Planet of the Apps

Pardon my ignorance, but what exactly is an "app?"
And while we're at it, what's the deal with Americans' insatiable app-etitie for apps?

In recent years, I have observed this phenomenon with growing app-rehension. App-arently, app appeal is app-roaching record levels, but it app-ears that the app-ex is still nowhere in sight. App-roximately seventy million Americans use so-called smart phone apps, and that number is growing daily. Younger people are more app-savvy than adults, who are considerably less appt to app, but that is changing. Even older folks who were once largely app-athetic to technology are beginning to app-reciate the joys of apps. The generation gapp is narrowing.

What's all this app-craze about anyway? Have we all become app-ahaulics?

Now that we're all walking around with fancy little $600 mobile devices, are we better off? Are we happier, or just app-ier?

It's app-solutely app-alling, if you ask me.

Just take a look at the app store. Apps galore. There are recreation apps, weather apps, productivity apps, even religion apps. You could straighten your tefillin with a handy tefillin app, or pray with an interactive prayerbook app. (Conversely, I suppose one could opt to app-andon one's religion with an app-ostasy app.)

Apps have even replaced relationships! You could have a dialogue with an intuitive app that reads your mind and talks back to you. The happy app cheers you up with a joke or compliment, and will commiserate with you when you're down. Dis-app-ointed your spouse? No worries. You could app-ologize with an app-ology app.

Trying to track your teenager's movement? No problem! Get a mobile monitoring app. Who needs honest communication, trust and responsibility? That's old hat. Get the app and you're all set.

How often have you mentioned a random topic in a group of company and someone had to app-noxiously inform you that "There's an app for that!"?

Indeed, you could practically live your entire life with apps. You could work remotely with an occupational app. Make house app-raisals, set up app-ointments, app-ly for a loan, read about the App-ollo, App-ache or App-alachian. With a shopping app, you could shop for app-arel, app-etizers or app-liances. Like Phantom of the Appra? With a bit of appracadappra, it's at your fingertips! You could read it with an ebook app, listen to it with a music app, or view it with a movie app.

There's an app for everything. An app for app-etite loss or app-dominal pain, an app for moustache trimming, mountain climbing, rocket building, or bird watching. There's even an app for sleep app-nea.(Problem is, you'll waste so much time on your iPhone that you'll be sleep-deprived anyway.)

App-endicular to all of this is the toll that app-mania is taking on our impressionable youth. First it was the raps. Now it's the apps.

App-art from the sheer waste of time spent by youngsters on apps, excessive app use does not seem to be improving their app-titude for achievement in school.

It seems that every time I app-rehend one of my app-happy students yapping about apps, I later app-rise the parent and discover that the child's fixation on apps meets with parental app-roval. Is this app-ropriate?

Our kids are being taught to rely on electronic app-aratuses to help them think. My daughter spends much of time in her advanced math course punching numbers into a fancy hundred-dollar calculator. Her classmates are now doing assignments with their iPhones, thanks to a new scientific calculator app. Is it AP class or APP class?

Speaking of school, kids never worry about being app-sent any more, because they can remotely access all class materials or assignments with a nifty homework app. It's app-normal!

I don't mean to be app-ocalyptic or anything, but what is this world coming to? Have we become so dependent on smartphone apps that without them, our society would coll-appse?

I had occasion to ride the commuter rail recently. Every single passenger on the train was enrappt in their smart phones. It was app-surd. They were too app-sorbed in their apps to notice their fellow, completely app-livious to their surroundings. No good mornings, no eye contact. It was a stifling app-mosphere.

What is app-ening to our world? Has it become "Planet of the Apps?" Has our society sunken to the app-ysmal depths of app-dependency?

I am sorry, but this app-robrious app-omination has got to stop. In this widespread appsense of common sense, someone has to un-app-ologetically and un-app-ashedly speak up for what's right.

I'm not necessarily app-osed to all apps, but quite frankly, I am skeptical as to whether there is true value in this modern-day phenomenon. I guess you can call me an app-nostic.

Perh-apps we ought to scrap the apps and focus on the here and now. Let's free ourselves from app-ressive app app-session. The key to happiness is not appiness!

Let's start living in the real world, not the virtual one. Learn to avoid the trap of the app. Instead of relying on a GPS app, why not use a mapp? Need to change a hubcapp? Use your thinking capp. Want to get fit? Go run a lapp and eat a healthy wrapp. Tired? Take a napp. Just do it, but do it without the app!

I'll be the first to app-laud your effort.

Personally, the only apps I buy are app-les and app-ricot jam, and frankly, I'd like to keep it that way. (Oops, I should've been more specific: I meant the old-fashioned edible apples that grow on trees).

My kids claim I'm behind the times, but I'm just waiting for the next technology to come along that will render apps app-solete.

So, in conclusion, don't get zapped by the app. Rather, tap into your own inner apps, the Torah and its mitzvos. Learn how to muster the powerful spiritual tools G-d gave you and apply them to every aspect of your daily life. They are state of the art. Best cuting-edge technology that never gets outdated, obsolete or phased out. (In other words, they won't go the way of the Treo, flip phone or fax machine, like your latest iPhone and its apps ultimately will, condemned to fade away behind the cobwebs of posterity). Your soul's hardware comes with a longer-than-lifetime factory warrantee from the Designer and CEO Himself. Guaranteed to withstand all trials and tribulations, to be used in any application, in the harshest or most adverse of conditions. Indeed, the soul is eternal, and so is a mitzvah.

That's why the Bible is so compelling. Real people using their spiritual tools to their fullest G-d-given potential. And that's what the Messianic Era is all about.

That's why everything really exists, for us to reveal G-dliness inherent in everything, thereby creating a dwelling place for the Creator in His world. And that's truly the only reason mobile phone apps exist. So if you gotta use 'em, use them for the true purpose of their existence. Utilize them for studying and teaching Torah, for doing mitzvot, for reaching out to your fellow human being with deeds of goodness and kindness.

Who knows? Maybe the app designers will catch on and create a "Moshiach App," letting everyone know the happy news at the very moment Moshiach arrives. Now that's what I call a useful app!