Though I’ve come very close on several occasions, I still haven’t bought myself an iPad. After seeing this video for Flipboard, an iPad exclusive app that assembles a magazine out of the articles your friends are sharing on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks, I might need to finally pull the trigger.
The app, from a company of the same name (whose co-founder, Evan Doll, in full disclosure, is a friend of a friend), is absolutely stunning. The interactions, the formatting, the incorporation of video, the sharing capabilities — all of them are best in class. The iPad’s collection of RSS readers and Instapaper-like “read later” apps are very nice, but the premise here is different. It’s like Instapaper without having to choose what gets pulled down.
And I will say that this looks to me a lot more like the magazine of the future than that the digital version of Wired does. It’s available for free in the app store now, though from what I understand the company is frantically working to add more servers to allow new members to join. Maybe I’ll have an iPad by the time they have capacity again…
Pete Mortensen is a design strategist for consulting firm Jump Associates and the co-author of Wired to Care: How Companies Prosper When They Create Widespread Empathy, a book and blog that are significantly more interesting than you might initially think. Pete’s particular Apple avocations are both around design–interface and industrial. Follow him on Twitter!
