New from the makers of the popular Sendtiment Cards is 'Over Here' for Windows Phone 8. This takes a well worn 'I'm here' app genre and takes it very low tech and low friction. No SMS, no GPS coordinates, no emails, just light and eyeballs. Say you want your friend to find you in a crowd. A concert arena, dark nightclub, bar, etc. but it is too dark for them to spot you. All you do is tell you friend in advance something like “Hey, look for the green flashing phone.” The app will then pulse that color - raise your phone over your head and "be astounded at how fast your friend finds you". A nice bit of lateral thinking!
From the developers:
Naturally Over Here app works best at night or in low light conditions where clothing and other indicators are harder to spot. Over Here is best for situations like:
In restaurants
In stadiums
In a crowded airport
In bars
In movie theaters
At concerts
At large festivals
On the street
Pretty much anywhere..
The interface is pretty straightforward and easy to use. What is also great is that you have 6 different colors (each with 4 shade options) to choose from.
It's simple and effective, and free, of course, though with a little banner ad at the bottom of the screen when picking colour shades:
Picking colours and shades, a couple of dozen different possibilities.... (The hazard icon links to short message about the pulsing light causing epileptic fits!)
Pulsing is smooth between the shade chosen and black - on the right here is one of the inbetween shades - it's quite a nice effect in real life.
You've got to love a bit of lateral thinking. Most such utilities require a friend noticing a message on their phone, following a link of some kind, downloading a map and then working out where they are relative to what's shown. With this 'Over here' implementation, they just look around, spot the flashing light and head straight for you.
Of course, there's the downside that if they're not in your vicinity yet, you may have to stand around for a while holding a flashing phone above your head and feeling like a dork!
