I just bought an iphone 4S and given that it is my first iphone ever, I’d like to know what your favorite apps are. Preferably apps that don’t require jailbreak.
Just a heads up: This is about apps, not about Windows Vs Apple or whether people should spend obscene amounts of money on gadgets. Thank you very much. 
I don’t have a ton of apps on my phone, but here’s what works well for me.
Flipboard:
Awesome news aggregator. Easy to configure and use, offers an enormous pool of sources to pull from. (Pulse News is a good alternative)
AudioGalaxy:
Pretty flawless music streaming app. Allows you to stream music from your computer, which is great because instead of going through the trouble to duplicate your large music collection onto your phone and convert it to the iphone preferred formats, you can save the time and the space and just stream it. All you have to do is make sure the tiny AudioGalaxy companion app is running on your computer.
TED:
Quick way to watch the TED talks.
iTunes U(niversity):
Stream/download lecture audio and video from many top universities for free.
iBooks:
For reading Ebooks AND .pdf files. (There’s a way to convert .pdf files on your computer to be compatible with iBooks. Don’t remember how I did it atm, but I can trace my steps if you want to know.)
Words With Friends:
Fun to challenge friends. Can play at your convenience.
Shazam: if you’re in a store or something and hear a song you like but don’t know the name of the artist or song, just open Shazam and it’ll find it for you. I was really surprised by how consistently it’s able to recognise songs just by recording some faint music, sometimes even over voices.
I have a pool game that I like a lot, and Tetris is always good to get. I was also addicted to Angry Birds for quite a while.
For news I have Drudge and I also like Reason magazine, both easy to read. Idk if you have a metro system or whatever where you live, but if there is an app for it, that can be really useful, as can the app for your bank.
Enjoy your new mini computer. I’ve had mine almost two years and it’s one of the best things I ever invested in.
Thanks for the suggestions.
So far, I have the usual suspects: Facebook, Wikipedia, Imdb, Evernote, Google, Speed Test, Instagram…
I also have a really cool app called 3d brain which allows to you look at a 3d rendering of any given part of the brain and tells you what is known about it. Really great stuff.
I’m really happy with it. It’s awesome to be able to look something up on the internet or check your email whenever you want. Plus, the damn thing is so beautiful.
Give it a week, or two… and you’ll realize that checking email every half hour is not necessary, or can be done on much cheaper phones just as easily, and that you’ll get no use of ibooks or news readers because reading on it is not comfortable or practical. Yes, you can look something up quick on wikipedia, but how is that handy unless you’re prone to quoting wikipedia mid-conversation. Instagram? --A disgrace. And wouldn’t you rather learn about the brain on a proper screen?
The main app that you might find useful is a voice transcriber. You know, a voice recorder that will render your speech into text, which you can then email to yourself. That’s handy. Because let’s be honest, you’re not typing long notes to yourself on that shitty ass keyboard. Check out “Vdictation” …otherwise just search for voice dictation, or something along those lines. There’s some good free ones.
And enjoy the few weeks you find your phone worth while.
Oh… What am I doing that I find it comfortable enough and practical?
For news articles it works great. For books, I’d rather have physical copies to read just because, but I don’t have a huge issue with the screen. Plus it’s convenient to carry around a bunch of books stored on my phone, there all there whenever I want to read them.
Mo, don’t be a contrarian just for the sake of it.
I don’t plan on checking my email every 30 minutes but It’s extremely useful to be able to do it whenever I want to.
For instance, sometimes you may be waiting for an important e-mail but you don’t want to stay home all day long and taking your laptop (in case you have one) with you is not practical at all. And, while it is true that cheaper phones also have internet, I didn’t buy an iPhone because I wanted to check my e-mail. I bought it because of the whole package, obviously.
Also some people may want to check something on Wikipedia (or any other website for that matter) because they genuinely want to learn about it, or maybe they want to browse the internet or maybe they’re bored… Not everyone is looking for quotes to win arguments.
And since you mentioned it, I have , in fact, learned about the brain. In a classroom, given that I’m a psychology undergraduate. The app is still extremely useful since I’m not a human encyclopedia and have multiple interests.
By the way, can you read? Because I remember saying that this thread was about apps, not about the iPhone being a worthy gadget or not.
I owned a 4 generation I Touch- pretty much the same thing you got, minus the phone. Don’t have it anymore, but the apps are still listed in Itunes.
Pandora
Al Jazeera English Live
Opera Mini Web Browser
Command and Conquer Red Alert + Expansion Pack Land of the Rising Sun
Documents to Go
N.O.V.A 2 NEAR ORBITAL VANGUARD ALLIANCE (it’s like Halo but on a smartphone, most advanced game out there)
Civilizations Revolution
BBC NEWS
FOX NEWS
FOX NEWS BUSINESS
It’s been a while, so there might be more news sites. Most of the philosophy stuff is pure shit. You can download movies onto it, I recommend Agora, Children of Dune, Zardoz, Lawrence of Arabia. I also have about every philosophy audiobook there is on Itunes… unless it’s 40 dollars or over, as well as a bunch of free ones. Music as well too
I recommend using Itunes Cards over credit cards on that thing.
I was a guard in San Francisco, and know the guy who designed that stuff… he’s not the british guy getting knighted, younger, rich as hell, and a little older than me, so he’s on the design team. He recommended to me to get a EVO 4G Touch… and I did and didn’t regret it when I owned it. Now I own a 9 dollar prepaid phone and a Ipod Shuffle… and just can’t begin to give a damn about that stuff. I like my nook… would like it more if it had access to the appstore. Most of the apps on Itunes are better made, but less in quantity.
Honestly, don’t worry about the philosophy apps unless you want Plato or Confucius or Aristotle to quote you to death.
Dolphin browser. (primary)
Opera Mini. (backup for non-mobile sites)
Skyfire (if you like flash)
Instapaper (saves sites for offline reading)
Antonyma (chan viewer)
Hootsuite (if you use more than 1 of FB, LinkedIn, or twitter)
eBay (good deals)
Skype
Skout (finding sluts)
Photoshop Express (free)
First Aid (just in case)
Whatever bank you use
volchok hypocrite,
I gave you an app recommendation. Can you read? Someone raised the question of why reading and studying on a phone is uncomfortable. To that supreme genius, I would suggest that it’s because the screen is about 2 inches by 3.5 inches, approx. Doesn’t that make sense? And to you, who wants to geniunely learn from wikis, the same fault applies.
I gave you an app. The one you’ll find most useful. And then apart from that I told you why buying it for “the whole package” is a dumbass move.
I’ll check it out. Did you need me to acknowledge you didn’t say something to me?
Double post.
Google maps looks and performs better on iPhone than any other too, imo. My husband and I are always opening up the browser to check stuff, too; on wiki or whatever, and find reviews of movies or restaurants while on the move. Like you say, it frees you up to move around if you’re waiting for something important or whatever.
I also have zero difficulty typing on it (I’m on it right now), and find it easy to read even long articles (just flip the text around).
I bought one fairly recently too.
I recommend:
Pandemic 2.5: Design your own virus and wipe out the human population. Good fun.
Canabalt: Run and jump over shit. Also good fun.
Chess.com: Err…self-explanatory.
I also use a messenger app called Kakao.
Plus some others that are only relevant to my location. Buses, subway, cinema, etc. etc.
There’s one born every minute 
I don’t have any because
a) I think mobile phones are inherently evil
b) my blackberry is used only for texts and calls and it was a freebie to go along with my contract
c) I have to have one, presumably because of the Antichrist/Satan.
There’s an app called photosynth that looks pretty cool.
My top used: Kindle/iBooks, Wiki Offline, Offline Reader.
Various relaxation apps/games (Moonlight Mahjong, Blue Block, Field Fencer, Melodia, LiquaPop, Osmos)
Lulz, looks like a straight version of grindr.