This is the second entry into Going Mobile, my series of reviews on mobile software. Frequent readers of this blog will notice that this series used to only focus on productivity software but is now expanding to the wider app ecosystem. I’m still taking a special focus on apps that actually allow you to “get things done” or provide a certain level of productive value.
This week I’m really excited to be taking a quick look at a brand new app by the nerd-famous Marco Arment – Overcast. Overcast is basically a high-end iOS only podcast client. As a podcaster myself, please check out Coder Radio if you are into development, I get really excited when a top-tier developer like Arment puts something out in the space.
The Good: Overcast is fast. I mean lightening fast. I’ve been using it since day one and have yet to find any noticeable lag or stuttering with any of the animations in the app. To be fair, some of this is due to the app’s arguably spartan design; in fact, other than the app’s logo, it uses all standard iOS controls, something that works surprisingly well and is refreshing when compared to some of the overly “designed” apps we’ve seen over the past few years.
Though I am not a huge fan of playing podcasts at higher than 1X speed, it’s good that Overcast offers the ability to finely control how fast you are playing back the audio. Like all of the app’s features, this is elegantly tucked away and is in now way intrusive.
The Bad: Overcast is free to download and use to a point and Arment has been pretty generous in what features he allows you to access before paying the $4.99 upgrade price; in fact, you can use some of the premium features for free with limits without paying – it is a little shocking that Apple allowed this, given their relatively hard position on trials of any kind. However, Arment’s generosity doesn’t make up for the fact that “smart speed”, the apps signature feature, is just not very impressive and I’ve found to not work pretty very well for the majority of podcasts in my somewhat extensive library.
The Ugly: It is a little disheartening that someone like Arment who has a following and could release even the simplest of apps and still get some immediate and great press felt that even he had to go with a freemium model to make a decent profit on the app. Arment’s done freemium in the “cleanest” way I’ve seen so yet but it still feels a bit unfortunate that it had to be done.
Conclusion: If you subscribe to more than three podcasts and use an iPhone, then you should give Overcast a shot.
