Android like Apple now has a ton of apps in the market and yes amazingly enough there are several that you’ll know about right off the bat to go searching for them and use them. Gmail… check, calendar… check… weather widget… check… and then begins the notion based search process.

I take pictures and videos, so I search the app market for pictures and videos, see what comes up in the top free… maybe take a peek at the paid for apps.

For new smart phone and app users you’ll be about to enter a period of discovery that will include you downloading everything from farting apps, to recipe and cooking apps to wallpapers and basically a lot of applications that you’ll use 3x and then never use again. You’ll think you’re a football fan or whatever your hobby is, type it in and find a plethora of apps (some even useful) related to your hobby and fandom.

After that you’ll note your phone’s battery life sucks and you’ll spend some time in the netherworld of utilities that promise longer battery life. You’ll also have had enough fun in the discovery phase that you’ll periodically check the latest and top free listed apps.

Then what? Barring the occasional urgent need (“damn how much is that in USD? I better download a currency converter app”), the occasional recommendation from a friend (“Angry birds is the best time waster eva!”), the occasional news article (“Color raises 43 million in funding”) you’ll slip into a period where you’ve basically hit the app wall.

… and yet every day hundreds of new apps hit the market and speed by your nose without you even noticing.

While a good many of the apps (lets just come right out and say most) will not be of any value, use or interest to you. There sheer volume of apps alone would indicate that you’re missing out on some apps that are actually right up your alley.

Say you’re a poet for example. Back in the discovery phase mentioned above you have searched “poetry” or “poems” or “Frost”… whatever… and you found your favorite poems and apps for poets. So you’re set, except you you’ll still need writing tools, and rhyming dictionaries, spell checkers, battery life extenders (for cranking out longer odes and sonnets), mood music, font changers, thought diaries, flashlight apps for writing under the covers in bed late at night… yaddy yaddy.

My point is… while the App Markets are fine for finding individual apps their not much good at telling you the best set of apps you might need for your/a particular lifestyle. Sure there are plenty of useful apps that overlap lifestyles, if I’m a poet or a golfer I’ll want long battery life… but I’ll also want recommendations for scorecard apps, GPS and weather conditions too… apps that might not show up in a searc for “golf”.

So what to do? I think to combat this problem Shanzai.com is going to play around on this site with creating a list of lifestyles and the variety of associated apps that we think are best suited for them. We review at least one app everyday, lets start figuring out who can really use em.

You can contribute your thoughts too, on lifestyle suggestions or apps for the lifestyles we cover. Stay tuned…

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