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Prototype MBTA complaint app released
By adamg on Sat, 08/20/2011 - 2:37pm
Hot off the developer's desktop: Talk to the T. Fairly barebones (let's you send a note and attach a photo to MBTA Customer Service), doesn't have standard MBTA branding yet, and only for iPhone/iPad. It's by a senior Web developer at the T.
Thanks to Stuart for spotting this.
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Comments
And the headline of the next
And the headline of the next Uhub post:
MBTA Complaint Server Crashes!
Packets will be re-routed onto substitute bus
for the next 3 years starting next month.
Hmm, why don't official T developers make mobile web apps that any smartphone can use, not just Jobs-slobberers?
Um, because you're the kind
Um, because you're the kind of person who calls people who use iPhones "Jobs-slobberers" when most people who buy them really don't care about Steve Jobs or even know who the hell he is or what he does at Apple?
Um, because
1. Management is ignorant of customers' needs, and doesn't care if they're seeing as shipping an iPhone-specific app first, rather than serving the widest number of customers first with a mobile-friendly Web page and only then looking at whether more narrow subsets can be served better with platform-specific apps
2. iPhone is a good thing to have on your resume, and better than making a mobile-friendly Web page. It's standard practice to try to push your projects to use technologies that beef up your resume.
Ooh, nerd baiting!
I have nothing against iPhones or Macs or anything else with a stylized Apple on it, but as an Android user, yes, I can be annoyed when a public institution only releases an app that significant numbers of people can't use.
But I'm not annoyed at this particular app. It's obviously beta at best. And even though the developer works at the T, I'm thinking it's not an official T app - something that would not refer to "the Boston T" or not have an encircled T on it.
Also, the T announced a few months ago it would be doing the same thing with complaints as it did with bus and subway data - give developers an API and let them come up with the apps. That's given us a number of bus/train tracker apps; I suspect we'll see a similar ecosystem emerging here, and, yes, somebody will come up with an Android app(as opposed to the city's Citizen Connect, which only has the single official app - in both iPhone and Android versions).
Irony
After 20 years of having been the person looking in on the PC and then even the Linux world with jealousy as software writer after software writer ignored the Mac, all I can say is:
:P
if you want an app for your
if you want an app for your phone then develop one.
Some background
With some (but not much) fanfare, the T announced this spring that they were opening up their system so that anyone could create a mobile app to submit feedback (aka complaints). They announced a contest to see who could write the best app.
The prize? Drumroll........ a one-month subway/bus linkpass!! So basically the T was offering to pay for an hour's worth of work, *if* your application was the best one.
I'm assuming nobody took the bait, because they later extended the deadline for submissions to June and upped the prize to a four-month linkpass. The summer is almost over, I don't see any products in the Android or iTunes market (except this prototype), and they haven't announced a winner yet. I guess nobody was interested.
Well
You can't expect computer programmers who take risks to work for free in hopes of selling $1 copies later or winning a contest... to be making big bucks, not like, say, the MBTA employees who open the doors on the T.
A new outlet to vent over the
A new outlet to vent over the Green Line not going to Somerville yet. Or the Blue Line to Lynn.
Great...
...But what if your complaint is that the commuter rail car you're in has a broken wifi? Something that happens about 10%- 20% of the time, BTW.
The same thing that happens
The same thing that happens when you're in a cell-free subway tunnel - you wait to submit your issue. (or is the app smart enough to hang on to the issue and automatically submit it later???)