My first Web application: Hypnocity
Hypnocity is my first iPhone Web application. I was goofing around with my iPhone at the office and was checking out the public website for my hometown (and current employer), Arlington County, Virginia, a community just a stone's throw across the Potomac River from Washington, DC, and was sorely disappointed by how difficult it was to find certain information that I felt, as a resident, was of great usefulness to me. I thought of putting the useful phone numbers and addresses in my iPhone Contacts application, but that seemed way too much effort for just some quick links. Well, hell, I'm a Web guy. Why don't I just create my own Web application that nicely displays the info I feel is important and then I can just access it anytime I want? So I did it and a few days later had Hypnocity.
Hypnocity is a simple and extremely useful Web application that makes it simple-as-pie for people to find all the most important phone numbers and addresses for services in Arlington County, Virginia, and to be able to immediately dial those numbers or find those numbers on a map via the magical wonderfulness of the iPhone.
Got a stray dog terrorizing the block? Just tap the number for Animal Control! Need to find out the address for the library branch that has a hard-to-find book? Tap and get its address just like that! More seriously, need the local substance abuse hotline? Need to report a broken fire hydrant? Want to find out if the county has towed your car and where to pick it up? Want to report suspected child abuse? Gang activity? Or do you just want to find the location of the nearest Metro station? All this and more is available with a few simple taps on Hypnocity.
Okay, sure, that's great for people in Arlington County, but what about other cities? Well, that's where Hypnocity is going. We're building the application as a full-service that municipalities can sign-up for and supply their own important addresses and numbers for their own residents with iPhones. For a fee, municipalities will have access to their own list of information that they can customize as desired. Visitors will pay nothing to access the application, of course, though there will be some very minor and out-of-the-way advertising (Google AdSense links or something like that). As new municipalities are added, visitors will be able to select them from the application's homepage and...voila! All the important information you need without searching in your Contacts, scouring the Web, or calling 411. Just go and tap.
Don't have an iPhone handy? Click here to preview Hypnocity
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