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4 App Categories for Business and Pleasure

July 16, 2018 No Comments

Featured article by Mindy Laughton, Independent Technology Author

Mobile Apps

You know what they say about all work and no play. Fortunately, that doesn’t really describe anyone. Even a person who seems to work all the time has one or two outlets for entertainment. And a person who happens to be between jobs is often the hardest working person in the room.

No matter how seriously you take yourself, you are both work and play. App makers know that. And there is a surprising amount of crossover in the business and casual genre.

Consider how business-casual has become a category of attire. It is the middle ground that recognizes that whether at work or at home, we are never truly one or the other. In service to that fact, here are a few of the app categories that you need on your smartphone for whichever mode you happened to be in.

Finance Apps

When you are ready to take the family out on the town, it only makes sense to check the bank account to be sure there are no surprises. You can’t have certain types of pleasure without money, and a good accounting for where every dime happens to be.

That same application may also be the one you use to keep up with your business finances as well. ou need one of the best iPhone X cases you can find because your phone is your credit card and financial passport for both business and pleasure. Breaking your smartphone while out and about has implications for your financial transactions.

Those financial apps may range from a Starbucks card with funds on it to your company banking app. Regardless of who you are, your smartphone is incomplete without at least one financial app.

Note Apps

Notes apps are a major category for developing social entrepreneurship skills. Some notes apps are devoted to capturing ideas locally on the device. Others are centered around saving things you encounter on the internet. Still others are all about handwritten notes and doodles.

It is very difficult to say whether notes apps belong in the business category or pleasure. Not all our ideas pertain to work. Some are just about the tune in your head that might be the start of a song. There are actually apps for that. Are notes for business or pleasure? Yes.

TV Apps

You might think that TV is a category that belongs squarely in the entertainment camp. But a financial expert keeping up with shows on finance might beg to differ. Educators use TV shows, movies, and documentaries in the classroom frequently.

Netflix and Hulu are great for documentaries, not just the latest sci-fi shows. Still, those TV shows come in handy when passing the time on a lunch break or the commute home.

There is more to TV than news and thrillers. There is also that great educational programming that makes the same app just as useful for a toddler as it is for the CEO. TV is a great companion whether in the kid’s room or the conference room.

AR Apps

If you have one of those phones that can handle AR, there are reasons to pick up one of the newer AR apps for both business and pleasure. It seems rather obvious to mention the games and AR toys that are proliferating the apps stores. What is not obvious is how much fun many of them are.

But if you are dead set against having fun, you can use AR apps to replace your ruler or tape measure. AR is already starting to augment navigation apps. And in a few years, it will be difficult to find any category of app that does not have an AR component.

Even games have their place in the business world. Microsoft has known this for ages. IT departments had to shut off access to Solitaire and Minesweeper. That was probably a mistake because every worker needs basic diversions from time to time. These days, they divert themselves with their Facebook accounts.

No app category is completely one thing or another. You can’t do business or pleasure well without finance apps, notes apps, TV apps, and AR apps. They say business and pleasure don’t mix. But as app developers have conclusively proven, those who say that are wrong.

About the Author

Mindy loves to write and blog. She’s had this passion since she attended college in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. If Mindy isn’t on her Mac, then chances are she’s hiking with her new husband and her dog, Winston.

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