ve experimented with various photography apps on the iPhone but this combination is easily my favorite. I find that with pairing TiltShiftGen and Mill Colour I have fine-tuned control over how I ultimately want my photos to look. I use PS Mobile solely to add a white border to my photos. I wrote an article about iPhone Photography that talks about all of this in more detail. Hipstamatic: This app is a new addition to my iPhone Photography lineup. I love the concept behind the interface and the fact that it’s expandable through in-app purchases of new “lenses”, “flashes”, and “film stock”. I’m still experimenting with the various looks, but so far it’s promising. Photos: With taking a lot of photos I want to be able to access my camera roll quickly, so this app stays close to the photography apps. Notes: I still use the built-in notes app mostly because it gets the job done with making lists for shopping, gift ideas, random thoughts, etc. I’ve heard good things about Simplenote, so I might be swapping this out at some point. The Weather Channel: At first I really wanted to keep Apple’s weather app on my home screen, but I wanted more detailed forecasts which this app provides in spades. Maps: This app is the one I was the most excited about having in my pocket before I owned an iPhone and has proved it’s value over and over again. Settings: I access my phone settings fairly regularly, so this had to stay put. Things: I have a terrible time remembering the things I need to get done, so Things is an absolute life saver for me. It’s helped me be more productive. I also keep this app directly above my mail app because the content in those can often go hand in hand. Calendar: I have my phone set-up to pull in my work events, so it needs to be quickly accessible and again close to the mail app. App Store: I need to lay off this app, but I’m not ready to move it off the home screen because I still check to see which apps are being featured and to learn more about the ones my friends tell me about. I’ve left the Phone, Mail, Safari, and iPod apps in their original positions and use them constantly. My 2nd screen is for gaming and the last two screens hold random apps I access just often enough to leave on my phone. --- ### Ryan Block URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/ryan-block Bio: Ryan Block is co-founder of gdgt, a consumer electronics media startup, and former editor-in-chief of Engadget. He routinely neglects blogging on his personal site, and lives in San Francisco with Veronica Belmont. It’s been almost a year and a half since I checked into First & 20, but not much about how I use my phone has changed. I still think the iPhone (4) isn’t an especially good productivity device - but it’s gotten lots better with time. My home screen is still mostly about getting down to business, though, and the overall layout of apps is largely the same since late 2009. There have been a number of upgrades (and a new app or two) along the way: --- ### Ryan Cash URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/ryan-cash Bio: Ryan is the Marketing and PR Coordinator for Marketcircle – a software developer that creates award-winning business applications for the Mac and iPhone. Ryan also writes for The Netsetter – a blog about startup businesses and online marketing. When he isn’t working, he can be found taking photos or drifting his 240sx. Apps on this home screen: Billings, CNN, Daylite, Facebook, NetNewsWire, Tweetie, Weather Eye I’m quite picky about the colour balance of the apps on my home screen – I’ve spent far too much time arranging the icons so that it’s both logically arranged and aesthetically pleasing. THE DOCK I have left the dock alone, as it works logically for me. I have contemplated putting the Messages app on the dock, but I prefer it’s original location for aesthetics (don’t like having the two green icons together). Phone - After all, the iPhone IS a phone. I find myself often using other forms of communication (SMS, Email, Facebook, etc.), but I still make good old-fashioned phone calls everyday. Mail - I use this multiple times daily, to check both work and personal email accounts. Definitely one of my most used applications. Safari - Not something I use super frequently, but I use it often enough to warrant keeping it on the home screen. I leave it on the dock because of the familiar physical location that I’m used to. iPod - Use the iPod daily, usually at the gym. Sometimes it even reminds me to go to the gym if I’ve been lazy. DEFAULT APPS Before I decided which third-party apps made it on my home screen, I had to decide which didn’t. I immediately got rid of the Voice Memos, Stocks, YouTube, App Store, iTunes, and Contacts applications. I’ll rarely use any of these applications, and have never, even once, used the Contacts application. Messages - Default location, used very often. Didn’t move to the dock as I find the icon too similar to the Phone app icon. Calendar - I use the iPhone Calendar to keep track of personal appointments and reminders. Photos - Used quite often as I’m into photography. Camera - Also use this often (currently over 1,500 photos taken) – I’d probably take even more if the iPhone had a better camera. Clock - Used primarily as a timer when cooking, and occasionally as an alarm clock when traveling. Calculator - I’m terrible at math. Notes - Use this very frequently to jot down creative ideas, keep lists of good restaurants, music and movies to check out, etc. Maps - Although I have a Sony GPS in my car, I often find it easier to look things up on my iPhone. Settings - I wouldn’t need this on my home screen if I could adjust brightness and WiFi settings from the status bar. THIRD-PARTY APPS I’ve very picky about which third-party apps make it to my homepage. The application has to be useful, used frequently, and have a well designed icon. My home screen is all business. Games have their own page (page 3), and the overflow of my home screen stays on page 2. I’ve moved all of the useless default apps and a few other apps that I’ve downloaded and use once in a blue moon (i.e. Kayak for traveling) to the last page. WeatherEye - Replaces the default Weather app – more detailed information, and usually more accurate. CNN - Since the iPhone app isn’t available to us in Canada, I have a bookmark to the Web app, which is designed quite well. I wasn’t really a “news junky” until the iPhone came around – now I seem to check it multiple times daily. NetNewsWire - I’m not a huge fan of reading on the iPhone, but in my idle time I’ll occasionally catch up with unread blog posts, primarily by Seth Godin. I still prefer the experience of reading blogs on the websites themselves. If the website isn’t well designed, chances are I won’t be reading it. Daylite Touch - Our company not only makes Daylite – we use it to run our own business. Daylite let’s me see what meetings I’ve been invited to, what my co-workers schedules look like, or see any tasks that have been delegated to me. It does a lot more than this, but these are the things I personally need access to when I’m mobile. Billings Touch - Another one of Marketcircle’s applications. I need to use this app for testing purposes (as I do with Daylite), and so that I can help provide valuable feedback to our development team. It also improves my ability to market the applications. I happen to do some freelance writing on the side, so I actually use Billings as a customer too. Facebook - I’m pretty active on Facebook, so I use this app quite often. I do more browsing than posting from the iPhone, but I’m able to see what friends are up to, find out event details when I’m out and about, and update my status to let my friends know where they can find me. Tweetie - My favourite Twitter app, hands down. I manage several Twitter accounts (my personal account, the Marketcircle account, and an account tied to a small drifting blog that I run). Being able to quickly monitor the search strings I’ve setup is incredibly useful – especially during product launches. --- ### Ryan Irelan URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/ryan-irelan Bio: I’m the Technology & Development Director at Happy Cog West and publish EE Insider and the ExpressionEngine screencasts. Occasionally, I have something to say at my personal blog. Hailing from the great state of New Jersey, I now reside in Raleigh, North Carolina. Apps on this home screen: Birdfeed, Ego, Fever, Instapaper, Mobile Fotos, OmniFocus, Remote, Simplenote, WeatherBug Like many others, my home screen is a collection of the apps I use the most. There is some thinking behind the placement of some of the apps, but not all. For example, the iPod app is located top right because that is the most comfortable way for me to access my music while my iPhone is connected in the car. My most used apps are in the dock with the row above it also getting heavy use. Every few months I demote or promote an app and update my home screen. Possible promotions right now include Ember, Ramp Champ and iBank. Some selected apps: --- ### Sam Brown URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/sam-brown Bio: Sam Brown is a freelance Web Designer and Developer from Edinburgh, Scotland who specializes in interface design and web standards, is a geek and loves all things technology. You can read his musings on his blog Sam Brown and view his portfolio at Massive Blue. Apps on this home screen: Attic, Dropbox, Fever, Foursquare, Instapaper, Remindness, Things, Tweetie, WriteRoom Twitter: This used to be Tweetie of course but is first and foremost on my iPhone because I use it all the time. I must admit I quite like the new icon, it’s not as good as the original Tweetie icon but to be honest, that wasn’t brilliant either. It’s a just move by Twitter and it fits well. The app is of course, fundamentally still Tweetie and still the best Twitter experience on the iPhone. Instapaper: This was one of those apps that I didn’t know I needed until I tried the free version, only to almost instantly buy the Pro version - I use it all the time on both my iPhone and iPad and couldn’t live without it now. Reading long articles in Instapaper is such a nice experience. Things: My preferred task manager that does exactly what I need it to do. I don’t use it as much as I used to on the iPhone and the syncing is a bit of a pain, especially when I forget to do it. foursquare: my favourite geosocial location-based networking checking-in gaming tipping discovering stalking app. Attic: This replaced the iPod app as a great way to discover what music is on my iPhone that I haven’t been listening to. I have an 8GB and it houses a bunch of photos, tv shows and other apps that I really can’t store much music on it so this app combined with some smart iTunes playlists ensure music is never left unplayed on my device. WriteRoom: I simply love the fullscreen writing environment in WriteRoom and use it on the Desktop as well. Plus, no bloody Marker Felt. Hooray! Dropbox: Gives me access to all my work files when I am out and about, lately I have been designing for the iPhone and being able to launch mockups fullscreen at the proper resolution on the device is such a neat way to test. Remindness: My personal project management app that I built a few years ago, it’s vapourware essentially and I’d like to get a working copy online for people to use one day in the not too distant future - although I’ve been promising that for a while. This is just a Bookmarked Web App. Fever°: RSS at it’s best. I subscribe to a lot of feeds and the Hot tab within Fever is invaluable - the iPhone version off the full app is pretty good and again is only a bookmark to the web app. Phone, Mail, Messages & Safari as expected. Interestingly you’ll notice I have quite a few screens on my iPhone, these are based on groups and will in OS4.0 be folders of course. Page 2 holds all of the default apps that come installed on the iPhone. Page 3 has single purpose apps such as Tipulator, FlipTime, Remote etc. Page 4 are apps that connect to the web, Facebook, Ego, Shazam and the like. Page 5 hosts a bunch of bookmarks such as BBC News, BBC iPlayer, and my sites. Page 6 is full of games Flight Control, Angry Birds, Strategery etc. Double-clicking on my home screen does nothing - my home button is fubared, can’t wait for the new iPhone! --- ### Sean Sperte URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/sean-sperte Bio: Sean is a graphic designer and web developer at The City Church in Seattle, WA. He’s been making websites since the early 90’s. He’s an Apple (and technology) enthusiast, and write a website called Geek & Mild. He’s married to Casey and has a baby daughter named Lucy. As you can see, my home screen is kept very minimal. After months of tweaking and testing I finally narrowed down my most frequently accessed apps and actions to these 11. Of course, I regularly access other apps not on this screen, and those are arranged by priority on the secondary pages. On my home page I organize the apps with both functional and spatial awareness. Dock I found and fell in love with the Dialvetica app a few months ago. It makes it super quick and easy to initiate a call, SMS or email to any of my contacts. The Rdio app has replaced the iPod completely, and the latest version is sublime. I also keep Camera there for quick access. Top Row The four main ways I communicate with my iPhone: Messages (texts), Mail, Twitter and Facebook. Second Row Our own app Canned for pre-composed text messages and groups goes just below the Messages app (for spatial relationship). After that is my notes app of choice (after trying dozens of solutions and apps): Evernote. Then Safari for mobile browsing - still the best app on the device - and Settings. A note about Folders I’ve grown to hate putting apps into folders, for two reasons: (1) when apps are in folders I more easily forget about them and don’t use them as often, and (2) folders feel slower to open and access than swiping to another page. The only apps I put in folders are those that I want installed but rarely access, and games. --- ### Sebastiaan de With URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/sebastiaan-de-with Bio: I’m Sebastiaan de With, a 21-year old freelance visual designer specializing in icons and UI. Most people know me from the Cocoia Blog, where I post about my design process and do teardowns of significant changes in interfaces. Others know me from my work for companies like HTC, Mozilla, HP, frogdesign, T-Mobile and various independent Mac developers. I also run a website that lets people learn how to design icons, Icon Resource. Apps on this home screen: Ego, LiveView, Mint, Things, Tweetie I’ve used the standard iPhone home screen without Stocks (adding a Twitter client or Things) for years, but recently I’ve started to allow more third-party apps on it. I can’t stand the icons on my home screen that I find less than native-looking – for instance, the double inner bevel of the Ego icon – but functionality won out against aesthetics in the end. The balanced out-of-the-box home screen of the iPhone 3G is fantastic (the 3GS ruined it with the horrible Voice Notes and Compass icons) but I also cannot stand the idea of wasting minutes of my life navigating to the second screen to open my apps. I might try jailbreaking my iPhone again in the future to replace the icons, but for now I can’t be bothered with the hassle of going through the onerous process. The obvious: Messages, Phone, Mail, Safari, App Store, Camera, Calendar, Maps, Clock, Settings, Notes. I consider these absolutely essential as basic functions of the device, and remain in their original spot. Youtube is there by virtue of my subscriptions: I follow great insightful videos from some people that are great to watch on the iPhone when I am on the go. LiveView is essential in previewing iPhone UI and icon designs – I use it daily. While the icon is offensively ugly and makes about as much sense as using a banana icon for a Stocks application, the app is fantastic. I’d recommend it to anyone working on iPhone designs. Things is the cornerstone of my workflow, and lets me stay on top of the tasks I have daily to meet deadlines. It’s the epitaph of simplicity and elegancy, which is what I love about it. It’s also entirely compatible with the way I store my to-do lists mentally. Also notable for having an astonishingly well-designed icon. I have a shirt with the (simplified) icon on it, which I wear with pride. I’m the designer of Warships, an iPhone game by Edovia, and as such I have it on my home screen for extensive play-testing. It’s really fun, which certainly helps. The icon is a work in progress. Before Warships, the excellent Ramp Champ game by the Iconfactory graced my home screen. Ego aggregates my website, blog, Twitter, Feedburner and Vimeo stats. I love it. It’s seated firmly next to Mint, and together form the best website stats you can have on your iPhone. Twitter apps are a hot topic, and in my iPhone home screen history it’s been stormy as well. I used to use Twitterrific, moved to Tweetie, then moved to Birdfeed and recently started using Tweetie 2, thanks to its snappiness and landscape mode. Its refresh gesture is also quite addictive. Horrid icon, though, particularly in the Dock. I have to keep it in the Dock because I can tap it easily; I check on Twitter a lot, and again, functionality takes first place. Off-screen but oft used: iReddit, to read the superior user-powered news website with a good dose of humor, the aforementioned Ramp Champ, a few iPhone app betas, Deliveries, Junecloud’s phenomenally designed package tracker, iStat to check on my old Macbook Pro turned server and Mac Pro desktop, and BeeJive IM for push chatting when I need it. I have the double-home button press set to the Camera, but I can’t say I use it often. --- ### Shawn Blanc URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/shawn-blanc Bio: Shawn Blanc is the head cheese of marketing and design for the International House of Prayer. He lives in Kansas City with his wife, Anna, and their two green couches, where he publishes his winded, namesake weblog, shawnblanc.net on design- and Mac-related themes. You can also follow him on Twitter here. Apps on this home screen: Birdhouse, Fever, Things, Tweetie Having a full twenty apps on the homescreen is too much for me. I keep the bottom row empty, and only have three apps in the dock to give a little bit of breathing room. All in all, I have seventy-one apps installed on my iPhone, while I mostly use only the twenty-seven apps that sit on the first two screens. On my iPhone’s first Home Screen, the apps I have are: iPod: Ironically, I rarely use my iPhone to play music or videos or podcasts. The times in my day I listen to music are either at my desk or in my car, and in those places I use my computer or in-dash CD player, respectively. Notes: Used primarily for storing various bits of information I need while on the go. Such as directions to somewhere, or a key-pad code to some room at work. Also used to jot down ideas or thoughts that come to me. One of the most memorable times I’ve ever tapped out an idea for a blog post was while my wife was driving me home after just getting my wisdom teeth pulled. Maps: This app gets used all the time. It seems I’m regularly in need of searching for the nearest coffee shop, ice cream shop, or auto shop. Also, the Maps app is one that I’ve noticed one of the most significant speed and usability increases since upgrading from an original iPhone to the 3GS. The addition of the GPS, plus 3G speeds and the compass makes the Maps app way more handy when on the go. Weather: When I owned my Jeep wrangler, I used Weather Underdround’s iPhone optimized site all summer long because of their radar. It was good to know if rain was on the way and exactly how far away it was to know if I should put the top back on or not. But now that I own a VW GTI, I simply need to know if it’s going to rain in the next few days to know if I should was the car or not. Birdhouse: For forming clever one-liners that aren’t yet clever. Tweetie: The best Twitter client for the iPhone. Smooth scrolling and easy to use. Fever: My RSS reader. And I don’t know which interface is better: the iPhone version or the standard version. Settings: Though I don’t use it regularly, I like to keep my Settings apps close by. (It’s the same reason I have the OS X Settings app in my Dock still, too.) When I do need to access settings it’s usually to turn on Airplane Mode or turn off Wi-Fi. Camera: For nearly the first two years I didn’t use my camera very much at all. It wasn’t until a few months ago, when I came up with the idea of For an iPhone, By an iPhone, that I began to take pictures at all. And now, with the latest and greatest camera and video capabilities in the 3GS, I’ve found myself taking a lot more candid photos and videos with family and friends that I haven’t made a habit of doing my entire adult life. Safari: Since so many iPhone web apps have their own Homescreen clips or full-on iPhone apps, I rarely just open up Mobile Safari and type in a URL. Though that’s not to say I don’t use it every day. Calendar: Synced to my MacBook Pro via MobileMe, I use my Calendar daily. Not only am I very focused when it comes to time management, I also go to quite a few meetings. From regularly scheduled one-on-ones with my staff and peers, to lots of random meetings each week. And a shockingly high amount of those meetings are set up when I bump into people while in line at our in-house coffee shop. Things: Since I operate so much of my day out of Things on iPhone and on my MacBook Pro, I sync Things at least twice a day - usually once in the morning, and once in the evening. It would be the perfect to-do app if only it offered over-the-air syncing like MobileMe. But, even still, Things is fantastic. The Dock: Phone, Mail, and Messages: These are the three apps I use habitually all day long, every day. Though I now search for contacts via iPhone’s Spotlight screen, I am constantly texting, emailing and making/receiving phone calls. --- ### Tim Van Damme URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/tim-van-damme Bio: Tim Van Damme is a belgian webdesigner running Made by Elephant by day, and blogging at Maxvoltar by night. Mac (and iPhone) fanatic, amateur photographer, GTD-nightmare, coffee drinker. Apps on this home screen: Birdbrain, Ego, Flight Control, Instapaper, Keynote, Rolando 2, Simplenote, TomTom, Tweetie The apps on my homescreen, left to right, top to bottom: The apps are grouped by category and how frequently they are used. On screen 2 I have all my less-used apps, and screen 3 is for the default apps I don’t use (and can’t bloody hide/remove). I own a 32Gb black iPhone, and don’t think I’ll ever buy a non-Apple mobile phone again. --- ### Trent Walton URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/trent-walton Bio: Trent Walton is founder and 1/3 of Paravel Inc., a custom web design and development shop based out of the Texas Hill Country. When he’s not working on client projects, he’s probably writing & designing articles for his blog, co-curating DesignSwap, or contributing ideas for the next edition of TheManyFacesOf.com. Apps on this home screen: Dropbox, Ego, Fever, Gowalla, Hipstamatic, Horror Vacui, IMDb, Instapaper, Pandora, Tweetie Maps: Though I don’t use this everyday, I find that having instant access to this mid-crosswalk or while driving down Loop 1 asking my navigator if I’m supposed to stay on or get off is essential. Horror Vacui: The only game I have on my iPhone. There was a time for about a month when I couldn’t go to sleep until I won 2 out of 3 vs the computer. Soon, Mimeoverse will take this spot. Hipstamatic: I rarely have the patience or time to run camera phone photos through photoshop, so this quirky little camera app comes in handy when you want to give your shots a dash of flavor. Camera: This comes in really handy for sharing graph paper sketches with the Paravel team on days we’re not working from the same office. After all, opening the scanner, situating your sketch and clicking scan is just too laborious. Pandora: I love Pandora, though the Tom Petty station is way too general. IMDB: I use this almost every day to track obscure actors all the way back to their guest starring roles on AirWolf. EGO: The simplest way to keep up with web stats & traffic. I’ve got Mint and Google Analytics for some of my favorite Paravel sites configured for regular monitoring. Dropbox: Matthew Smith recommended Dropbox to me about a year ago. I’ve got the iPad and iPhone versions for easy file access from anywhere. Instapaper: One of the first apps I use when I’ve got some free time. If I find a site or an article worth checking out during the workday, I’ll use the Instapaper bookmarklet to save it for later. Fever: The other app I use when I’ve got a free moment, Fever is really the only way I’ve been able to take advantage of RSS. I subscribe a lot, and using Fever’s “Hot” feature helps me find what I’d like to read without dealing with unread article counts. Gowalla: This app has proven to be as useful as it is fun. For the most part, I use this to brag about all the brilliant Texas food I’m eating. Also, Gowalla is based in Austin, TX and I love to support local web/tech businesses. Twitter: Formerly known as Tweetie, I love it no matter what you call it. --- ### Veerle Pieters URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/veerle-pieters Bio: Veerle Pieters is a graphic designer based in Belgium. Starting in ‘92 as a freelancer Veerle worked on print design before focussing on webdesign. She runs Duoh! n.v. together with Geert Leyseele. My home screen changes all the time, so this is basically a snapshot of today’s screen ;) Here is the list of apps on my home screen: Contacts: To access my personal contacts quickly iCal: For my personal calendar items Tweetie: To tweet from my iPhone Facebook: To access Facebook from my iPhone Messages: To stay in touch with my family who are more into using text messaging instead of e-mailing. Password1: For fast and easy access to all my different passwords. I have so many passwords I wouldn’t know what to do without this app honestly. Shazam: An amazing tool that recognizes the songs I don’t know. Groceries: Fast and handy app for my weekly visit to the super market. I tend to be distracted. Evernote: A way of (smart) saving everything I need to remember. All notes are synced together in 1 location. I have a lot of text snippets saved in there that I frequently need and bunch of URLs and resources. Everything is tagged so I can find things quickly. Daylite: For my business contacts, calendar, project planning, todos, milestones… CameraBag: To mask my lousy camera skills ;) Photos: To access my photo library and share them on the go if somebody wants to see a picture. Weather: To see the weather forecast of the next days here in Belgium (which changes so quickly all the time). Maps: To look up locations or to find my way. Clock: To view the time in different time zones, to makes sure I don’t call at weird hours or in the middle of the night. AI also use it a lot to set alarms. Settings: For quick access to my settings. --- ### Veronica Belmont URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/veronica-belmont Bio: Veronica is a technology and gaming-centric video host based out of San Francisco. Currently her projects include Qore (a monthly interactive magazine about the PS3 for Sony) and Tekzilla (a weekly tech help and how-to show on Revision3). She is also the media producer at gdgt, and writes a new column for MaximumPC.com called Trending Topics. Apps on this home screen: Authenticator, Foursquare, Kindle, Mint.com, TripIt, Things, Tweetie I would guess that like most people, I tend to keep the apps I use the most on the front page, and from there on out they’re organized by type or whatever random method I come up with that week. I haven’t mussed with the basic layout too much, because frankly I use the built-in apps almost as much as the ones I download myself. I’m a big fan of Mint, so I keep the app on the front screen so I can check my accounts on the go. Tweetie has been my favorite Twitter app for some time now, but I’ve heard good things about Birdfeed as well. I’m a self-admitted Foursquare addict, so that has to be right at my fingertips when I’m out and about, and Things keeps me from going insane by laying out everything I need to get done that particular day. Some of my other favorites include: --- ### Wil Shipley URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/wil-shipley Bio: I’m Wil Shipley, first founder of The Omni Group back in ’91 and the owner of Delicious Monster nowadays. Among other things I’ve worked on OmniWeb 1 & 2, was the lead on OmniGraffle 3, wrote OmniPDF (and licensed it and its framework to Apple), and wrote Delicious Library. I don’t use a ton of third-party software, although I’ve got four screens of games after this, but I almost never play them. The original “Library” app I did is up there, even though Amazon made me pull it from the Apple Store - six months of my life wasted, grr. I decided that the second-most commonly-used apps should be on the second-to-bottom row, so I put Maps, Tweets, Stocks, and Camera there, since I use those almost every day. I have to check my Apple stock daily, and I like to read tweets whenever I get a little down time - although I use Twitterific on the Mac, Tweetie was faster than Twitterific when I first started tweeting on my iPhone, and I’m not super-religious about brands. I just got “Schlage iLiNK” (ugh stupid name) two nights ago - it lets me check my webcams(!), turn on and off lights, set the temperature in my house, and unlock my doors from anywhere in the world! That’s pretty amazing, and some of it is actually useful. (It’s also part of some research I’m doing for a possible upcoming Delicious product.) I love iTunes Remote - I have six Airports in my house (most with speakers attached), a wall-mounted iMac in my kitchen that has my master iTunes collection on it, and an Apple TV. Remote lets me control all these things from wherever I am in the house, so I can play whatever music wherever. It’s one of those apps that feels like the future. --- ### William Couch URL: https://firstand20.com/homescreens/william-couch Bio: William Couch is an interaction designer, developer, and photographer. Currently in the Washington D.C. area, he focuses on creating interactive web applications at USA TODAY, alongside collaborating on user interface and user experience design for emerging platforms including iPhone, iPad, and Android. Apps on this home screen: Beer There, Foursquare, Gowalla, Instapaper, Tumblr, Things, Tweetie, USA TODAY I’m fairly specific about the arrangement of apps on my home screen, such that applications that I use most frequently are near the bottom and edges, with the right seeing more frequent use than the left. I use Calendar sparingly but having the date and day quickly accessible is handy. I should probably just move Contacts off the home screen as I just use Spotlight to search for contacts now, although that’s about all I use Spotlight for. Launching Contacts takes forever on my aging 3G and it’s then an additional tap (to top) to search or scrub on the alpha-slider, and invoking the keyboard can sometimes take an oddly long time. Swiping left on the home screen though, with near instant keyboard invocation and the cursor already in the search field, is just much faster. Maps is one of my favorite apps and I use it often enough that it takes this spot. Messages sits near the top edge as I use it often enough but not that it would be in the Dock or lower on the screen. I like having these four apps together as a bundle of the original apps. The varied colors and patterns sit nicely together. I find myself in Settings often, whether I’m toggling Airplane Mode, WiFi or brightness. Instapaper is far and away one of my most beloved apps. It has completely changed the way I read content online, and has even set my expectations about reading in general. That said, I really only find myself using this version of the app when I’m idling with just my iPhone, whether on the Metro or elsewhere. Otherwise, I far prefer the experience on iPad. I’m a big fan of Tumblr and enjoy keeping abreast on my Dashboard with the app. However, I seldom post on the go, and the auto-post to Twitter default really needs to go (this has been corrected in the v1.2 update). I’m always interested in seeing the progress and development of the design and functionality of iPhone apps so I keep the App Store front and center to see what’s popular, what’s new, which of my apps have updates, and to perform some self-monitoring on our iPhone apps. Of the location-based service apps, I’m smitten with Gowalla. I’m really intrigued by its design, exploratory philosophy, and concept of turning that exploration into a game rewarded by goods, both digital and physical. Plus, it’s the service most of the people I care about use, and I’ve definitely had many serendipitous moments where friends were nearby and I met up with them, or I’ve been able to make suggestions to others when they visit some of my favorite places around town. USA TODAY is here by default to monitor the content and application, but I also personally prefer the Weather tab to any other weather app on iPhone. It’s fast, simple, and gets me what I want to know. Nearing the left edge is Mail, which I don’t think requires explanation. Twitter is also a requisite, and like others, I wasn’t a huge fan of the icon change, especially being another blue one, but the app is still irrefutably the best designed Twitter app for iPhone. Though, I am keeping my eye on Iconfactory’s relaunch of Twitterrific with version 3. The simplification they’ve discussed in light of their iPad app has me intrigued. I’m not a huge fan of foursquare, but enough people I know use it that it’s worth having here. If I lived in New York or San Francisco, I’m sure I’d use it more as I’ve witnessed its utility when visiting those cities. BeerThere is a mobile web app that my buddy, Nick Nunns, and I are building to log where, when, and what beers we’ve tried. Nick’s a home brewer and we both love craft beer so we thought this would be a fun exercise. It’s a work in progress, so I use this for testing and designing the app and different icon variations. If you’re interested, you can sign up for the beta, coming soon this summer. First in the Dock is Phone, which I actually use with some frequency. Unlike most, I have little issue with AT&T’s service. In fact, I was happy to move off of Verizon as I get better reception in my apartment with AT&T, which is crucial without a landline. Safari also needs little explanation, it’s excellent and infinitely useful. Things and I have a love/hate relationship. It’s a beautiful app with one of the best icons, but I go through spurts of using it; when I have a lot of items to address and keep track of, it gets heavy use, but on a daily basis, it just sits there. I feel like I’ve spent more money with them than I have actually getting things done, which is silly. I do think I’ll use it more though with the coming OTA sync. Maybe then I can justify purchasing the iPad app. Finally, iPod holds its original place as I love and listen to music a lot, and this is almost always running when I’m out and about. Double-clicking the home button invokes the Camera which is why Camera is missing, and if iPod is running, invokes the controls. The rest of my screens are organized by application function, with the second for more web apps and utilities, third for camera and photo editing, fourth for music, remotes, and audio apps, fifth for games (I’m a pretty casual gamer), sixth for errands- and travel-related functions (Gas Cubby, Groceries, etc.), and the rest are kind of leftovers that I infrequently revisit. --- ## Apps (141) ### Tweetie (39 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tweetie Tweetie is a fast, full-featured twitter client for iPhone and iPod Touch. It offers everything you'd expect - from your timeline to trends - all with an incredibly polished user interface, fantastic performance, and unparalleled ease-of-use. ### Things (18 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/things Things is a beautifully focused and amazingly intuitive task manager. Other task managers either oversimplify or are too difficult to use. Either way you are not getting stuff done. Things instead has the right balance between ease of use and powerful features. You can even sync wirelessly with the desktop version of Things using Wi-Fi. ### Facebook (15 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/facebook Facebook for iPhone makes it easy to stay connected and share information with friends. Use your iPhone to start a conversation with Facebook Chat, check your friends' latest photos and status updates, look up a phone number or upload your own mobile photos to Facebook while on the go. ### Birdfeed (12 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/birdfeed Birdfeed is a very nice Twitter client for iPhone. ### Ego (9 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ego Ego gives you one central - and lovely - location to check web statistics that matter to you. With support for Feedburner, Google Analytics, Google PageRank™, Mint, Squarespace and Twitter, you can quickly view the number of visits to your website (including daily, hourly and monthly numbers), feed subscription totals and changes, and how many people are following you on Twitter. ### Foursquare (9 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/foursquare It's foursquare! Think: 50% friend-finder, 30% social cityguide, 20% nightlife game. We wanted to build something that not only helps you keep up with your friends, but exposes you to new things in and challenges you to explore cities in different ways. There's a lot of experimenting here, so bear with us as we try to figure it all out (and thanks!) ### Instapaper (9 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/instapaper Save web pages for later offline reading, optimized for readability on your iPhone or iPod touch's screen. Previously featured by Apple and critically acclaimed by top blogs, newspapers, and magazines! ### Gowalla (8 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/gowalla Share your experiences through Gowalla with your Facebook & Twitter friends. Stamp your passport and earn rewards at the places that you visit. Discover and create locations anywhere in the world with your iPhone. ### Remote (7 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/remote With Remote you can control the music on your computer or Apple TV from your iPhone or iPod. Play, pause,skip, shuffle. See your songs, playlists, and album art on your iPod touch or iPhone as if you were right in front of your computer. ### Twitterrific (7 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/twitterrific Twitterrific is the award-winning mobile Twitter client that's beautiful to look at, easy to us and chock full of elegant features. Manage multiple accounts, search Twitter quickly, filter tweets and much more. ### Fever (6 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/fever Your current feed reader is full of unread items. You’re hesitant to subscribe to any more feeds because you can't keep up with your existing subs. Maybe you've even abandoned feeds altogether. Fever takes the temperature of your slice of the web and shows you what's hot. ### Reeder (6 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/reeder Google Reader Client. ### Simplenote (6 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/simplenote The easy-to-use, syncable, searchable notes application for iPhone and iPod Touch. When you buy Simplenote, you also get full access to the web version. All your notes sill sync wirelessly with the web version when your device connects to the Internet. ### AIM (5 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/aim AIM keeps you connected to the people you care about right on your iPhone or iPod Touch. Mobile AIM lets you communicate whenever you want, wherever you are, in whatever way suits you best. Connect with friends and family and keep track of status and presence updates in real time. ### Birdhouse (5 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/birdhouse Birdhouse is a notepad for Twitter. It's a simple, well-designed app for capturing your ideas, saving them for later, and publishing when ready. ### Google (5 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/google Google Mobile App is the fastest, easiest way to search Google. ### Weather Channel (5 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/weather-channel The Weather Channel delivers the weather tools you need to plan your day, week or even the next hour. Using patented ultra-local TruPoint(sm) weather technology, The Weather Channel is the only weather provider to provide future radar, so you'll know where the storm is heading, not just where it's been. ### Wikipanion (5 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/wikipanion Wikipanion's custom formatting for the iPhone formats each page so that it is easy to read and quick to load. With a direct connection to the Wikipedia servers, pages load several times faster than when viewed from Safari. Wikipanion is the only Wikipedia reader to support double tap zooming in and out on the page. It also has complicated algorithms to display tables, size images and scale TeX equations for easier viewing. ### Dropbox (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/dropbox Access your Dropbox on the go. Download files for offline viewing. Sync photos and videos to your Dropbox. Share links to files in your Dropbox. ### Ember (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ember Ember is a Campfire client that allows you to use Campfire anywhere you go. Now in a native iPhone app you can chat effortlessly with groups large and small. ### Evernote (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/evernote Evernote for iPhone lets you capture any moment or idea as it happens, wherever you may find yourself. And, thanks to Evernote's amazing cloud-based sync, you can recall it all any time from your iPhone, Mac, PC, the Web, or other mobile device. ### Google Reader (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/google-reader Have trouble keeping up with the sites you visit? Read them in one place with Google Reader, where keeping up with your favorite websites is as easy as checking your email. ### NetNewsWire (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/netnewswire NNW is an RSS reader for iPhone. You can read news from millions of weblogs and sites that publish RSS feeds. Because NetNewsWire syncs with all of NewsGator's free RSS readers, if you read an item on your iPhone, you don't have to read it again on your Mac or other computer. It's automatically marked as read everywhere. ### Tumblr (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tumblr-web Tumblr lets you effortlessly share anything. Post text, photos, quotes, links, music, and videos, from your browser, phone, desktop, email, or wherever you happen to be. You can customize everything, from colors, to your theme's HTML. ### WeatherBug (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/weatherbug WeatherBug and WeatherBug Elite are now available at Apple's iTunes App Store. WeatherBug is the only source for truly live, local weather - providing users access to the largest network of professional weather stations in the US and thousands of locations around the world. Choose WeatherBug or WeatherBug Elite and put live, local weather in the palm of your hand. ### WriteRoom (4 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/writeroom For people who want to write and take notes on their iPhone. WriteRoom. iPhone is a distraction free writing environment. Unlike Notes, WriteRoom.iPhone provides a clean interface and tether free syncing. ### Bible (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/bible YouVersion has given you the ability to engage with Scripture like never before, and with YouVersion mobile you have access to the Bible, corresponding contributions, and online community no matter where you are. With YouVersion mobile the Bible is with you...during your morning commute in the tube, while waiting in line at the grocery store, or in church on Sunday. YouVersion gives you the power to engage in 40 different translations, in 22 languages, on one device that rests in the palm of your hand. Download the free App and enjoy regular time with the Bible, right when and where you need it. ### Byline (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/byline Read the latest news from your favorite sites and blogs on your iPhone or iPod Touch, even when you’re offline. Simply use your free Google Reader account to subscribe to websites you’d like to keep track of. Byline will automatically bring you new content, putting thousands of RSS and Atom feeds at your fingertips. ### CameraBag (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/camerabag Simple. Intuitive. Minimal interface. Take a new photo or choose one from your library, swipe between camera styles, and save any you like. For more control, use the options panel to set camera behavior, image size, cropping and border effects, and more. You can also email photos directly from within CameraBag. ### Flickr (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/flickr Almost certainly the best online photo management and sharing application in the world. ### Groceries (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/groceries Say goodbye to boring grocery planning and chaotic shopping lists. Simply select items from hundreds of ready-made groceries, find specific brands from thousands of products or add new items in an instant. Optionally organize your items by aisle and let Groceries navigate you through the supermarket. Compose your list on your iPhone and send it over standard Email to your partner who does the shopping. Whatever you need to buy: Groceries manages what belongs on a shopping list and adds features that really make sense and fun. In the supermarket, Groceries gives you a beautiful yet simple to use shopping list to quickly cross items off as you add them to your cart. ### Kindle (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/kindle Kindle for iPhone allows Apple iPhone and iPod Touch owners to read Kindle books using a simple, easy-to-use interface. You can shop for hundreds of thousands of books at www.amazon.com/kindlestore, and wirelessly transfer the books to your iPhone or iPod Touch. ### MLB At Bat (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mlb-at-bat At Bat 2009 brings LIVE baseaball to the iPhone and iPod touch. At Bat 2009 now delivers 1-2 LIVE streaming games a day. Also included are live Audio, pitch-by pitch, and in-game video highlights. ### OmniFocus (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/omnifocus Winner of the 2008 Apple Design Award for Best iPhone Productivity Application, OmniFocus brings task management to your fingertips. Keep track of tasks by project, place, person, or date. Bring up a shopping list, agenda items to discuss at work, things to do at home, and any other lists you need. ### PCalc (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pcalc PCalc is ideal for scientists, engineers, students, programmers, or indeed anybody looking for a feature-rich calculator for the iPhone or iPod Touch. It includes an extensive set of unit conversions, a paper tape, an RPN mode, engineering and scientific notation, as well as support for hexadecimal, octal and binary calculations. ### Tumblr (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tumblr Use Tumblr's iPhone app to easily post quotes, photos, audio, and more to your tumblelog. ### Yelp (3 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/yelp Yelp was founded in 2004 to help people find great local businesses like dentists, hair stylists and mechanics. ### 1Password (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/1password Now every iPhone and iPod touch owner can experience the peace of mind of secure, safe web browsing that Mac users have known for years! Do you use the same password every time you create a new web site account because it would be impossible to remember them all if you didn't, choosing convenience over safety? No longer do you have to make this difficult choice! 1Password secures your most private data without inconveniencing you. It not only creates and saves as many different passwords as you'd like, but it restores them as well, at your command. ### Attic (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/attic Attic is a slick music controller for all those unplayed albums that are collecting dust sitting in your iTunes library. Listen to, create playlists of, and shuffle through your forgotten albums. ### BeejiveIM (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/beejiveim Based in San Francisco, Beejive (pronounced \bē-hīv\) is a privately held company specializing in the design and development of software for mobile devices. Founded in 2006, Beejive strives to become the world's premier developer of fast, reliable, and easy-to-use mobile software. BeejiveIM, the initial offering from Beejive's product portfolio, is a multi-protocol instant messaging client that connects the mobile user to the major instant messaging networks. BeejiveIM was created to address the lack of reliable, user-friendly instant messaging applications available to mobile users. ### CNN (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/cnn NOW you can get live streaming video of breaking news, the most important headlines of the day with location-based news, weather and traffic from the palm of your hands. With the NEW CNN App for the iPhone and iPod touch, you can also iReport directly from your phone using the phone's advanced photo and video capabilities. Download the CNN App for the iPhone and iPod touch, available now on the App Store. ### CityTransit (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/citytransit CityTransit is a guide to traveling through the New York City subway. It includes official maps licensed from NYC's MTA, line data, a GPS-based station finder and live service advisories. ### Daylite (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/daylite Daylite Touch is a business productivity manager for the iPhone and iPod touch, designed as a companion to Daylite on the Mac. Winner of a 2009 Macworld Best of Show award, Daylite Touch helps you manage your business and your team, keeping everyone on the same page and helping you stay on track and deliver on time. ### Flight Control (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/flight-control Flight Control is a delightful action/strategy game for iPhone and iPod Touch that is as simple as it is wickedly addictive. Touch and drag your aircraft to their landing zones, and avoid mid-air collisions. It sounds easy, but as more and more planes arrive you will need smart strategy, keen eyes and a smooth steady-as-she-goes touch! ### Hipstamatic (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/hipstamatic Digital Photography Never Looked So Analog. The Hipstamatic for iPhone is an application that brings back the look, feel, unpredictable beauty, and fun of plastic toy cameras from the past. ### IMDb (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/imdb IMDb is the world's largest collection of movie, TV and celebrity information, and has the leading app on the iPhone and iPod Touch to find US showtimes, watch trailers, browse photo galleries, get US TV listings, find latest DVD and Blu-ray releases, explore popular charts and share movie information. We aim to list every detail about every movie and TV show ever made, including who was in it, who made it, the plot, user ratings, trailers, photos, reviews, quotes, goofs, trivia and much more. ### Mint.com (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mint.com This application is a must-have for budgeting. A huge financial planning time saver with in-depth budget analysis and practical alerts. Make smart spending and saving decisions a cinch with Mint! ### Mint (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mint Mint is an extensible, self-hosted web site analytics program. Its interface is an exercise in simplicity. Visits, referrers, popular pages and searches can all be taken in at a glance on Mint's flexible dashboard. ### Mobile Fotos (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mobile-fotos Mobile Fotos is an iPhone application for browsing and uploading to Flickr. It finds photos taken near your current location, plays videos, and uploads your images with geotags and EXIF data intact. ### Ninjawords (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ninjawords Ninjawords is a dictionary for the iPhone built on these principles. We made it because we saw that the low-cost dictionaries on the App Store are slow, cluttered, and all use the same bad data source (WordNet) for their definitions. ### NYTimes (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/nytimes NYTimes app allows you to enjoy the high-quality journalism of The New York Times on your iPhone, wherever you are. Specifically designed to utilize the features and navigation of the iPhone, this application downloads and syncs the latest news directly to your device. Compatible with the iPhone, iPhone 3G and iPod Touch with operating systems version 2.x. ### Pandora (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pandora Pandora Radio is your own FREE personalized radio now available to stream music on your iPhone. Just start with the name of one of your favorite artists, songs or classical composers and Pandora will create a "station" that plays their music and more music like it. Already a Pandora user? Even easier. Just log in. Pandora on the iPhone is fully integrated with Pandora on the web. Enjoy all your existing stations - and create new ones right from your iPhone or iPod Touch. ### Pastebot (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pastebot Pastebot Command Copy & Paste. * Overview * Gallery * Sync * Press Pastebot Overview Pastebot is a powerful clipboard manager that stores text & images copied from your iPhone/iPod Touch. Organize, apply filters to, and copy clippings to be pasted or sent to other apps. Don’t just use Copy & Paste. Command it! ### Pianist (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pianist Pianist is a virtual piano for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Use it as a musical scratchpad when away from the studio, or as an instrument to jam with your friends. ### Ramp Champ (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ramp-champ Delight your Senses in this new twist on a classic boardwalk game. Experience the Wonders of the ocean depths. Gaze in Awe as strange alien creatures descend from the skies. Join Us on a journey through lush, sun-filled fields and dazzling carnival nights. Test your Skills as you amass vast quantities of tickets which can be redeemed for virtual baubles and trinkets. ### Rolando 2 (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/rolando-2 The sequel to the iPhone Game of the Year has arrived in style! Get ready to roll as you guide a massive cast of characters on a funky new quest filled with action and surprise behind every touch. ### Shazam (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/shazam Create and share music moments and stories. With Shazam you can identify music tracks, buy them, and share the tags with friends. You can also learn more about artists; keep and grow your music collection and personalise your tags. ### WhatTheFont (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/whatthefont Identify the fonts in a photo or web graphic! Ever seen a great font in a magazine ad, poster, or on the web and wondered what font it is? Whip out your iPhone and snap a photo, and WhatTheFont for iPhone will identify that font in seconds! WhatTheFont for iPhone connects directly to MyFonts’ acclaimed font identification service, which has been helping customers pinpoint mystery fonts for 10 years. It works via Wi-Fi or the mobile phone network, so you can get your font fix right there on the spot. ### Yammer (2 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/yammer Yammer is a way for employees to connect and share by posting messages. As employee participation grows, Yammer becomes a corporate social network, discussion board, and knowledge base all rolled into one easy-to-use interface. ### Accuweather (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/accuweather Get the "Best Weather on the Web" wherever you go with the AccuWeather GPS application for iPhone. This worldwide forecasting tool has all the free features you need to "weatherproof" your day. ### 2Do (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/2do Get things done by being in the center, 2Do surrounds you with your projects and actions, grouped the way you like them, sorted the way you need them and reminding you at the time you want them done. ### Air Mouse Pro (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/air-mouse-pro Instantly transform your iPhone or iPod touch into an air mouse, trackpad, and wireless remote for your computer! Sit back and surf the web, browse your photo library or control your music player from the comfort of your couch. Our air mouse uses the built in accelerometer to translate your hand motions into mouse movements on your screen. It can also operate as a trackpad, allowing you to control your computer with a single finger. Suddenly your iPhone has become an essential part of any home theater PC and a presenter's best friend. Using an innovative application notification system, the iPhone will always know what applications are running at any time and show the appropriate keys for that program, providing you with a single screen for controlling ALL your media and web applications. ### Amazon (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/amazon The Amazon Mobile app allows iPhone and iPod Touch owners to very quickly search, shop, compare prices, read reviews, and make purchases on Amazon.com using a simple, yet elegant interface. ### Air Sharing (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/air-sharing With Air Sharing, you can mount your iPhone or iPod touch as a wireless drive on any Mac, Windows, or Linux computer. Drag-drop files between your iPhone or iPod touch and your computers. View documents in many common formats. ### Authenticator (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/authenticator The Battle.net Mobile Authenticator is an optional tool that offers Battle.net account users an additional layer of security to help prevent unauthorized account access. This includes World of Warcraft players who log in to the game using a Battle.net account. The Authenticator application itself is a small program that you install and access on your cell phone or mobile device. ### Analytics (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/analytics Instant, Mobile Access to Google Analytics. Finally you can get to all of your reports and data with Analytics App for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Whether you’re on the road, in a meeting, or sitting on the throne, Analytics App gives you quick and easy access to your analytics data. ### BBC iPlayer (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/bbc-iplayer To play BBC programmes on your iPhone or iPod touch, you'll need to be online via a wi-fi broadband connection (the iPhone's EDGE connectivity is too slow for streaming video). BBCiPlayer on iPhone is a beta version right now, so if you find some programmes aren't available on iPhone or you get the occasional oddity... yep, we're working on it. ### Beer There (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/beer-there Mobile web app, currently under development by William Couch and Nick Nunns. ### Billings (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/billings Billings Touch is a time tracking and invoicing application for the iPhone, designed for standalone use – or as a companion to Billings on the Mac. Create clients, add new projects, and track time when you're mobile. Invoice your clients straight from your iPhone – or sync over WiFi to Billings on your Mac. Also keep track of mileage, expenses, and client payments. Billings Touch lets you invoice like a pro, even when you're mobile. ### Birdbrain (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/birdbrain Birdbrain monitors your Twitter account for changes to your friends and followers. When you start Birdbrain it takes a snapshot of your Twitter account and shows you the changes since it last updated. While Birdbrain is running it will automatically update every 20 minutes. ### Boxcar (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/boxcar Boxcar sends push notifications when you're mentioned on Twitter, or sent a direct message. The best part is, it works with what you already love: Twittelator, Tweetie, Twitterrific, Twitterfon (Lite and Pro), Twinkle, SimplyTweet, Twitterena+ (Lite and Pro), Birdfeed or Hahlo.com! ### Brushes (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/brushes Brushes is a painting application designed from scratch for the iPhone and iPod touch. Featuring an advanced color picker, several realistic brushes, multiple layers, extreme zooming, and a simple yet deep interface, it is a powerful tool for creating original artwork on your mobile device. Brushes allows you to choose any color (including transparency) using the hue/saturation color wheel. With a generous level of undo and redo you never need to worry about making a mistake or backing up too far. Brushes records all of your actions when painting. These actions are stored in a .brushes file which you can download directly from your iPhone or iPod touch via Brushes’ built-in web server. Version 2.0 adds support for layers. Each painting can have up to four layers. Layers can be rearranged, deleted, merged, and copied between paintings. You can also adjust the opacity of each layer. Nominee You can open your .brushes paintings in Brushes Viewer, a free application for Mac OS X. Brushes Viewer allows you to replay your paintings stroke for stroke, export them at very high resolutions (up to 1920 x 2880), and even export them as QuickTime movies. ### Boxee (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/boxee The boxee remote turns your iPhone into a boxee remote control. The boxee remote app connects to boxee over wifi and has two modes: Gesture Mode and Buttons Mode. ### Camera Genius (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/camera-genius Camera Genius is the camera app you wished your iPhone shipped with. Loaded with features you want in a camera app. *NEW* Burst Mode - Capture up to 3 shots in quick succession. (2 shots with iPhone 3g or 1st generation iPhone) *NEW* Location and Timestamp - automatically add the location and timestamp into every photo. *NEW* Camera Zoom - Now zoom in on subjects to get that close up shot. *NEW* Camera Manual - Lots of hints on the best way to take photos on your iPhone. *NEW* - Redesigned user interface. To start with you can capture group photos just by saying "cheese" or making some noise. Now capture that perfect shot just when everyone is ready. Anti-shake stabilization helps eliminate those blurry photos. A timer lets you setup timed group photos. You can set the interval between 2 and 30 seconds. Just tap the numbers when the timer pulls up to change the timing interval. Finally the big photo button makes it easy to capture those photos without having to try and tap the tiny photo button potentially missing that candid shot. Just tap the screen to take the photo. Camera guides help you compose and align photos based on known photographic principles. We also keep track of the number of photos you are taking with a little reminder in the upper corner. Reset the count to zero by tapping it. Start using this camera app today and you will quickly be replacing the default camera application. ### Classics (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/classics Escape into some of the greatest stories ever written and experience a revolutionary new reading platform, only for iPhone and iPod Touch. ### Darkslide (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/darkslide Darkslide (formerly Exposure) puts Flickr in your pocket. Get access to your Photos, Photosets, Groups, Tags and Contacts in one place, share photos and use the location features of iPhone to find photos on Flickr that were taken near you. ### Deep Green (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/deep-green Deep Green is a beautiful and elegant iPhone OS chess application for the casual player. Playing chess has never been such a pleasant experience. On any platform. Enjoy the beautifully rendered graphics and animations in a simplistic and powerful user interface. ### Dictionary (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/dictionary The free Dictionary app delivers world-class reference content from Dictionary.com and Thesaurus.com including more than 275,000 definitions and 80,000 synonyms. The app also features audio pronunciations, similarly spelled words and Dictionary.com's popular Word of the Day that is enjoyed by more than a million users. ### EccoNote (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ecconote This recorder is simply the best Voice Recorder in the Application Store that you can get. Please compare us with the other recorder applications, feature for feature. Use EccoNote Pro to record Notes, Memos, Meetings whatever you want! EccoNote Pro was written to solve a simple need: the ability to record something quickly, and have it play back. ### Epicurious (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/epicurious Epicurious' Recipes & Shopping List allows users to browse and search our 25,000 professionally created recipes, toggling between an easy-to-view shopping format, and a cooking format that shows one instruction step at a time. ### Eucalyptus (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/eucalyptus A ground breaking new app for the iPhone that puts over 20,000 classic books in the palm of your hand. ### Flickit (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/flickit Keep your Flickr photostream up to date while you're on the go! Upload and tag batches of photos using Flickit's super-fast uploading engine and streamlined interface. ### File Magnet (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/file-magnet FileMagnet makes it easy to copy files from your computer to your iPhone and iPod Touch. It's compatible with all the popular file formats so you can read all your favorite documents on the go. ### FlipTime (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/fliptime Omletworks today announced the immediate availability of FlipTime, an iPhone application which is a simple desk clock & calendar which is designed to look like flight information boards at airports. It uses actual sound sampled from actual clocks so as to realize the flip-flap feelings. Take a look at all of panels fluttering at launching this application!! And try to flip panels by flicking from top to down!! ### FluxTunes (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/fluxtunes Ever tried to use your iPhone/iPod touch to play music while you're driving? How about when you're jogging and have your iPhone/iPod touch attached to your arm or hip? There are times when it just isn't convenient (or safe!) to have to unlock your phone and look at the screen while you use small touchscreen controls to control music playback. That's where this music player comes in. Control playback with intuitive gestures anywhere on the touchscreen. ### Free RSS (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/free-rss A free RSS reader application without ads. Simply add your feeds, then manage and read them. Feed caching support for offline reading and unread items indicator. ### Frenzic (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/frenzic Frenzic is a fast paced puzzle-based game for iPhone, iPod touch and Mac OS X that will sharpen your reflexes and get your neurons firing. It takes only minutes to learn and months to master, but beware, once you start playing you may never want to stop! ### Gmail App (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/gmail-app - Browsing Gmail on a large screen - Remembering a google account besides Safari - A built-in browser that displays links - Interface orientation settings - Custom domain settings (for Google Apps) ### Harvest (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/harvest Time tracking on your iPhone just got better with the Harvest Time Tracker. Now you can quickly and easily manage your timesheets on-the-go. * Track your billable-hours online, or offline. The Harvest time tracker automatically syncs your offline records when you are back online. * Easily switch between tasks you are tracking with a single tap. * Manually activate the syncing process by a simple "shake to sync" action. ### HopStop (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/hopstop Just like the website, this app provides detailed public transit directions and information. Whether traveling by bus, subway, taxi or walking, this app will get you where your going. ### Horror Vacui (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/horror-vacui Horror Vacui is a two-player abstract strategy board game based on the antiquated notion: Nature abhors a vacuum. ### iDisk (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/idisk You can already access your iDisk online at me.com. And now you can access it right from your iPhone or iPod touch. Free for MobileMe members, the iDisk app for iPhone and iPod touch makes your important files accessible anytime, anywhere. View popular file types, such as Microsoft Office and iWork ’09 documents and presentations, PDFs, and more, in portrait or landscape. Share any file, big or small, with just a few taps. And access files in the Public folders of other MobileMe members just as easily. ### iVideoCamera (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/ivideocamera iVideo Camera lets any iPhone (2G,3G,3GS) record videos. Now with tons of effects, this is best video app not only for older phones, but also for 3GS users! ### Keynote (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/keynote Now you can maintain complete control of your Keynote presentation using your iPhone or iPod touch, thanks to Keynote Remote. The application works with Keynote ’09 (part of the iWork ’09 productivity suite), letting you progress through your slides with a swipe. Hold iPhone vertically, and you see presenter notes; horizontally, and you see the current and next slide in your presentation. ### Labyrinth (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/labyrinth Labyrinth is the classic game where you control a steel ball by tilting a wooden labyrinth. It is available for iPhone/iPod touch and Android. The full version of Labyrinth has over 1000 levels and is controlled by the accelerometer with high accuracy. Labyrinth has been downloaded more than 10 000 000 times (Yes, 10.0 million!). ### LiveView (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/liveview LiveView is a specialized remote screen viewing application intended as a tool to help designers create graphics for mobile applications, it has also proven to be useful for creating quick and dirty simulations, demos, and experience prototypes. ### MobileRSS (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mobilerss MobileRSS is a full featured Google Reader client for your iPhone & iPod touch. MobileRSS comes in three versions - Free, Premium ($2.99, ad-free), and Pro ($4.99, ad-free) - all usable if you have a free Google Reader account. With offline integration, you'll be sure to find MobileRSS a simple and effective way to track your favorite online content. ### Navigon (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/navigon With the NAVIGON Mobile Navigator you can transform your iPhone into a complete mobile navigation system. Experience the unique features and user-friendliness known from NAVIGON's multi-award-winning personal navigation devices on your iPhone wherever you go. The software includes many of NAVIGON's hallmark navigation functions such as Reality View™ Pro, Lane Assistant Pro, Speed Assistant and Day & Night Mode. And of course, it features NAVIGON's sophisticated and elegant map views including branded POIs along the route. The new route guide for your iPhone - the ideal companion for all frequent travellers. ### NPR News (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/npr-news For those who like to get their NPR information on the go, we're pleased to announce the launch of the NPR News iPhone app. It's designed to let you tune in your favorite stations, catch up on programs you missed or simply stay abreast of the latest news. It's fast and efficient. And, like the redesigned Web site, designed to deliver news and programming to standards NPR listeners and readers have come to expect -- with integrity, consistency and occasional wit. ### Pano (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pano Pano for iPhone lets you take beautiful, seamless panoramic photos straight from your phone, no other software necessary. ### Pickin' Time (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/pickin-time A fast, family-friendly game that's bushels of fun for kids and adults of all ages. ### Remindness (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/remindness Helping you remember what the fuck it is you are supposed to be doing! ### RedLaser (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/redlaser What if your iPhone could read barcodes? ...just like the scanners at the checkout (you know, the ones with the red laser.) You could do all sorts of cool things. * Check online prices for a DVD player. * Scan movies at the store and beam them to your TiVo. * Scan a book and check for reviews. * Scan the milk and add it to your grocery list. I know what you’re thinking. That’s impossible, right? You heard the camera just wasn’t good enough. Actually, it is good enough. But you can’t use just any old barcode technology. You need RedLaser – just maybe the most advanced 1D barcode recognition technology on planet earth. ### RTM (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/remember-the-milk Remember The Milk (RTM) lets you manage tasks quickly and easily. An intuitive interface makes managing tasks fun. Set due dates easily with next Friday or in 2 weeks. Extensive keyboard shortcuts make task management quicker than ever. ### Rowmote (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/rowmote You love the remote control which came with your Mac - so simple yet elegant, with easy control of Front Row, iTunes, Quicktime, DVD Player, Keynote, and more. You carry your iPhone or iPod Touch wherever you go... Enter Rowmote! On one side, Rowmote is just like your Mac’s remote control but over the wireless network. On the flip side, by tapping the Apps button, you get bonus abilities, switching between most controlled programs and toggling the iTunes Visualizer. Rowmote controls Front Row, Airfoil Video, Adobe Lightroom 2, Amarra, Boxee, DVD Player. eyeTV, Firefox, iPhoto, iStopMotion, iTunes, Keynote ’08 and ‘09, kJams Pro, Last.fm, Movist, mPlayer, OpenOffice Impress, PandoraBoy, PandoraJam, Plex, Powerpoint 2004 and 2008, Quicktime, Safari, Skim, Spotify, The Tube, VLC, and XBMC. Rowmote can even sleep and wake your computer! ### Rolando (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/rolando Rolandoland has been invaded and the Rolandos need your help! Use innovative tilt, tap and Multi-Touch controls to solve physics puzzles, toy with interactive environments, and evade pesky enemies as you lead the Rolandos to victory. ### Satchel (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/satchel Bring the popular and critically-acclaimed productivity service Backpack everywhere with you on iPhone or iPod touch! Satchel for iPhone gives you the ease of use and functionality of Backpack, no matter how far you are from your computer! ### Schlage LiNK (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/schlage-link Complement your Schlage Link system with this iPhone application that allows you to remotely monitor your doors and grant entry to your home anywhere in the world. Additionally control othe Z-Wave devices directly or through scenes and schedules created within your Schlage Link web portal. ### Slingplayer (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/slingplayer Is that TV on your phone? You bet it is. When connected to a Slingbox SOLO, PRO, or PRO-HD, this award winning app will play anything you can see on your TV at home on your iPhone or iPod touch. Change channels, control your DVR and watch your favorite shows right on your phone. And best of all, there are no monthly fees. We really think this app is one of the best reasons to own a Slingbox – a seamless, high quality experience that shows off the magic of Sling technology and the iPhone. This app is restricted to Wi-Fi only at this time. ### Socialcast (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/socialcast This new application (that is, of course, free) enables mobile access to your Socialcast community with a robust set of features that makes using the app easy and effective. We’ve made sure that all conversations are threaded in this app, giving you the clear context around messages you find and share from your phone. With this app, Socialcast is keeping its focus on activity streams – making filtering information and people easy on your iPhone. In the app, you can switch between activity streams, allowing visibility to your home stream, group activity, and custom streams. ### Stanza (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/stanza Stanza is a free application for your iPhone and iPod Touch. Use it to download from a vast selection of over 100,000 books and periodicals, and read them right on your phone. It’s a wireless electronic library that stays open 24/7. ### Subway Shuffle (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/subway-shuffle The iPhone game Subway Shuffle is a collection of puzzles set in a subway system. You have boarded a car on the Red Line, and your task is to reach your destination. The problem is, there are other subway cars in your way! Each subway car can move only on its own color line: the red cars on the Red Line, the blue cars on the Blue Line, etc. Can you shuffle the cars from station to station, eventually moving your own car to your exit station? Subway Shuffle comes with 70 different layouts, of increasing difficulty. The early levels are fairly easy. They help you learn the techniques you will need to solve the later levels -- which, though simple looking, are surprisingly challenging. ### Take Control (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/take-control MobileMe has become a Swiss- army knife of online services, offering not only a whizzy "push" data-syncing service for tracking calendar, contact, and bookmark info on a variety of devices, but also email services, online storage and file sharing, a place to put your iWeb site or share photos or videos, and more. Take Control of MobileMe helps you understand the features and get set up, and then it dives into the details of real-life projects. ### TaskPaper (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/taskpaper TaskPaper is a surprisingly adept to-do list with a paper-like user experience. Other to-do apps start with a database and build up; TaskPaper starts with a sheet of paper and builds down. ### TomTom (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tomtom You never leave the house without your iPhone. Now, everywhere you go, you can have the most advanced navigation technology to lead the way. Turn every trip into a navigation experience to remember. The TomTom app puts award-winning technology at your fingertips, like IQ Routes™ which gives you the smartest, most efficient route for any time of day. ### Trip Cubby (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/trip-cubby Trip Cubby is a polished, full featured app; essential for anyone who needs to track mileage for tax deduction or reimbursement. After many failed attempts over the years at keeping a paper mileage log, we created Trip Cubby to take the time and tedium out of this money saving process. We designed Trip Cubby to be fast, clever, and above all, easy to use. With predictive input, auto-entry, auto-calculation, and quick access to frequent trips, Trip Cubby does the hard work for you. A few quick taps will create useful data ready to search, sort, and generate email reports. ### Tris (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tris No longer available. Pulled from the App Store... Google "Tris" to find out more. ### Twitter Search (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/twitter-search Search Twitter in realtime - see what the world is doing right now. ### Typography (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/typography Are you a graphic designer? Do you know the difference between a font and a typeface? Do your eyes light up when conversations turn to ems, kerning, and baseline grids? If you answered yes to these questions, then The Typography Manual for the iPhone and iPod Touch is for you! The Typography Manual has several useful features and resources for designers, including a visual type anatomy glossary, a font size ruler, an em calculator, and enough content to fill a 60-page book. It has all the essentials of a desk reference in a regularly updated pocket resource. ### USA TODAY (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/usa-today The latest news, sports scores, weather and photos you’ve come to expect from USA TODAY are now available for your iPhone and iPod Touch. Staying informed on the go has never been this quick, easy or enjoyable. ### Urban Daddy (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/urban-daddy The brand new UD application has your answer to the eternal question: "where should we go next?" ### Weather Eye (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/weather-eye * Detailed Current Conditions, Short Term, Hourly and Long Term Forecasts * Severe Weather Alerts (Canada and USA) * Multiple city access (travel, cottage or favourite destination) * Radar and Satellite maps (On iphone and Android) * Data available in Celsius or Fahrenheit, Metric or Imperial * One touch access to mobile.theweathernetwork.com for additional info (Flight times, traffic, golf and ski reports…) ### Weightbot (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/weightbot Weightbot Whether you are trying to lose (or gain) a few pounds, tracking your weight has never been more fun. Set your goal weight, record your weight at any interval (one weight per day max), view your BMI, and see your progress on a beautiful graph. Weightbot also has a built-in secure password feature to protect your weight from prying eyes. It’s easy to use, surprisingly addicting, and designed for everyone to enjoy. Even if you are not actively dieting, you will love tracking your weight just to use Weightbot. ### WordBook (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/wordbook WordBook is the most downloaded commercial English dictionary in iTunes App Store. It is quick, intuitive, rich and more of all, loved by tens of thousand iPhone and iPod users. WordBook comes from the developer of long time favorite WordBook for Smartphone, winner of Smartphone and Pocket PC Magazine's Best Dictionary Software Award in 2007. ### Zen Bound (1 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/zen-bound Something to be enjoyed at a slow pace: a game where a high score is not the goal. Zen Bound is designed to challenge in a subtle way, it does not attack or force the player. Zen Bound is a game of stone, wood and rope; much effort was put into making them feel right. Above all, we focus on playability and polish. Zen Bound features an original musical score and sound effects by Ghost Monkey. Original concept and coding by Mikko 'Memon' Mononen, of modest demoscene experience and previously in lead engineer position for Crysis. ### B&N eReader (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/bn-ereader Automatic downloads of your latest Barnes & Noble eBook purchases and samples. Access to download eBooks from your Online Library anytime. Bookmarks, note taking & highlight functionality. Lookup function for dictionary, Wikipedia or Google. Portrait or landscape display modes. Customizable font, margins and page gestures. ### Convertbot (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/convertbot ### Happening (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/happening Happening brings nearby events from Yahoo's Upcoming.org service to your pocket. TechCrunch: "The Upcoming app Yahoo should have built" ### I Took This Today (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/i-took-this-today Absolutely the quickest and easiest way to get pictures and movies from your phone to the web. ### Jamie Oliver (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/jamie-oliver "you too can have the best cooking app we've come across yet" - coolhunting.com "The daddy of all food apps" - The Observer ### Kilo (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/kilo The first step to getting your weight under control is to keep a food diary to track what you are eating. If it’s not easy to keep your diary updated, you are not going to do it. Kilo gives you easy access to your food diary, whether you are at your desk, or on the go. It’s actually easier than pen and paper because it remembers your previous foods and exercises, let’s you duplicate previous entries, and gives you a link that will search the internet for caloric values of foods that are new to you. ### Mill Colour (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/mill-colour The Mill is one of leading visual effects companies in the world. With its Mill Colour app, The Mill takes some of the excellent color control that it’s known for in the professional editing world and brings it to your iPhone. ### Outside (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/outside Outside combines current weather and local forecasts with custom push notifications. Swipe to see the forecast or setup and receive alerts when the weather is just right. ### Photoshop (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/photoshop It's easy to use the PS.com Mobile App on your iPhone. Simply drag your finger to crop, adjust color, apply effects - you name it. * Crop, rotate, change color with just a touch. * Give an extra glow with Soft Focus. * Get artsy with Sketch. * Apply one-touch effects like Warm Vintage and Vignette. Try any edit - you can undo it. ### SalesCast (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/salescast Splendora SalesCast puts the most fabulous ONLINE sales (from our favorite private sale sites like HauteLook, Ideeli, Rue La La, Billion Dollar Babes, and Swirl) all in one place ... the iPhone. Starting with the best deal of all: Splendora SalesCast is free and in the App store now. (Web version coming soon.) ### Snapture (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/snapture No one trick ponies here. Snapture is the next generation camera app that delivers a comprehensive feature set that will truly revolutionize the way you take photos on the iPhone. ### The Guardian (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/the-guardian A smart, flexible and stylish way to access a great digital brand on the move." Wired.co.uk #1 Paid, Grossing & Paid News (UK & Ire) ### TiltShift (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tiltshift This is the 5th release from the ToyCamera series and this software will allow you to create retro miniature pictures. Originally, it's published as a free web service and AIR app. Now the awaited iPhone version has finally been released. By adjusting various parameters, it allows you to apply many ToyCamera effects on your pictures: from miniature pictures to vintage styles images. It is an indispensable app for all the ones who like fashionable ToyCamera style pictures. With TiltShiftGenerator you'll also be able to take a simple photo and adjust the details of each picture taken with camera apps such as my ToyCamera. ### Tipulator (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tipulator Take the guesswork out of restaurant tipping. Enter the bill amount, select a percentage, and Tipulator will calculate the tip. And it’ll split the check among friends. Use Tipulator the next time you go out to dinner… your dining partners will be curiously fascinated with your cute new toy. ### Tripmix (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/tripmix Every road trip needs the right music. Tripmix gives you the ultimate road trip mix wrapped in a retro interface. Sit back, pop in that 8-track and enjoy the ride. ### TypePad (0 of 65 home screens) URL: https://firstand20.com/apps/category/typepad TypePad bloggers who own an iPhone have been able to use the i.typepad.com solution for months now, creating and editing posts, checking stats and managing comments from the Safari browser. The launch of the TypePad download offers exciting new features and functionality.