I consider myself to be a heavy user of apps. My most used apps are Mail, Calendar, Phone and Text but I am also a daily user of Foursquare, Facebook, Sonos, Spotify, TomTom and Twitter. My friends encourage me to start using Gowalla, WhatsApp or Hyves to communicate with them. Increasingly, I find myself rreaching the top of the saturation curve. I’m using too many apps of the same nature for any of them to actually be truly useful. And in fact, I now have too many apps in my life in general. I’ve become app-saturated.
In this regard, apps are in a way just the new websites. There’s only so many you can visit throughout the day and so you find the ones you like and cycle through those day in and day out. Only on the rare occasion does a new site break into this must-visit cycle.
I’m not sure many app developers fully understand this just yet. There’s so much exuberance in the app space right now because mobile platforms are exploding with growth. And so anytime one type of app remotely hits, a hundred similar apps pop-up. And they all seem to think they’re in the right position at the right time to hit too. For some developers it may work. But it will only work for two or three apps in each space, tops. It’s a harsh reality. But it is reality.
When you’ve reached the top of the app saturation curve, it means that for every app in, one must go out. That means a new app has to be good enough to displace another one. If you’re not designing an app that is meant to be on the homescreen of every iPhone or Android phone out there, you’re not aiming high enough. Take it from someone who has seen the top of the saturation curve.
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