Zambia, The Apps You Need To Get Before Midnight Are….

Today is the last year of 2014 and things are bound to get a little fuzzy with our gadgets. We expect congestion, tonnes of messages from random people, phones getting stolen, puked on or left in taxis. Chaos basically. If you’re staying home tonight, skip this article.

1. Lookout: This app helps track your stolen phone incase that’s the fate of your gadget tonight. It takes a ‘theftie’,which is a picture of your phone thief taken with your phone’s front camera if he hopefully faces your phone. It will then send you the theftie together with the location of the device to your email address. It works best on Android devices, but iPhone users can activate their (way cheaper) Find My Phone feature in their security menu. Download the app, create an account with your email address, set a password and you’re good to go.

2. Instagram: Boy do you need this app! Not only because you can share the pictures you take tonight across several other platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr, but because it puts the words you want to say to the world in picture form. Feel free to use the hashtag #NYE with all the selfies you take.

3. Skype: If your loved ones are far but you still want to see them at the countdown at midnight, get Skype ASAP. Signing up is fast and easy on your smartphone/PC. Get calling tonight but get a big enough data bundle if you’re going to opt for video calls. Remember it only works with front-facing camera enabled gadgets and web cams. Read all about getting started on Skype here.

4. Whatsapp, WeChat, Telegram or BBM: Despite all these social messengers being rivals, you need them tonight, atleast one of them. Stay connected to your friends and family by sending texts over these messengers, or even sharing pictures and other files. You don’t have to be alone *cues Liquideep*. Seeing as as usual call and SMS network failures may be part of the agenda tonight, you may want to consider a data using option instead.

P.S Get onto that Taximania   tip too. We all need to get home or move between places all night so how about getting a trusted cabby provider on your mobile. It’s not an app but we’ll just throw it in here. It’s a taxi finding service so you can get a cab to drive you wherever you want, metered payment included.

Happy New Year, from Techtrends Zambia!!!