It’s day 30 of Gizmodo’s March Madness challenge to name the greatest apps of all time, and we now know the first of the final two contestants. People chose Google Maps with over 71% of the vote! YouTube was eliminated from yesterday’s game. Rest in peace YouTube. Today we have two annoying apps, but one of them must be left empty-handed.
If you’re just tuning in, you can read all of our selection criteria for this historic match right here. Check out the full list of contestants embedded below. As always, if you think we’ve missed your personal favorite app, give us a shout in the comments. Now, let’s take a look at today’s challengers.
Here’s what we said about Flashlight apps in the first round:
For many people, a flashlight app is not an app at all. Today, it is a built-in utility on most smartphones. But this is not always the case. In 2010, a full two years after the App Store launched, Apple finally allowed apps to use the camera flash on the iPhone 4 as a continuous flashlight. Many developers have jumped on the gold rush.
By 2013, there were over a thousand flashlight apps in the App Store, but the good times fell apart when Apple added native flashlight functionality. Whoever is still making money in this crowded field is going bankrupt, and many brick-and-mortar flashlight manufacturers may be feeling the pain.
A flashlight app does one thing, and what it does is useful. This is something countless apps cannot do.
This is what we last wrote about the calculator app:
Calculator app. Not a specific calculator, just any calculator on your phone. We all have one. Calculators have even appeared on smartphones, but the advent of smartphones has absolutely eliminated the need for most people to have a dedicated number-crunching device.
So, reader, what would it be? Run the numbers and search the dark corners of your heart. Should the flashlight move on or should the calculator take on Google Maps in the final round?
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