Techcrunch points out one blind iPhone user, Austin Seraphin, who wrote on his own blog, Behind the Curtain, back in June 2010 about how the phone changed his life in just the first 24 hours of using it. That is amazing. He goes on to explain how he uses the iPhone, and the key of course is the VoiceOver feature. Android phones, I’m assuming, have a similar feature.

So if you’re a mobile apps developers, whether you pick Apple iOS, Google Android, or some other Mobile OS with VoiceOver-like features, wouldn’t it be gratifying to build life-changing apps? Don’t ignore this market. While it might not be large now, the more well-designed mobile apps there are for the sight-impaired market, the larger that market will grow. (There might even be government grants to develop such apps.) While there’s no way a touchscreen smartphone can produce Braille content, combining audio and touch interactions might actually be a more valuable experience for the sight-impaired, and such apps could have a profoundly positive effect on someone’s life.

Of course, you’ll have to throw some of your mobile apps design principles out the proverbial window and approach design from a literally different perspective. That is, without sight. Trying closing your eyes and think about how you would want a mobile app to interact with you if you couldn’t see. If you had to tap, double-tap or swipe the screen based on audio cues, could you navigate through an app without looking? How can you improve the screen flow? Is it possible for a blind person to use your app on their own, or would they need a sighted person to changing settings for them? Can you incorporate touch-based interactions with voice without making it overly complicated?

For those of you looking for a challenge, the sight-impaired mobile market could be a great starting point and rewarding besides.

Have you designed or used mobile apps intended for the sight-impaired? What was your experience?

Links: Techcrunch, Behind the Curtain.

Tapulous is not the only iPhone app developer turning a healthy profit. There are others, though many more developers are making nothing at all or a negligible amount. CallStyle is currently engaged in market research on monetizing iPhone apps, and we’ll be publishing our findings in early 2010.

As you’ll see in the original review below, I was very excited about Timelines, especially because I found the interface gorgeous and the graphical breakdown of time codes enough to satisfy my data visualization fetish. My disappointment was that the interface was not entirely intuitive. However, out of fairness, I have to admit that I used the app without really making much of an effort to more than browse the instructions and video primer. But now, after a few more weeks of use, I’m finding that I actually enjoy the Timelines app. It’s still quirky and “sticky” in funny ways, but other than that I get out of it what I want in a time logging tool.

Original Review
The TimeLines time logging app for the iPhone and iPod Touch looks fantastic and seems great in theory, but in actuality, it’s the first iPhone app I’ve paid for that I’ve been disappointed in and felt like I wasted my money. So far, I’ve found it difficult to use, lacking in instructions, difficult to correct.

That said, I love the visuals and the charting potential, but the unusual way of entering times and durations for project tasks/ activities is very awkward at first and “sticky” in a bad way. And if you need to change one task’s duration, it could have a domino effect on subsequent tasks in the timeline.

To improve this app and make it worth the US$4.99, a number of things have to be improved:

Foremost is the funny way the current vertical bar of color sits underneath the point you stop at. Take a look at the screensnap above. The final vertical bar for (task ‘Code 3′) ends 15 minutes below the point that the ‘break’ bar sits at. Visually, the break bar suggests that a task ends there, so why is it sitting 15 min above the task code bars bottom? But wait, it gets odder. If you leave the app and come back, there’ll be a ‘break’ bar at the bottom of the final task, but the break bar of 15 min earlier will still be there (see snap below). Instructions to this regard would help.

Another big issue I have is that if you define, say, 10 different task/time codes but a given day does not use them all, all the codes still show up on the left. That might mean you have to scroll down needlessly to see durations for various time codes. What happens if you have, say, 20 different time codes? To be a more efficient app, only the codes in use for the given day should be visible. Of course, the current screen makes it easier to enter durations for a given task code, but harder to view overall. So to facilitate the improved viewing of durations, Cronologic will have to change the way task codes are selected.

I really hope they improve this app. It looks like it has a lot of potential. (A free, basic version would have been nice, with maybe only 2 or 3 time codes allowed.) But for now, I’ll log my work tasks as I’ve been doing: in a Google spreadsheet.

Roman Scharf, JAJAH”s co-founder said that JAJAH is aiming to change the way the advertising community sees telephony as an advertising media. “We spend more time on the phone than consuming all other types of media, TV, reading papers and radio included. However, advertisers spend very little budget advertising on telephone calls,” saysScharf.

JAJAH is gearing its in-call advertising platform as the Google Adwords of phones. JAJAH”s in-call advertising will be made available to its users soon. And it will be offered to JAJAH users as an opt-in solution where they will hear and see targeted advertising content and eventually receive monthly credit for it.JAJAH will also give its users an incentive to earn back their phone bill or even make money while calling their friends or relatives.

JAJAH is also looking into increasing the reach of its in-call advertising to include telecommunication companies to use their platform in monetizing phone inventories. Telephone operations will later on be given the opportunity to use JAJAH”s advertising appliance in their environments and to connect to JAJAH”s platform.

The in-call advertising will also allow businesses to target their audience on any given scale. These businesses would be able to play their advertising messages to local communities ofJAJAH users. Hence, a more specific and audience targeted advertising campaigns will be carried out.To test this new service, JAJAH has partnered with advertising network Oridian, thus giving JAJAH instant access to a large number of companies which can try out JAJAH”s in-call advertising.