Cheap Gas! Version 3.0 Now in iTunes! Augmented Reality is HERE!

Exact Imitation is the Most Sincere Form of Thievery

OK, Apple.

I turned the other cheek when another app with the name “Cheap Gas” showed up in the app store.  That was also a GasBuddy.com client, and differed in name only by some hyphenated bullshit tacked onto the end of “Cheap Gas.”

Fine.  It’s a crowded little space (GasBuddy.com, GasBag, iGasUp, Cheap Gas!). Build a better mousetrap, yada yada yada. Fine.

When a THIRD app shows up – named “Cheap Gas Finder” – and uses the “Cheap Gas!” application in iTunes VERBATIM as their app description… well, let’s just say “enough’s enough.”

It’s not like Cheap Gas! is an obscure app.  It’s not a world beater, but it’s fairly well known, with well over 400,000 downloads.

How in the hell can anyone simply tack on a word of a popular app, steal their description VERBATIM, and still get approved into the App Store?

Am I pissed?  Really, more disappointed than pissed.

I’m used to being kissed before I get screwed.

So, there’s THAT.

Below are the screen shots of my app, and the two copycat apps.

Whither NASA?

I’m a huge fan of NASA (the idea), but not so much NASA the government agency.

After six more launches, human space flight – at least for the next decade – is a total question mark for NASA.

We frequent the KSC Visitor Complex at least once a month.  We go to Shuttle launches.  We attend Camp KSC.

And all I can do is wonder – why are we about to mothball a brain trust that we have spent the last 50 years developing?

I’m not a huge proponent of continuing to tread water in low earth orbit.  If the U.S. is to continue HSF, it needs to go big – or go home.

As we often do, sometimes we’ll drive the Space Coast and come to KSC north from Florida Highway 3 (which runs right through the Space Center).  When you drive north on FL 3, you have to take a left on Space Commerce Way to get to the Visitor Center – about a 5 mile drive.

Space Commerce Way is a fantastic metaphor for the state of NASA today – it is nothing but a hard path with swampland on either side.  And absolutely no space commerce of any kind to be found along the way.

All I can do for now is hope for someone with vision – maybe my kids’ generation – to rekindle the dream.

Because for now, it all but appears to be dying.

Cheap Gas! Version 3… with Augmented Reality

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Tucking In

Some of the best conversations I’ve had with my sons have been at night while tucking them into bed.

Without embarrassing them here, I’ll only say this – when I think that they aren’t listening, or that they aren’t taking to heart what I’m trying to get across to them, they surprise me with the depth of their reflection.

I have to stop and realize that more often.

Cheap Gas! Version 3 Submitted to iTunes… New Augmented Reality Feature

Augmented Reality in Upcoming Version of Cheap Gas! – “Cyborg”