Our group has again released a new mobile phone application. AppAware allows to share online your Android application installs, updates, and removals. Out of these events, AppAware calculates a popularity measure. As such, users can learn from each other which apps are hot and which are not. Additionally, the install/update/removal events can also be shared via twitter.
If you want to try it out install AppAwarefrom the Android Market (search for 'AppAware') or scan this barcode. You can also browse the recorded apps from your desktop computer: http://appaware.org
As we have been developing several services in the past (e.g. my2cents, APriori) putting more information about products at the consumers' fingertips, I also stumbled over some critics. Tim O'Reilly has put out "buy where you shop" in a recent blog entry. As consumers could abuse and ruin the small shops providing the nice physical experience of the product but don't get a share if you decide to still buy the product online. However, other approaches [1] propose to combine both worlds and to provide benefit both instead of cannibalizing each other: physical stores become showrooms for online stores and receive a share of the online purchase as a reward. To that point GS1's MobileCommerce group has yet released another whitepaper [2] outline the various opportunities for retailers to attract customers using mobile technologies. Focussing on hybrid shopping, i.e. the combination of both online and physical stores [3], is probably more promissing, as consumers probably will never realize the long-term implications (i.e. small shops have to close due to competion from e-tailers).
