screen shot via Cloak website

With the advent of social networking sites becoming too personal, there has been a movement to anonymous or antisocial networks. A new app called Cloak, hopes to take the antisocial network and apply it to real, everyday life.

Cloak is an idea from programmer Brian Moore and former Buzzfeed creative director Chris Baker.

Personally, I think we’ve seen the crest of the big social network. Things like Twitter and Facebook are packed elevators where we’re all crammed in together…I think anti-social stuff is on the rise. You’ll be seeing more and more of these types of projects,” Baker told the Washington Post.

Cloak works by gathering Instagram and Foursquare geolocation data of the user’s friends and then places that data on a map relative to the user. A user can see the location of their friends, whether they want to avoid them or not, and set up a list of undesirable people so they can receive alerts when the user is nearby.

The company describes the app as:

Incognito mode for real life.”

When using Cloak, the app will alert the user when one of their friends that has been designated as undesirable is nearby, allowing the user to forever avoid that person.

Cloak hinges on the user’s friends using Instagram and Foursquare extensively. If they aren’t checking into locations and taking photos, Cloak doesn’t have the ability to gather their geolocation data. Geolocation data from other sites like Facebook, Google+ and Twitter isn’t collated by Cloak just yet.

Whether an app of this kind takes hold still has yet to be seen.

Right now we’re just focusing on iOS. If the app proves to be a hit with users, of course we’ll expand the idea…Plus we’ve got some fun features we’d like to roll out beyond what’s included in our launch,” the company told Time.com.

Cloak is currently available in the Apple app store. If it is successful, expect to see Cloak available across other devices. Until then though, keep an keen eye out for those you would rather not see.

The post Cloak App: Incognito Mode for Real Life appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Tickle

An app that would have saved us all from the average “2.5 times per week” we encounter awkward situations, Tickle describes itself as “an app to help rescue you from these unfortunate social experiences,” according to its promotional video. A method that has required a real person to make that call to excuse you from a bad blind date, Tickle just requires your hand, your phone, and the impetus of an awkward experience to let you receive the call that gets you out of it.

Making your phone sensitive to the most awkward touches, Tickle requires just the slightest phone petting to activate a false call to your cell that will allow you to excuse yourself from, say, the moment after you make an insensitive joke about bald people around your toupee-wearing co-worker. Just when you think the uncomfortable silence following your faux pas will never end, your phone rings. Then all you have to do is politely excuse yourself with a concerned look on your face as you ask the nonexistent caller, “Is everything okay?”

Cooked up by Alex Cornell and Phil Mills in San Francisco, the app purports not only to respond to your subtle touch, but also to begin recognizing when you’re around the people and situations that have a pattern for making you feel uncomfortable.

An impressive and useful device, Tickle, alas, is as fake as the calls it makes to your cell. This is no surprise coming from Tickle “creator” Cornell, who came out with the fake app Jotly, which lets you “rate everything…even yourself” back in 2011. Since then, Jotly has become a real, usable app.

As told by Tech Crunch, Cornell not so long ago left his position as the co-founder of Firespotter to work on Internet parodies like Tickle, for which he “teamed up with fellow Jotly co-conspirator Phil Mills.”

It’s almost a shame that Tickle doesn’t exist. It seems like an easy to control, get-out-of-jail free card from encounters that probably occur above the 2.5 per week average that the “promotional video” suggests. Fortunately for those who believe in Tickle, Tech Crunch reports that Cornell has no problem with someone actually building his spoof of an app.

Watch the video to decide on the mock app’s usefulness yourself:

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The post Tickle: The App That Dissolves Awkward Encounters appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

screen shot via Forevernot.com

Social media and gambling go hand-in-hand. Some people go to a casino to hit the tables and slots. Others spend their nights aimlessly stalking friend and celebrity profiles on Facebook and Twitter. Now there’s a way to combine the two, all in one easy to use app.

Forever Not is a game that allows users to anonymously rate friends’ and celebrity relationships and wager on whether they will make it or break it. The Forever Not interface is similar to that of the popular dating app Tinder. The app uses Facebook to present a mix of friend and celebrity couples, and allows users to swipe right for “Not” to vote that the couple will break-up within 30 days, or left for “Forever” to vote that they’ll stay together.

Forever Not then allows users to go back and view photos of couples they’ve previously voted on and track their Forever Not scores. Users can cash out on their bets every 30 days depending on how their votes fared.  In concept it’s all fun and games—complete with virtual betting—but in reality the app has proved a bit creepy. Unlike dating apps where both parties sign up and agree to share their information, Forever Not uses Facebook to allow users to rank all of their friends’ relationships, without their consent or knowledge.

As a relatively new app, most couples (and singles alike) still don’t know Forever Not exists. Whether or not the app takes off as the next big thing remains to be seen, but in the meantime it may be in the best interest of most couples to remain oblivious to the idea of their friends betting on the success of their relationship.

Betting on celebrity relationships is one thing. Hollywood is full of break-up stories and it seems relatively harmless to bet a few shekels when the odds are in your favor more often than not. But when it comes to betting on the success or failure of the compatibility of your friends and loved ones, is there a moral line being crossed? Sometimes the process is a bit of a guessing game, as many Facebook users are listed as being in a relationship but don’t disclose the name of their partner. In such cases, you’re left voting on the romantic longevity of a friend and an anonymous question mark.

Forever Not is available for free download in the iTunes store and will soon be available on Android, Kik Messenger, and Facebook Apps.

The post Forever Not: The App That Lets You Bet On Love appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Image via Twin Design/Twin Design/Shutterstock

Photo app Instagram has never been more popular. It now has 150 million active users each month and 55 million new photos added every day. And it’s safe to say an awful lot of those photos aren’t just in-the-moment snaps. They’ve been manipulated, retouched or filtered with any number of built-in features and additional apps. Join the masses and make your Instagram better with these apps.

1. Pic Stitch

Image via iTunes/Pic Stitch

This free iPhone app let you put several photos into a grid to style them and share them all together.

2. Photo Grid

Image via Google Play/Photo Grid

This free app has the same basic principle as Pic Stitch, but it’s for Android users.

3. PicsArt Photo Studio

Image via Google Play/PicsArt

This is a free Android app that lets you edit photos, draw on photos and create collages.

4. Camera+

Image via iTunes/Camera+

This app brings professional photography tools to your iPhone for $1.99. Zoom, focus and improved clarity are some of the many features included.

5. Camera ZOOM FX

Image via Google Play/Camera Zoom FX

This Android app offers a full photo editing suite for $2.99 with optional free add-ons.

6. Pudding Camera

Image via Google Play/Pudding Camera

This free Android app gives you access to some professional photo tools and effects. It offers a variety of aspect ratios, camera and lens effects, and retro-style filters.

7. Retromatic 2.0

Image via iTunes/Retromatic 2.0

This $1.99 iPhone app can turn a picture into something you’d see on a 1950s poster.

8. Rakuga-cute

Image via iTunes/Rakuga-cute

It’s all in the title. This free iPhone app turns photos into cutesy, girly snaps with lots of effects.

9. PicLab

Image via iTunes/PicLab

This free app is available for iPhone and Android. It lets you add artistic, typographic text to photos and has some standard features like filters and effects.

10. InstaSize

Image via iTunes/Instasize

This free app lets you post entire photos to Instagram instead of the standard square photos.

11. Perfect365

Image via Google Play/Perfect365

This free app for iPhone and Android is like Photoshop for Instagram. It lets you alter and “enhance” your face, add virtual makeup and try on different hairstyles.

12. Afterlight

Image via iTunes/Afterlight

This $0.99 iPhone app lets you adjust lighting effects for an artistic touch.

13. Slow Camera Shutter Plus

Image via iTunes/Slow Camera Shutter Plus PRO

Create long-exposure photos with this free iPhone app.

14. Tiny Planet

Image via iTunes/Tiny Planet

This $0.99 iPhone app turns your surroundings into tiny, spherical planets.

15. TiltShift Generator

Image via iTunes/TiltShift Generator

This free app for iPhone simulates tilt-shift photography for a toylike look.

16. DXP

Image via iTunes/DXP

This free iPhone app combines photos for a dreamy, double-exposure look.

17. Double Photo

Image via Google Play/Double Photo

This is the same idea as DPX but for Android users.

18. Superimpose

Image via iTunes/Superimpose

Separately adjust the foreground of your photos or give yourself an entirely new backdrop using this $0.99 iPhone app.

19. Tangent

Image via iTunes/Tangent

This $1.99 iPhone app lets you add geometric shapes and patterns to your photos for an artistic twist.

20. Instarchive

screen shot via Instarchive, by Recollect

This isn’t an app per se, but it’s still useful. Back up your pictures and save them on your computer with Instarchive.

The post 20 Apps To Make Your Instagram Better appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Image via Twitter/danjacovell

The latest, and definitely one of the strangest, Snapchat hack has been sending pictures of smoothies from compromised accounts to entire friend lists. The image of smoothies are overlaid with text directing friends to visit the website “snapfroot.com.” From snapfroot.com, the user is automatically redirected to allrecipes.com, where actual smoothie recipes are listed. 

The hack is on the heels of a recent hack that released the usernames and phone numbers of 4.6 million Snapchat users.

Let’s take a look at the three things we learned from Snapchat’s latest hack:

1. Snapchat needs to figure its security out
2. Snapchat users need more secure passwords
3. Snapchat has a legitimate monetization route

1. For a company that prides itself on the privacy of the images shared between users, it tees itself up as the perfect hacker’s challenge. If Snapchat doesn’t improve its security fast, someone else will, and offers like Facebook’s for $3 Billion will be gladly accepted by the first app to do so.

2. While Snapchat works to fix its security, users can provide a layer of defence from such hacks by improving their passwords. According to a spokesperson for Snapchat who spoke to wired.com, the smoothie hack was generally successful if and only if the hack guessed the user’s password on its first try. In order to prevent this from happening to you, consider resetting your password. Passwords that include upper case and lower case letters with numbers and symbols protect users better than simple passwords that include first names or pet’s name. Many of the hacking techniques use brute force, where hackers choose common combinations of words until they guess correctly. The words are usually selected from information gathered about you from around the net. Using a password with an uppercase letter or symbol, exponentially increases the amount of attempts required before a bot guesses your password. As a result, hacking bots are more likely to pass up on your account.

3. If anything positive came out of this hack it is that it proves that Snapchat has a legitimate route to monetization. Periodic messages sent to user’s phones from Team Snapchat exemplify that Snapchat can access millions with the swipe of a finger. What if, instead of recipes for smoothies, the message referred to the launch of a new product? This is the perfect opportunity for Snapchat to study the effects of the hack as a potential opportunity to monetize in the near future using the same tactics.

For now, here is to hoping that the next time we read about Snapchat it doesn’t involve a hack.

https://twitter.com/danjacovelli/status/433437498073944064

The post What We Learned From Snapchat’s Latest Smoothie Hack appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Wingman

A new app is in development that would let users meet each other in the air.

Wingman started as a joke. App creator Gabe Whaley was getting off a plane when he thought, what if there were an app like Tinder, but for people in flight?

I’m pretty sure that at some point, anyone who’s flown has had a thought, like, ‘I wonder what it would be like to talk to that person. Too bad it’s never going to happen, because the seating arrangement didn’t provide for that,’” Whaley told ANIMAL. “And of course, most people have at least some sort of exposure to what the mile high club is.”

So, the 24-year-old copywriter from New York set about making the “Tinder for airplanes.” Users will be able to create profiles with some basic information: picture, first name, age, occupation and flight information. They’re also asked whether they’re traveling for business or pleasure. Then the app shows a list of people on the same flight, and users can opt to start conversations from there.

I think it will make people curious, and you never know: someone might use it, and it might start a conversation that they might not have otherwise had,” Whaley said. “It could turn out to be really good, or really bad. Either way, I think it’s really funny.”

Whaley said it’s “incredibly unrealistic” to think Wingman will lead to actual in-flight hookups. Still, it could make for a fun experiment. “Whether they go through with it or not has nothing to do with the app. It has everything to do with them.”

The app has been in production since December. Whaley hopes to have a beta version available by April and a full release in summer. Anyone interested can sign up for updates via the app’s website.

The post Wingman App Will Allow Passengers To Get More Friendlier Mid-Flight appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

screen shot via Vimeo/Facebook

Facebook just introduced its new iPhone app called Paper, and people are already excited about it.

Paper, which officially launches on Monday in the App Store, combines aspects of the traditional Facebook app with aspects of a news-reading app. It’s customizable, so people see the news and posts they care about in fun and interactive ways, and it’s completely ad-free.

The idea behind the app is to share high-quality posts. Product manager Michael Reckhow explained to The Verge that there are the “tools that were out there for sharing high-quality stuff and also the tools where you could reach an audience,” but that those options were often mutually exclusive. “We felt you shouldn’t have to choose between one or the other.”

The app uses a set of intuitive motions to navigate, doing away with buttons that would otherwise take up screen space. That way, the app’s interface lends greater focus to what people want to see. Users can pan wide photos by tilting their phones, and news stories appear on individual cards. Users can choose what topics they’re interested in, and they can customize each post they create.

Paper is set to be a big hit when it becomes available next week. But for now, the app will be available only in the United States and only on iPhones.

The post New Facebook App ‘Paper’ Set To Launch Feb. 3 appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

screen shot via iTunes/Rap Genius

Rap Genius just launched a new iPhone app, letting users more easily browse lyrics and content from their phones.

The app makes Google search results less important, as people can more easily go directly to Rap Genius for answers. That’s a big step for the site; it found out the hard way just how dependent it is on Google search results when it was punished for bad SEO tactics and almost entirely stopped showing up in searches.

Like the traditional website, the app will be able to give information like lyrics, annotations and news. It can automatically bring up information for a song playing from users’ Apple Music app. It also has a Shazam-like feature which can identify a song after listening to it for a short period.

Thousands of years from now, the mobile app is how people will remember Rap Genius,” co-founder Tom Lehman told TechCrunch.

Lehman’s official statement was along the same lines. “Right now, more than half of our traffic comes from mobile devices,” he said. “Soon, it will be 100% – In 1,000 years, when the aliens land, ‘Rap Genius’ will literally mean ‘that dope iPhone app’. This app has long been our users’ most-requested feature, and we’re pumped to finally deliver.”

The post Rap Genius Launches iPhone App appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Snapchat just can’t catch a break lately, and its users aren’t too happy.

The Snapchat team announced last week that it would be looking into complaints of large amounts of spam on the photo sharing app.

And over the last two days, it rolled out a new “ghost” verification screen in order to cut down on automated spam. The screen shows nine simple pictures, and users must select all the images containing the company’s ghost logo. Snapchat meant for the screen to be a less annoying version of a CAPTCHA in order to separate humans from nonhumans.

Snapchat

But the new security measure was barely live before people found one big issue with it: computers are able to find the ghost, too. Unlike standard CAPTCHAs, Snapchat’s human verification process could be rendered useless by implementing just a few simple lines of code.

Computer engineer Steven Hickson wrote in a blog post, “This is an incredibly bad way to verify someone is a person because it is such an easy problem for a computer to solve.”

Explaining how he hacked the new verification system, he wrote that the Snapchat ghost acts as a template, and that computers can easily find matching templates. He used a “thresholding” technique to determine how closely aspects of given images lined up with the ghost template.

Hickson’s program first looked for pieces of each image that were the same color as the ghost template. Then for each white blob found, the program extracted “feature points,” giving a partial outline of each blob. Were the white blobs unique, or did they line up with the template?

It took Hickson just 30 minutes to write the program. He summarizes:

With very little effort, my code was able to “find the ghost” in the above example with 100% accuracy. I’m not saying it is perfect, far from it. I’m just saying that if it takes someone less than an hour to train a computer to break an example of your human verification system, you are doing something wrong. There are a ton of ways to do this using computer vision, all of them quick and effective. It’s a numbers game with computers and Snapchat’s verification system is losing.

People who want to replicate Hickson’s results don’t even have to write their own code, as he was nice enough include a link to the full code from his blog.

It looks like it’ll be back to the drawing board for Snapchat’s security team.

This isn’t the only big security issue the company has had recently. Earlier this month, the app had a major security breach that affected 4.6 million users. The company’s solution to that issue was to allow users to opt out of the “Find Friends” feature, making their phone numbers unsearchable.

The post Snapchat’s New Verification System Already Hacked appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.

Sex With Google Glass

“Sex with Glass” is a new app for Google Glass that lets users watch their intimate moments from their partners’ points of view. On the surface, it sounds like it could be a promising and fairly straightforward idea, but people are raising many legitimate concerns over the still unreleased app.

Lebanese programmer Sherif Maktabi created Sex with Glass during a London hackathon, saying he wanted “to change the way people experience things.” Partners can wear Google Glass to record and stream their experiences in the bedroom. If both users are wearing Glass, they can trade perspectives. They can also use the app to control ambiance like lighting and music, and to get inspiration from the internet.

Users can use the app on their iPhones as well, adding yet another view to the mix. Users can choose which perspective they want to watch at any given time. They can replay the entire scene for up to five hours before the videos are deleted permanently.

Google has previously stated that X-rated apps aren’t welcome on Google Glass and has banned other raunchy apps, but the company hasn’t made a statement on Sex with Glass yet.

The Issues

There’s no shortage of issues with either the app’s website or its overall idea.

Maktabi and his team, which now includes Sabba Keynejad and Satara Achilles, seem to have outdated and sexist views of sex, which they have no problem flaunting on the app’s (sNSFW) website.

The site boasts that the app lets you “see everything, from every angle,” but it really only shows women. The photos, meant to give examples of the experience, cater to the straight male demographic. “What he sees” is her, from the back. “What she sees” is also her.

And women seem to be the only ones with privacy concerns, according to the programmers. The site used to read, “You’ll be able to watch your videos for five hours until they are deleted forever. That’s for all the ladies out there.” That second sentence has since been deleted from the site.

Let’s face it: when Google Glass hits shelves later this year, most users will likely be straight men. So I can sort of forgive the programmers for gearing the site toward that demographic.

But there’s still the question of practicality.

Adam Clark at Gizmodo asks all-important questions like, “Is it possible to undress sexily while wearing Glass?” and “Is it possible to do anything sexily while wearing Glass?”

Adi Robertson of The Verge imagines the experience like this: “Assuming that you and your partner are both participating in a closed beta that requires purchase of a $1,500 headset, you can both don the fragile prototypes and have extremely cautious intercourse while watching a live camera feed from the other person’s viewpoint.”

The app may be good for a one-time experiment into extreme narcissism and voyeurism, but it just doesn’t seem practical beyond that.

The post Sex With Google Glass App Lets Users Experience Intimacy From A New Perspective appeared first on Wall Street Insanity.