Lighter

Michael (Admin) | Sep 25, 2008 Utilities

User rating:

(3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)

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I’m feeling kind of ornery today, so I’m gonna rip on an application just for existing. Normally I wouldn’t do this to a free app, but according to Chillingo Ltd’s description for Lighter, the free deal is a “special introductory offer – free for 1st week!”

So how much are they going to be charging? 99 cents? Two bucks? Three? Man, I really hope it’s not three.

By my count, there are at least ELEVEN lighter apps out there. Many are free and the others are priced at a semi-reasonable $.99 for those who like to flush good money down the toilet. Any “lighter app” that charges more than that should be booted from the App Store on grounds of attempted price gouging and insulting the intelligence of iPhone users.

Lighter is, itself, an app that isn’t bad for lighter junkies. It offers three types of lighters: Bic, Zippo, and the fancy kind you “slide” open to ignite. The flame animations are nice, except for the Zippo flame which looks nothing like an actual Zippo flame. What, you think I’m being overly picky? It’s my right… nay, it’s my duty… to be picky here. Remember, this app will eventually cost money! Apps that are indefinitely free get a pass. Apps that are “free for 1st week” do not.

Chillingo admits that there are problems with Lighter crashing and they’re planning to fix this with an update, but even after that happens I still say it’s a tragic waste of money to pay for this kind of thing.

If you insist on having a lighter on your iPhone, please do the smart thing and get Lighter while it’s free or get some other free one – there are plenty out there, like this kickass Virtual Zippo.

Let’s challenge developers to spend their time developing apps that are actually unique rather than encouraging them to play copycat. The iTunes App Store is cluttered enough as it is.

(stepping down from my soap box now)