The year 2010 has been a very good year for the Apple iPad. In earlier blog posts I was a bit critical, but now I am a believer. People ask me often should they purchase an iPad, and my answer is generally the same-”buying an iPad is like having leather interior in your car, you don’t need it, but it’s nice if you have it.”
It is very hard to narrow down my top ten apps because there are so many that are so good, but here is my list.
Flipboard-This app has revolutionized the way I see my twitter lists, rss feeds from Google reader and Flickr. It was the apple app of the year from 2010. I can write so much about this app, but do yourself a favor and download this asap.
Instapaper- This app is new to me, but not new to the app store. This is a great app for reading content that you save from any web site and viewing offline. This is great for those long airline flights with no wifi.
Evernote-If you are like me you have a hard time remembering things so you write a lot of notes. The Evernote iPad app makes it easy to upload/sort/create notes and even audio record them. I am using it now for a major proposal I am writing and it is very good and easier than keeping multiple word documents.
Goodreader -Quick summary: super-robust PDF reader with advanced reading, annotating, markup and highlighting capabilities, excellent file manager, TXT file reader and editor, audio/video player, Safari-like viewer for MS Office and iWorks files(From the Goodreader web site). I couldn’t have written it any better. I use this to read and organize all pdfs on my iPad.
Osfoora HD- This app is by far my favorite twitter app for my iPhone and iPad. I have tried many twitter apps and I like this one because its versatile and fast and I can access everything I want quickly in this app. If you are a “twitter app snob” like me, trust me, give this one a try. I have persuaded many friends to purchase it.
Dropbox If you don’t know what Dropbox is, the service offers about 2GB of free space in their cloud for your files, and automatically syncs your cloud storage space with the folder of your choice on your Mac or PC. Dropbox for iPad allows you to view these files on the go, as long as you are connected via 3G or WiFi. You can for instance open a Keynote/Powerpoint document available in your dropbox folder via Keynote on your iPad. It is hands down my favorite cloud storage services and apps.
Keynote for iPad- In 2010 I used this app for major presentations and it hasn’t let me down. Apple has been good about rolling out updates, for example being able to view your presenter notes while presenting. This won’t take the place of my laptop for presentations, but for short presentations this is my app of choice.
Kindle- I included this app and not the apple iBooks app because of the amount of books that are available on the kindle store. The iBooks apps interfaces better, but the selection is still lacking. Amazon’s specialty is books and I use this app daily whenever I am reading my ebooks.
Netflix-This app came in handy recently when I took my 4 year old daughter to spend the night at my mothers house. She asked me did I bring DVD’s for her to watch and I said, “just give her my iPad and pull up a movie on Netflix for her.” That application alone makes me love this app. Of course you need a netflix subscription, but with their recent changes, you can purchase a streaming only plan and that is exactly what I have instead of mailing DVD’s back to them.
Prompster-If you are like me, you may have to give a public speech sooner or later and you don’t want to be up front shuffling note cards or pieces of paper. My friend, Pastor Noah Washington, suggested this app, so I took his advice since he does speak weekly and I wasn’t disappointed. In the photo above I had to do a speech at my high school and I used this app and it worked flawlessly.
Those are my top ten apps, I didn’t even get into game, entertainment and sports.The iPad opens up so many possibilities and I am glad I made the “leap” to purchase one in 2010. Look out for iPad 2 hopefully soon.
My top 10 iPad apps of 2010
The year 2010 has been a very good year for the Apple iPad. In earlier blog posts I was a bit critical, but now I am a believer. People ask me often should they purchase an iPad, and my answer is generally the same-”buying an iPad is like having leather interior in your car, you don’t need it, but it’s nice if you have it.”
It is very hard to narrow down my top ten apps because there are so many that are so good, but here is my list.
Those are my top ten apps, I didn’t even get into game, entertainment and sports.The iPad opens up so many possibilities and I am glad I made the “leap” to purchase one in 2010. Look out for iPad 2 hopefully soon.
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