'Appily swinging our way through the mobile jungle…

Right, I’m annoyed!

I’ve spent two weekends now walking round Central London trying to get an iPad 2 but all sold out… everywhere. I went to the Apple Store on the Friday they came out in the UK to be faced with a massive queue that went all the way round Covent Garden. It was unbelievably huge! I waited for twenty minutes without moving and gave up, thinking that, of course, Apple would have realised that there would be huge demand and would have enough stock to last at least until the next day, if not the next week. How wrong I was!

I’ve been round all the Apple stores obviously, and John Lewis, and Currys, and PC World and they’re all sold out. The Apple Store told me that I should go online at 9pm and reserve one to pick up the next day but I’ve tried this for 2 evenings now and they’re all gone within literally 5 seconds… How frustrating.

I have checked on a few websites now and it seems that there’s a global shortage of iPad 2s, but I just can’t shake the feeling that I’m being manipulated by Apple. Did they really underestimate the demand by such a huge extent? If so then it’s a serious, serious cock-up! But this is Apple we’re talking about. They’re the company that has come back from obscurity through a supreme attention to detail (just look at the sexy magnetic power cable on the macbook!) and expert marketing tactics.

So basically, I think that the reason that it’s so difficult to get an iPad is that Apple are restricting supply, thus guaranteeing that consumers like me talk and blog and tweet and in essence do their marketing for them and therefore building demand. Pretty simple, pretty clever.

It’s actually interesting from a general social marketing point of view as it’s allowed Apple to create an agnostic and all-encompassing social media campaign without paying a penny or having to deal with any single network.

That’s why it’s so difficult to get an iPad. They aren’t letting us buy them, so that more people will want them. I’ll let you know if I get one at 9pm tomorrow!

The native weather app that comes on with your iPhone does it’s job as a basic tool to give you a general idea of the upcoming weather in your area over the next few days. If, however, you’re looking for something a bit more accurate, with loads of functions and a great interface then WeatherPro from MeteoGroup, a German app maker, is an essential addition to your app arsenal.

This nifty app finds the closest weather forecasting centre to you via GPS, and uploads a ton of information about what you can expect weather-wise over the next 14 days. I’ve been using this app for about 6 months now and it’s been spot-on every time… Although it could be argued that in the UK that’s not too difficult, and too be fair I think 99% of the predictions have been for clouds with potentially bright periods… But as I say this has been a completely accurate forecast! Good old not-so-sunny Blighty.

The amount of detail that WeatherPro goes into is pretty spectacular, so if you get excited about wind directions or humidity levels, then you’ll love this app. I imagine that for those of you who take part in outdoor activities like golf or sailing will find this of particular interest.

Apart from the day-to-day usefulness of this app I’ve found it really useful for holiday planning as I can get weather reports, that I trust, for anywhere in the world, that give me more info than just the temperature alone.

Another nice piece of functionality in WeatherPro is you can get animated radar and satellite images of local weather patterns (although this only works in certain countries).

WeatherPro - Best Weather App for iPhone