Designing Children

Are Kids 6+ the Next Competition for App Designers and Marketers?

Tiny Tapps’ iPad App Signals an Ushering in of a Whole New Wave of Really Young App Developers and Graphic Artists

Move over Zuckerberg – you are gettin’ old school…fast.

Like with athletic phenoms, musical prodigies and other computer nerds the youth movement is moving quickly and aggressively into the tech side of applications and software.  Not the consumer demo side – the designer side. But we aren’t talking about teens anymore.  Tiny Tap is the latest of the apps to transform children into techtykes by helping them customize a game or playable book with their own photos, cam shots, music, narration and other techniques that can be shared.  What better way to learn how to tell a good story, and isn’t a good storyteller also a good marketer?

Out of 200,000 plus, iPad apps (Apple, 2012) TinyTap (http://techcrunch.com/2012/05/25/tinytap-app-lets-kids-create-customized-ipad-books-games/#comment-box) is one of handful that takes home schooling to a new level and may signal a trend in better assisting our young people with developing applicable skills in this sprawling technological landscape, through story telling, graphic design and programming.  This also puts those teachers turned software company advisors in a peculiar position –from front seat to back in favor of the actual users of the software (Donahoo, 2011).

Not to leave aspiring writers and artists out of the game, the Scribble Press application (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/scribble-press/id487300076?mt=80) allows children to draw, color or write designs and messages utilizing a number of app features like markers and other tools.  Like TinyTap, Scribble has templates and examples that are offered in this free app to help children kick start the process.  Once the art is complete, the eBook can be published, printed and mailed (w/ a $9.99 purchase through the app) in soft or hardcover book.

As a marketer of “Big Kid” apps for iPhone and iPad (check out http://www.good-fish.com) and an amateur app developer (more Will Ferrell in The Other Guys than Zuckerberg), I understand the interesting characteristics of developing new ways for people to interact, using visuals and words to engage.  It’s only natural that as we acknowledge as we are teaching our children, they are listening and learning, and teaching us a thing or two as well.

I suppose easing kids into rather than PHP, Eclipse, Android SDK or other software/app language programming, these fledgling apps might provide them with the baby steps (couldn’t help this pun) before moving on toward bigger, more available projects.

But before we put this subject to bed, so to speak, the question has to be asked:  Do we really need that much more competition, especially from those young enough to be our kids?

As of this article’s publishing, the number of active iTunes App Store publishers in the U.S. is 162,296 (148 Apps, 2012).  [Sorry, no age statistics were available]  The numbers of children developers can only grow. Progress, right?

Apple.com (2012) App Store -Apple iPad. Home page.  Retrieved from http://www.apple.com/ipad/from-the-app-store/

148 Apps.Biz (2012). Number of Active iTunes App Store publishers in the U.S. (June) Retrieved from  http://148apps.biz/app-store-metrics/

Chen, Y. (2012). iPad App Lets Children Create & Publish Their Own Hard-Cover Books. (Jan. 11).  Retrieved from http://www.psfk.com/2012/01/publish-kids-books-ipad.html

Donahoo, D. (2011). Teachers: An Untapped App-Development Resource.  The Huffington Post. (August 29). Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-donahoo/educational-apps_b_875736.html

Perez, S. (2012).  TinyTap App Lets Kids Create Customized iPad Books & Games.  Techcrunch.(May 25). Retrieved from http://techcrunch.com/2012/05/25/tinytap-app-lets-kids-create-customized-ipad-books-games/#comment-box