February 22nd, 2012

The Carphone Warehouse Appys 2012: Music

In this is the season of the BAFTAs, and the Oscars, it is only right that there should be awards for handset applications… The Appys! In this second video in the series, Carphone Warehouse presents their nominations for the best music applications 2012. The other categories cover a whole range of applications grouped under convenient tags, such as games, news, health etc.

The blurb that you can read on the associated website is a little over-the-top, with phrases such as:

We love to learn and share new things every day – which is why we are so besotted with apps. They are little bundles of joy, designed to make you fall deeper in love with whatever smartphone or tablet you own.

Now I like Apps as much as the next person, but “little bundles of joy”?.. Sounds like I am a stork carrying a baby in my beak rather than a handset!

Just to remind you of the deal? All staff at Carphone Warehouse have nominated their favourite apps into a short-list, and the best from the public vote are picked by their panel of experts. For a period of time you can vote for your favourite in each category. What’s the incentive? Each week there will be three prizes including smartphones, headphones and the more categories you vote in the more chances there are to win. Winners for each prize will be announced as they are drawn, so you have to check back regularly to the main site to see if you have won. The winners will also get the chance to attend a special awards ceremony event in London on 25th April.

Music and game apps are probably the most popular- and the winners in these categories will carry some prestige in the industry. So who won last year?

The winner of the Games category last year was Spotify-

This year’s nominations include last year’s winner, and four challengers:

Who are the judges? Apart from Carphone Warehouse officials, there are two from The Sun empire, and the most interesting is Simon Oliver. He owns Hand Circus, a computer game company which he started from his room at home. After being rejected by most game developers, he created his own game ‘Rolando’, which has been so successful he is now Britain’s first App millionaire. Now that’s a person who is likely to be able to sift out the chafe from the wheat!

The video itself is virtually the same for each category, driven along by a catchy disco/sub-rave soundtrack, and there’s no speech- a common video pitch these days- aimed at younger watchers who haven’t the time or patience to listen to the spoken word. Obviously the nominations for this video are the music ones, and at the start form into a music note, contrasting with the games video, which turns into a console. Having pre-selected nominees means that it doesn’t take long to say which one you prefer and cast your vote. It’s short as well, and so has to pack in the key info in less than a minute and a half. It’s likely that once you have investigated and cast your votes for one category (probably music and games being the most popular) you will have a look at the other categories and perhaps cast votes there too.

I wonder whether any famous celebs will be there to join the winners on the red carpet for the Appy Awards event- but it might be good to have a chat with Simon Oliver- he may give you some tips on how you might make your first million! Also you might be able to rub shoulders with the judges from the Sun newspaper… by which time there’ll be a Sunday Sun. Just don’t give them your phone number…

See the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLDMvFtN8Dc