Screen Time...Your Kids Will Hate It

Introducing the latest app from BabyBinks...Screen Time.

Screen Time is a simple way to enforce time limits on an iPhone, iPad of iPod Touch device. You simply set a time and press start. After the time expires, a series of alert notifications will display over-and-over-and-over again. The only way to stop them is to go back to the Screen Time app and enter the correct passcode.

After frustrating your child and rendering the iPhone useless to them, they'll eventually return the it to you. Now when you say "only 5 minutes of Angry Birds", you can mean it.

Like our other apps, this one was born out of necessity. Trying to convince your 3-year, who can not tell time, that her 5 minutes are up can only end up in everyone crying. Especially daddy.

Because you can't put a price on making sure you get your iPhone back from your kids...Screen Time is available as a free download in the App Store.

It Wasn't An Honor Just To Be Nominated

Getting noticed is the hardest part of app development. Developing an app is straightforward (granted you have the idea). Managing provisioning profiles and submitting it to the App Store can be a painful experience, but nothing that a few hours of Googling will not get you through. Setting the price can be a fantastic internal struggle, but one that you will be wrestling with for months. Bring your app to market was the easy part...marketing it is the part that will make-or-break your business.

Getting your app noticed by Apple is a great way to begin the release of a new app. Out of the 5 apps released by BabyBinks over the past 2 years, 3 have been featured as New & Noteworthy. Based on the comparisons to 2 apps that were "overlooked", spending a week in the top row of the App Store makes a tremendous differnce in the life-cycle of your app. As an example, Elephonics (not featured) and Zombies Vs. Literacy (featured) are simply different themed versions of the same app, the difference between being featured translates into a 100 fold difference in downloads (to date).

And the Award Goes To

Being 'New & Noteworthy' is a great start, but it will not last very long. To sustain interest in you app, you have to do a lot of marketing (and this means more than just posting it on Facebook and tweeting about it on Twitter). There are many channels to market apps, and, despite what you may have been told, all of them are the same as marketing any product or service.

One channel that developers often overlook is awards. In the app market, winning awards is very social and a great marketing campaign (and a lot of friends) can vote your app into a nomination, or even the award winning spot.

And speaking of awards, I recently received an email for the Google Alert I set for Zombies Vs. Literacy. I clicked on the link and was directed to the Ericsson Labs blog for a post titled Vote on the Best Literacy Application. My excitment grew when I saw the full context for the reference:

Today is the World Read Aloud Day. Celebrate the Power of Words and Stories and Take Action for Global Literacy.

Let’s read aloud for someone. Read at home, at work, in a public space, on the train or anywhere. Read a book, a magazine or let the book be read by a device. Many applications exist that support reading text aloud.

We, at Ericsson Labs, support this World Read Aloud Day initiative and want to take action to show the world that the ability to read and write belongs to all people.

Today you can vote for the best literacy application. We have gathered 10 proposals we have received in a list below. Take a look at them and vote for the one you think is the best. They are web sites, web applications, Android applications and iPhone/ iPad applications.

Time to Dust Off My Awards Shelf

Move over Elementary School "Perfect Attendance" trophy. It's time for some real hardware. First, this is Ericsson Labs...as in Sony-Ericsson. Except for their recent attempt to create a Walkman, iPod "killer", Sony-Ericsson is one of the most successful companies in the world. Second, my app is on the same list as the Kindle app (Amazon) and The Cat in the Hat (Oceanhouse Media). That is pretty good company. Third, they have "gathered proposals". Someone actually like my app enough to submit a propsal for it to be considered for this award.

How do you know that I did not just submit a proposal for my app and then fein this fake humility? Look closely you can see for yourself:

Instead of linking Zombies Vs. Literacy to the App Store, the link is actually for an app pirating site. Clicking on the link takes you to a page where you can download the hacked .ipa file that you can download to your iPhone.

But I Just Dusted

As much as I appreciate the recognition for our app, I have to say this is one award I will not be touting too much. I realize its just an Ericsson Lab's blog, but I would have expected slightly more attention to detail from a global, billion dollar company. Especially one who is struggling to mount a response to the iPhone and will want to lure developers to its plaform.

Of course it does not really matter, as nothing could possibly trump my back-to-back-to-back "Best Dad of the Year" awards received each Father's Day...and, at least, I have the t-shirt, tie,and coffee mug to prove it.

Moms With Apps: Lessons From Our Educational App Store

The Moms with Apps app is an independent catalog of educational and family friendly apps in Apple's App Store for iOS devices.  It is the collaborative effort of the Moms with Apps (MWA) developer group to improve the search and discoverability of educational apps.

This feat is accomplished by curating and categorizing over 1000 apps from over 300 of the App Store's most applauded educational app developers. While the App Store bundles all educational apps into a single category, the MWA app provides additional categories such as Art, Creative Play, Early Learning, Foreign Language, Math, Reading, Science, Special Needs, etc.  Within these categories app can be further searched by recommended age.

Phew, Apple Likes It

The entire concept of redefining and improving the education category of Apple's App Store was a questionable undertaking in its own right.  As a group of developers who are all basing their livelihood off of the App Store, there is overwhelming pressure to always stay positive about Apple and its offerings.  However, the notable rise in the use of iPhone and iPads for educational purposes, seemed to motivate our cooperative to try and make the Educational App Store an easier place to navigate.  It was entirely plausible that Apple would take take offense by the underlying, yet unspoken message: The Educational App Store can be better.

Our trepidations were quickly assuaged, as the release of the MWA App was immediately recognized as the #1 app in the educational New & Noteworthy chart in 8 regional App Stores.  The app was sprinkled across the top Free downloads charts around the globe and, on some days, we were consistently seeing a few downloads a minute.

Being a resident of Canada's loud neighbor to the South and having little insight into their educational system, I do not fully understand the reasons but the Canadians have really embraced Moms with Apps.  We were fortunate enough to enjoy a week on the front page of their App Store as a featured app with our own custom artwork.  That's us in green...next to the Oscars!

Phew, Parents Get It

App developers who are also parents have a complex and distorted way of looking at the App Store, compared to the typical iPhone toting parent. Once you've seen the behind the scenes, inner workings (as a developer), the magic of the worlds biggest software store disappears and is replaced by bouts of frustation and disillusionment. It's kind of like the Matrix...but without the shiny outfits, guns, and bewildered grunts of Keanu Reeves.

The question that we, as educational developers, want to know is, "Are there parents out there that are looking for great educational software, but are just too flustered by the App Store to bother?" I see it myself when I go...pretty much anywhere. Two-year olds playing "Angry Birds", "Cut-the-Rope", or "Plants Vs. Zombies". Granted, every game (especially physics based ones) have some educational value, but is it simply that parents are not as concerned with the apps their toddlers are playing as educational developers think they are.

Thankfully, they are.

The most telling (and encouraging statistic) that we have observed from the MWA app is the average time per use. Simply, this tells us how long a users is using the app in a single session. In the first month, the MWA app average time per use was 23:59. This is averaged over 135,000 visits from 50,000 users. Quite simply, parents are spending a significant amount of time searching for apps that meets their families needs. They were waiting for a better way to discover apps.

The Report Card: Trends in Educational Apps

As with any app that has benefited from exposure by Apple, we had a very strong start, but downloads have plateaued (cumulative downloads shown in blue).  This is not discouraging, as on any given day we see anywhere from 200-500 downloads per day.

Category Browsing Patterns

Within the app, users spent 45% of their time searching through apps, 30% of their time looking through Books, 20% of their time looking through our "Apple Picks" sections, and 5% spread out among other app features (e.g. New Releases, Viewing History, Developers, etc.).  Apple picks is a historical listing of the apps featured by Apple.

While browsing through the Apps category, the most popular categories with parents are as follows:

1. Early Learning
2. Art
3. Creative Play
4. Parents
5. Special Needs
6. Games
7. Reading
8. Music
9. Foreign Language
10. Math

App Browsing Patterns

During the first month, each user viewed, on average, 22 apps per session.  This correlates well with the average session time of 24 minutes per session: parents are taking time to actually read the app descriptions.  For developers, this means that the hours of analyzing each word in an app description were not lost.  It is actually a very important part of marketing your app.

I, for one, found this surprising, as an informal survey of non-developer iPhone owners indicated that purchasing decisions were based on recommendations from friends and screenshots.  When asked if they read the descriptions, I received a unanimous "No".

Unfortunately, the layout of iTunes actually encourages this impulsive purchasing by requiring you to click to read the entire description, so it is not surprising that iOS users have begun to devalue the app description.

Most Viewed Apps

Overall During the first month, the following apps were the 10 most popular in terms of times viewed. It is nice to see some newer apps listed alongside some of the tried-and-true staples of great educational apps:

My Very First App by Night & Day Studio, Inc. ABC 123 Blocks = Learning Tool For Toddlers by The Guys in the Booth Bug Builder by Zinc Roe Rapunzel Classic Story HD by Kwiq Apps, Inc. Baa Baa Black Sheep - by Duck Duck Moose

A Family Matters by Weiner Family Studios ABC 123 Blocks = Learning Tool For Toddlers LITE by The Guys in the Booth Draw with Stars by L'Escapadou iTouchiLearn Words for Preschool Kids Letters, Spelling & Puzzles by Staytooned My Underwear by Thumb Arcade

Book Browsing Patterns

When the MWA App was designed, the debate between "What's an App and what's a book?" had not really taken hold.  Now it is front and center and a major concern for the book-style app developers in MWA and across the entire app ecosystem.  Tales of rejections and suggestions by Apple to release book-apps through iBooks are starting to become more prevalent.

Unfortunately, this segregation was not as clear to myself and, as such, didn't amply separate out statistics for Books vs. Apps.  However, the app has been updated to monitor this and the next Report Card will be able to shed more light on the subject.

The one main pattern to take away is that 98% of the Book views all originated from "View By Release Date".  It appears that users are treating the virtual bookstore, much like the traditional brick-and-mortar bookstore, and starting at the new releases.

A Horse to Water

It should be no secret that the MWA app, in addition to its altruistic goals, is designed to be a marketing tool for educational app developers.  The MWA developers have invested their time and efforts to curate and annotate their apps, in the hopes of making it easier for parents to find their apps and converting them to happy, paying customers.  It's a win-win scenario, parents find the apps they're looking for, developers get customers who appreciate their apps (and aren't scoffing at a $0.99 price tag).

In the MWA app, the user has the option to view the app they're looking at in the App Store.  This has the advantage of letting the users read reviews and, potentially, purchase the app.  During the first month, 16% of the apps viewed resulted in a tap-through to the App Store.  This is not purchases but simply getting to the App Store.  Once in the App Store, the users may see unfavorable reviews and elect not to purchase, among other scenarios.

Without anything comparable to analyze this rate against, it is difficult to draw many conclusions.  If you consider the MWA app as simply an advertisement tool, than the number is huge compared to the sub 1% click-through-rate seen in in-app ads (at least in my apps).  If you think of it as a store front, than we would need more cooperation from Apple to compare it (but I'm not going to hold my breath).  It falls somewhere in-between and so there are more questions than answers at this point.  At the end of the day, we can say that we are helping parents find apps to better fit their needs and helping to direct them to the App Store for more information.

Moving Forward

The feedback from users has been great.  For once, I 'm proud to point people to my App Store reviews for a Free app.  Parents are just as excited about the role of iOS devices in education as are the developers who are working on them.  However, they have been very clear that they want more from the MWA App.

We have been listening and working hard to implement them.  In the next major release (coming soon), we will be introducing "Page 2", a second page in the MWA App.  Page 2 will contain exclusive content from leading researchers, educators, technologists, bloggers and industry professionals all providing insights on apps, books, and parenting the 'iOS generation'.  We hope that the addition of Page 2 will continue to forward the mission of MWA to advocate healthy intersections of kids and family life with technology.


The Moms with Apps app is available as a free download in Apple's App Store .

Why iPads in Schools Won't Matter (to Developers)

Like many iOS developers, I fantasize about quitting my day job to go full-time at building a sustainable software development company. The bloating of the App Store, the notorious 'race-to-bottom' and even the more recent in-app subscription controversy, all seemed like enough obstacles to keep me dismayed at day job while joyously programming iPhone apps at night.

However, the excitement brewing in the educational app market, from the realization that the magical qualities of the iPad might have more to do with children learning, provided a small glimpse of a larger and more predictable app marketplace...educational institutions. If schools embrace the iPad and start purchasing them in large numbers for their students, they are going to need to purchase apps to go on each device.

Cranking the Volume in Education

Apple foresaw this and introduced "Educational Volume Purchase Program" that developers can enable on their apps. At the developers discretion, they can reduce the cost of their apps up to 50% for bulk educational buys.

My optimism about the educational market was further sparked when one of my apps, Elephonics, has been benefited from educational volume purchasing. Currently, there is a school district in Ohio and a school in Oregon that use Elephonics as part of their curriculum. Given that my sole motivation for developing the app was to help my daughter learn her sight words, it was great to know that, not only did other kids like the app, but that educators also valued it.

There's More to Rhode Island Than the Setting for Family Guy

The headline of an article published in the Rhode Island News on Monday, again provided more concrete validation about the increasing role iPads might play in formal education. Titled, "Electronic tables break down educational barriers in R.I. schools", it described a pilot program at a South Providence middle school where each student was given an iPad. It further described how school districts across the state were being trained on how to use the iPad in the classroom.

I was just about to storm down the hallway to quit my day job, when the article revealed a disheartening detail that made me slink back into my chair.

At Trinity, the iPad has nearly eliminated the need for paperback novels. The school buys one book for $6 and downloads 34 copies.

Buy One, Get the Entire School District for Free

Another magical feature of the iPad is that you can transfer purchases to other devices using the same iTunes account.

I know a few teachers in different school districts who explained to me that a single IT administrator is responsible for all the computing equipment at their schools. It is logical to assume that, if a school makes an investment in iPads, than a single person will be in charge of maintaing them and loading software on them. Using the same iTunes account, a single app purchase could them be installed on all the devices at the school.

This is exactly what the school in Rhode Island is doing.

Making the Overly Complex, Difficult

On the surface, it appears that the App Store Volume Purchasing Program was created to encourage schools to purchase multiple versions of an app because the management and distribution of the software would be simpler. The alternative, as described in the article, requires a lot of man-hours and patience to install the same apps on a lot of devices.

The teachers who were involved in the Volume Purchasing of Elephonics told me that the process was so complex that in the future they would probably just look for Free app alternatives. Just what we need...another reason for users to look for free apps instead of paying for quality software.

The Outlook

As a parent observing how my children have benefited from iOS devices, I am excited to see these devices move into the classroom. As a developer, I hope that educational institutions do not take the approach of the Rhode Island school and load a classroom full of iPads from a single app purchase. If others adopt this mentality then there will be even less motivation for developers to create great apps for educators.

Hopefully, a solution will arrive that makes it as easy for educators to purchase and install quality software as it is for my daughter to practice her sight words.

Introducing Moms with Apps

Once you have kids, everything you have is up for grabs. Last Oreo cookie...gone. Tivo space...occupied by Dora the Explorer. Last sip of Coke...shared. Nice leather couch...a canvas to paint on. Playboy subscription...cancelled. Sleeping in on the weekends...never. New iPhone 4...hand it over.

Some of these concessions are livable, after all I don't really need another Oreo. Some of them are heart-breaking, since I've had that couch since college. However, some of them could jumpstart a lifetime of learning...and I'm not talking about reading it just for the articles.

Taking Education By the Hand

Parents and educators have been quick to note the fantastic educational potential of the iPhone. The interface is intuitive and engaging, while the vast selection of educational applications guarantees that you will be able to meet your children's educational needs. Want to practice early reading skills, while teaching you children how to avoid zombies? There's an app for that. For any educational subject and school topic, you can be sure that there isn't just an app for that....actually, there are hundreds.

Therein lies the problem.

Type Math, I Dare You

While the App Store has revolutionized the software industry, it is cluttered and notoriously difficult to navigate (and that's being nice). It also made $0.99 seem like a lot of money to a lot of people.

Let's just say that I want to find an app to help my 5-year old develop her math skills. I type "Math" into the search bar and you get "Math+-x+", "Math This", "Math That", "Math Math Math", "Mathy McMath Math", and so on.  Are these the best math apps, or just the ones with math in the title? What kind of math is in the app? Why does iTunes only show the first two sentences? It's 3 clicks to find out what type of math this app is for. And even once you establish that it's actually a math app, what ages is it suitable for? It's enough to make you want teach your kids math the old fashioned way...with a nun wielding a ruler.

Introducing Moms with Apps

For as frustrated as users get, developers have it even worse. They have spent hundreds and hundreds of hours developing their apps. Testing, tweaking and refining every last detail. Then, because the title of their name didn't lead with "Math" followed by some random unicode symbol, their app is stuck on page 4 of search results.

Some developers decided to do something about it. Not just any developers, but the members of Moms with Apps. Moms With Apps is a collaborative group of family-friendly developers seeking to promote quality apps for kids and families. It started with a few moms chatting over Twitter, evolved into forum, and finally graduated in to a fully fledged movement to promote the best in educational apps for children.

Members of Moms with Apps represent the very best and most renown developers in the App Store. Check out the member list and you find that it mirrors the Top Educational App Lists. Collectively, over 40% of the Moms with Apps member's apps have been featured by Apple in the App Store. These developers have set the standard for excellence in educational apps.

The Moms with Apps App

In collaboration with Moms with Apps, BabyBinks is proud to introduce the Moms with Apps app. While the name is a veritable marketing nightmare, the app is a comprehensive catalog of educational and family-friendly apps from Moms with App members. The developers have painstakingly categorized all of their apps by educational subjects and provided a recommended age.

These are not the categories your not going to find in the App Store. Categories like Art, Science, Music, Special Needs and Early Learning. And what about Math? You'll be searching through Counting, Addition, Subtraction, Fractions, Division and Money to find exactly the app that is appropriate for you children. The app also keeps a historical record of the educational apps that have been featured by Apple.

It's not going to get you your Playboy subscription back, but rest assured, when you son finds a box in the basement labeled "College Textbooks" that has 18 years of magazines in it, you'll be glad you were able to find an app that helped develop early literacy skills. That way when he swears he was reading them for the articles...you'll be able to half-heartedly believe him.