You may have fought it. You may have sworn it would never happen to you. But it has. You have turned into your mother or father. It really [...]]]> Those young whippersnappers today and their new fangled technology.

You may have fought it. You may have sworn it would never happen to you. But it has. You have turned into your mother or father. It really wasn’t your fault though. There wasn’t much you could have done about it. Being a parent today means that technology has caught up with you.

My parents are old enough to remember life when families were just getting a television in their house for the first time. I remember life before cellphones. My oldest boys remember the sound of a 56k dial up modem, but really do not have any memories that go back to life before video games.

Behold! The predecessor to the smartphone. (It's casting quite a shadow...)

For many of us today we remember when cellphones looked like giant bricks. Then they turned into tri-quarter looking devices from Star Trek. And then there was text messaging. This was an amazing development but not always super easy as each number had to share its space with 3 letters. I loved text messaging but it was slow and clunky for me at first.

One of the days in my life that I will never forget is the day I got the cellphone bill after they offered “unlimited texting” in our family plan. My older boys had cellphones but had been limited to 20 text messages a month. Each month they had dutifully kept their texting to that magic number. That first bill after we went unlimited had over 300 text messages logged on the phone line of just one kid. At the time I was amazed. I thought to myself “That is around 10 text messages a day! Holy Cow – that’s a lot of texting”. We started hearing stories of kids sending over 1000 text messages a month. Texting was now a way of life for our kids.

We can try to stay up with technology but we will always remember when that new technology emerged and how it was first presented to us. One of those new things is the emergence of apps in our life.

This past week Famigo posted a truly insightful infographic about how apps are being used by the Famigo families. One of the most interesting bits of information for me was the number of apps we use by age group. Parents used eight apps. We compare that to the number of apps a toddler is using: 147. By the time the kids are a little older and into their tweens and teens they are using over 300 apps. It is no surprise that the infographic found that most families are downloading free apps. The only thing you have to worry about on the free apps is whether or not they are truly free.

Starting out by checking out some of the best android apps for kids. This can help parents who are taking their time jumping into the app world, to keep up with these young whipper snappers today who are jumping into the new world of apps as though they don’t have any memories of life before apps.

Join the discussion Thursday Feb 23 at 9pm EST to talk with other parents about safe apps and video games on Twitter – follow the hashtag #ESRB

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Mary has recently joined the Famigo Parenting Advisory Board and is an enthusiastic proponent of using technology to bring families closer together. Blogging for over 15 years, Mary founded StayatHomeMom.com, was a guest on the Oprah Winfrey Show, and has spoken to several groups on Internet Safety, social media and connecting families through technology. Mary has volunteered with Wired Safety, the world’s first Internet Safety and Help group for over 10 years. Mary and her husband Tom have 4 amazing kids and have lived in 6 different states and 2 countries. They love travel, video games, reading and staying connected with friends from around the world.

Connect with Mary on Twitter @maryheston @wiredmom @sahm411

We had a ton of fun though, [...]]]> This week was a bit all over the place. We had some educational games thrown in with some absolutely not-educational-at-all games, mixed in with some simply random stuff.

We had a ton of fun though, and there was (as always) a lot of awesome apps to sort through. Who came out on top? Check out the list below to find out this week’s favorites.

Top 5 Apps of the Week

1. The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore - iPad ($4.99)

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore

This app is based on the animated short of the same title which is nominated for an Oscar this year. (If we were betting people, our money would be on Mr. Morris Lessmore, it’s fantastic.)

We love that the app isn’t simply a mobile version of the film. It’s more of a book app and a game and a movie all in one. Which really covers everything that we love, so a thousand thank you’s Moonbot Studios!

If you’re looking for a hands-down stellar app that has a Pixar-like ability to entertain kids and parents alike, your $4.99 will be well spent on The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore.

2. Trash Chaos - iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad (Free!)

Trash Chaos

Adorable graphics and sounds? Check. An evil queen? Check. A squad of world-saving super heroes? Check. Important lessons on recycling? Check.

Trash Chaos really does have everything you could want in an educational app that will make for an excellent learning and entertainment experience for kids. You help the Yogome Squad prevent the Evil Queen Ignorantia from polluting the planet, all the while picking up interesting tidbits on how important recycling is to maintaining a sustainable lifestyle and keeping our world safe and clean. (Also check out the Yogome’s team other super neat app: SaveTheSushi.)

3. HeavenHell - Android & Apple (Free!)

HeavenHell

This game, which was just released in the past week, is a fun physics-based puzzle game that pits angels against demons in a surprisingly cute and completely violence-free battle of slides. (Right? How can a battle of slides be anything but endearing?)

It’s extremely addicting, kind of along the same lines as Angry Birds where a mix of cute characters and simple but increasingly complex gameplay hook you from the very start. This isn’t the epic battle of good and evil that you’d expect when angels and demons confront one another, but we happen to like this version quite a bit more.

4. The Game of Life - Android ($4.99) & Apple ($0.99)

The Game of Life

I like to think of The Game of Life as a kind of precursor to the Sims. There’s something oddly appealing about the even most mundane activities, everything from taxes to doing the dishes, when you’re in charge of how someone else’s life progresses.

We loved this game when we played it old school, out of a cardboard box, style. The app does not disappoint, and it’s so cool that you can now carry this game where ever you go. We wouldn’t want to play the regular board game in a car, good lord, all of those missing pieces…, but the tablet version is nice, clean fun that will keep everyone in the car busy (and interacting, which is always nice).

5. iLearn with Poko Seasons and Weather - iPad ($2.99) & iPhone ($1.99)

iLearn with Poko

We haven’t really ran across an app like this before. It’s kind of like an interactive educational kid’s TV show. There are a bunch of different activities that are actually educational, none of this: “Well, TapFish teaches your kids responsibility… and stuff.” No. If your toddler is looking to acquire some real life working knowledge of the seasons, you’ve struck gold with iLearn with Poko.

Poko is going to be teaching a whole variety of subjects through the iLearnWith educational program. Right now, there’s one other app that’s live on the market, iLearn with Poko Fun Counting and Additions. It lives up to its seasons and weather counterpart.

Free App From Oceanhouse

Dr. Seuss Band

Dr. Seuss Band

Zax! Whompf! Zummers! It’s a Dr. Seuss meets music in an app! The wildly famous children’s stories are incorporated into a colorful and fun music game, packed with sweet content and awesome effects. AND it’s free this week, so what’s stopping you?

But realistically, who goes out of their way to snap [...]]]>

Would a QR-code-free world be a better place?

In the last couple of years, QR codes have found their way into mainstream advertising. They are featured on buses, billboards, flyers, just about everywhere.

But realistically, who goes out of their way to snap a picture of something only to lead you to a promotional page on a website? Not me. And from a design stand-point, they take away from the actual advertisement. So why do advertisers insist on shoving this dreadful square in front of me every chance they get? Kooaba, a Swedish tech company, may have the solution to this unsightly issue. They have created an app called Shortcut that uses similar technology as QR codes, except Shortcut is actually useful.

Shortcut by kooaba

Kooaba’s CEO, Herbert Bay, wants to “kill QR codes,” and there are many people on his side. Bay’s app uses the same image-recognition technology as QR, except it has the ability to recognize and analyze any image, not just QR codes. Shortcut allows advertisers to ditch distracting QR codes and give the reader an interactive experience.

According to Bobbie Johnson from Gigaom.com, the goal of Shortcut is to get rid of QR codes all together. As Bay states in Johnson’s blog, “The pitch when we talk to newspapers and printed publications is that we can make them interactive — and they don’t need to place any QR codes anywhere. In addition they can sell their advertisers on that interactivity . . . it removes the need for QR codes.” This technology allows for more interactivity than QR codes and does so in a more discrete way than allowing a black and white square to dominate your advertisement.

Kooaba hopes to get rid of QR codes.

But when technology like this comes around, does privacy become an issue? Think about it. If you are able to scan anything in the world and then your phone takes you to a website or promotion, you better be careful of what pictures you take. I have this fear of a little kid taking a picture with his mom’s iPhone and accidentally capturing something besides the focus of the picture and it leading the child to an undersirable web page. Hopefully Shortcut addresses this issue because it is a definite possibility.

I don’t really think QR codes should “die,” however, I do think there is room in the market for a better product. QR codes are intrusive and one dimensional while Shortcut, for example, can make anything and everything an interactive advertising experience.

I recently read a post in a hip tech blog about a new social game you play [...]]]>

The Phone Stack Game

Finally, a cellphone game your whole family can play at the dinner table and not feel bad about.

I recently read a post in a hip tech blog about a new social game you play with your friends using your phones. I know what you’re thinking, another FarmVille or Words With Friends.  But it’s not another app recommended by Famigo, this game is actually social (not antisocial!) and it’s a game of iron wills and high stakes. You play it with the people who are sitting right next to you at a meal.  It is called: The Phone Stack.

The rules of the game are simple:

• At the beginning of a meal, stack everyone’s phone face down.

• The phones are supposed to stay in the stack no matter how much they ring, chirp and beg to be picked up for the entire meal.

• You lose if you’re the first person to grab his phone before the end of the meal.

• The loser pays for the entire meal!

I started playing this game out with friends at restaurants. The result of this game is that everybody present actually socializes instead of passing a meal like zombies hypnotized by their little screens.  Since I’ve started doing this, my meals and the company have been much more enjoyable.  The game is great because everybody is a winner, even though it is more expensive for the “loser.”  We’ve even started playing it in meetings at the Famigo offices to keep them short and have everyone engaged.

Obviously this is the adult, eating-out-at-a-restaurant version of the game.

However, we’ve created a new version that is family-friendly.  We call it, brilliantly, “The Family Phone Stack.”   The rules are pretty much the same, but since every kid in a family might not have their own smartphone, we’ve expanded the game to include iPods, cordless landline phones, remote controls, iPads and even magazines.  Since you probably don’t get a check when you’re having dinner at home, we’ve also changed the stakes.

In the family version the loser has to wash the dishes!

We challenge you to start playing this game at all your meals.  If nobody loses in the first game, I will come and wash your dishes next time I’m in town.

Check out the super nifty infographic [...]]]> Famigo recently completed a study on family mobile media usage. We collected and analyzed information from 1,000 random usage samples from Famigo Sandbox through a 4-week period in January.

Check out the super nifty infographic below to see our findings:

This is something that [...]]]> There has been a lot of coverage in the past couple of days over Google’s new privacy policy and Path uploading its customers’ address books onto their servers without permission.

This is something that seems to occur every 6 months or so.  A company pushes the boundaries of user privacy and then backs off until everyone has forgotten all about the controversy.  They then slightly alter their original plan and users think they have won a significant battle for their privacy. The companies argue two things when confronted with blatant breaches in privacy: one is that their new policy will allow them to create better services and, secondly, if you don’t like it, don’t use our product.

Both, in my opinion, are utterly ridiculous.

Let’s use Google’s new privacy policy as an example of both. For those of you have not read the new privacy policy go read it here. For those of you who prefer the cliff notes version:

Google is essentially combining all of its many privacy policies into one that encompasses all 60 of its different services. Not only that, but Google will track all of your actions across the different services and combine that data.

Now I know what your thinking, “Yahya, don’t they already do this?” Yes and no.

You see, before all of the data collected from search was used only in search and all the data from your Android device stayed with that device. Now every service will talk to every other service. Meaning Google can literally track your every move.

They will know when you search from home or when you search from work. They will know exactly where you are at any given time if you’re using an Android device.  Now, Google says that they will not be offering any of this information to third party groups and that you should not be concerned. But you should be.

Google is one of the largest advertising companies on the planet. They will use this information to serve you “relevant” ads. They do not need to sell the information to another ad company because they are the ad company. Google claims that their new policy will help improve their services. In reality it will only help one service: Google’s ad business. The more information Google collects and the better they know you, the more money advertisers will pay to advertise with Google.

This is Google’s Hail Mary pass against their biggest rival: Facebook.  Facebook already knows so much about their users because of voluntary disclosure that ads can be tailored extremely well. Google does not have this kind of data but would love to have it; hence the new privacy policy. The argument that Google’s new privacy policy creates better services is a joke.

Someone is always watching. That someone is probably a Google employee.

Google also argues that they make it very easy for someone to deactivate all of their accounts. This is also a false argument in the sense that it is extremely difficult for someone to completely remove Google from his or her Internet life. From email, searches, documents, videos, and phones, Google is everywhere. There are no real alternatives. Bing doesn’t count. Google owns such a large part of the market that they can potentially do whatever they want and customers will just have to deal with it.

I know that it may seem like I can’t stand Google, or that I am unfairly picking on them. In fact, I think they create some great services that make my life easy. Yes, they are not the only company who collects information on their users. Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft have all gotten in trouble for this, but when your unofficial motto is “Don’t be evil”. I am going to call you out on it, especially when you claim that your actions are in the best interest of your customers.

From one of our childhood favorites, Harold and the Purple Crayon, to some serious strategy games for teens and parents, we’ve got you covered.