Apps for Kids 001: a new Boing Boing podcast

Apps For Kids is a new Boing Boing podcast. It's about iOS apps that are fun for kids and their parents. My 8-year-old daughter Jane is my co-host. We'll look at games, activities, and educational apps. Episodes will be short -- under five minutes.

In the first episode of Boing Boing's Apps for Kids podcast, Jane and I review the endless runner game Temple Run. It's free and you can download it for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch from the iTunes Store.

Download Apps For Kids 001 as an MP3 | Subscribe via iTunes | Subscribe via RSS | Download single episodes as MP3s

Apps for kids is on Stitcher!

• [a_w_young]

  Why just “iOS” stuff?

  • [Mark_Frauenfelder]

    Because we don’t have other mobile devices. :(

• [Justine]

  Oooh! Looking forward to listening in. Love that your daughter is the co-host. :)

• [Mobad Media]

  I think your daughter might enjoy our 3D transformation of Brianne Drouhard’s children’s book, Billie the Unicorn. Check out the trailer and send me an email ([e-mail]) if you would like a promo code. http://youtu.be/uvnEjrGhGys

• [Robin Hillman]

  Our company made an app called “Tiga Talk” which is a speech therapy game: http://tigatalk.com/app/ – We tried to take a really positive approach to speech therapy, and made the rewards for participation lots of fun and colourful.

  We’ve learned so much about making games for kids, and I’m excited about this new podcast!

• [Mike Baker]

  Really nice graphic there, Mark! What font is that?

• [appfiend]

  I think your readers, and Jason Weisberger, would love a review of any of the TeachMe: apps from 24x7digital!  http://www.24x7digital.com/appstore

• [Mark_Frauenfelder]

  Thanks for all the tips. If you would like Jane and me to take a look at an app, please email the code to [e-mail].

• [Scotty Iseri]

  Would you be able/willing to look at an android app?  

  • [Mark_Frauenfelder]

    If I ever get an Android device, sure!

• [Dan Perez]

  We just released our first ebook app called The Worst Book Ever! Does your child love to eat mushrooms, pull out splinters and go to bed early?  Didn’t think so.  But you’ll still love this misguided story…  

  http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-worst-book-ever!/id481902731?mt=8  If anyone wants a promocode, just shoot me an email – dan at twizzletales.com

• [Tyler Tinsley]

  Hi mark
  check out my brother’s ios game Fascination http://www.fascinationgame.com/ twitter him @franktinsley if you want a free code!

• [redesigned]

  My 8yr old daughter and I love playing on the iPad together, and enjoyed your podcast.  Thanks for putting together short audio reviews that we can enjoy listening to together to discover new apps.  The short length is perfect for us.  As a dad and tech geek i appreciated this on so many levels.  Cheers, Josh

• [AppCurry]

  If you have kids, be sure to check out our app: Talking Car Zippy http://bit.ly/talkingcarzippy . Kids love cars and they would surely love to interact with a talking car. Lots of cool animations and facial expressions that would surely keep them busy :)

• [Ken Olsen]

  Brilliant podcast topic. My girls have been in to Plants vs. Zombies lately. Can’t wait for the next edition!

• [Donny Viszneki]

  Here goes…

  Recently my employer wired me $1,100 USD to purchase my first iOS devices: an unlocked iPhone 4 and a wifi-only iPad 2. Learning to use these devices (in tandem with my shiny new 27″ iMac, also courtesy my employer) has awakened in me memories of my history with Apple products, and my unlikely genesis as a software developer.

  I was raised by a single mother supported by welfare. The year I was born, she won in a local raffle an Apple IIc+, a variant of the Apple II most techies from that era will deny ever existed. I still remember as a child, in the wee hours of a wintry morning hours before the sunrise, coming across across its Applesoft BASIC programming manual (apparently an abridged version, unfortunately. It would be some time before I was able to tap into the full potential of the machine.)

  I rummaged through the basement until I found the gray beast, lined with vents, clicky keys, and a retractable handle. When my mother found me awake, instead of scolding me as she might have ordinarily, she only instructed me that in fact, “QWERUIOP” were not the conventional homekeys. I had had some notion of homekeys, and immediately began relearning to type.

  I wrote my first computer game as a preteen sitting on the floor of my bedroom among a littering of Legos and Hot Wheels race tracks. A major milestone in the direction of my life, my career, and my philosophy of life.

  Had I grown up twenty years later than I did, I might have had an iPad instead. This machine will never invite any child to look beneath its beautiful, sleek exterior. It comes with no programming manual, a $50/year (IIRC) developer membership fee, and an editorial purview that seemingly begins at its symbolism of status and ends at political censorship, never straying far enough from that program of social control I most readily associate with the cult of personality that sustained the Communist Party of Soviet Russia to consider quality assurance issues like application stability.

  Where would I be without hackable computers? Who would I be?

  I’ve been using these iOS devices for about a month, and feel somehow that I am betraying my roots. But it’s my job.

  I thought it was BoingBoing’s job to provide a sorely needed counterweight to the fascist-fashionista culture of Steve Jobs, his rabid fanboys, and his unconcerned customers who only want to own an iOS device insofar as they want to own an expensive car or a beach house.

  BoingBoing, you are a beacon light in our dark world. Please do not let that light go out.

  Sincerely,
  Long time reader,
  Don Viszneki.

  • [Tyler Tinsley]

    So counter point.

    My brother has been able to create some promising stuff in the past, music, short films. but he never really stuck with anything.

    About two years ago he gets it into his head to develop apps and games. No programming experience, only a basic knowledge of computers and the ability to learn. he spends a year looking for a programer, scraps that idea and learns how to do it himself in one year and now he has a full featured app for sale.

    All along the way he kept telling me how helpful the apple documentation and API were, he also used third party tools like unity. anyway the massive structures and institutions around the ios platform really help developers. 

    There is a reason you see such a flood of apps on that platform and why it’s harder to support others. 

    As for kids learning to program and hack, games like minecraft and little big planet are so awesome and i’m sure we will only see more games imitate these successes in the future. these games have even started appearing on IOS and handhelds.

    • [Donny Viszneki]

      I encourage the likes of LBP and Minecraft, but that alone is not an opportunity to become a professional software developer.

      I’m glad to hear about your brother, maybe things aren’t as bad as they seem from my point of view.

• [Mike Bennett]

  I look forward to the show.  Please, if you can, comment if the apps are available on other platforms as we are an Android house.  Perhaps you could have guests once in a while with Android devices.

  • [Mark_Frauenfelder]

    Thanks, Mike. We’ll do that!

• [Rob Beschizza]

  Wonderful! I like the short, scripted format a lot.

• [Mike Levad]

  Mark, I look forward to your show.  Don’t forget X is for X-ray an app previously featured by Maggie here on BoingBoing

• [Tom]

  I’m a parent and an iOS app developer.   My wife and I have created a couple apps for parents/kids  and we’re planning on creating more. 

  You can check them out at: http://spillingcoffeemedia.com/  If you like demo codes, fire a tweet @tom_coffee.  

  Subscribed and will listen to on the way home…. and even as an iPhone user I would hope you would offer something for the millions of Android users out there!

• [Matt Wilkes]

  Would like to see some Android app reviews too! It’d be unfortunate for a cool idea such as this to turn into an Apple podcast advertisement.

• [John Reinschmidt]

  iOS only? Dislike.

  • [Mark_Frauenfelder]

    We will try to review apps that are available on other platforms, too!