Accessories get smart

A group of Canadians is riding to the rescue of people who’ve worn bulky smartwatches and hated it – and who can’t bear to part with the watch they wear every day. Glance is an accessory that parks itself on your watch’s wristband and offers the kind of functionality you’d find in smartwatch, like caller ID, messaging, auto responses, find my phone and filtering out unwanted calls. With Bluetooth 4.0 and 3D motion sensing, you can also remotely control your computer and track your activity, thanks to a companion iOS and Android app.

See you, see me

Apps that let you take pictures and print them on stuff – like clothes, calendars, posters, even confectionery – aren’t new, but Seeme is one that has an edge. It started as a design community and images people upload can be printed on postcards and t-shirts, with more media on the way. The first point of difference is the T-shirts get printed all over in what the creators see as the modern expression of the Polaroid. Users can connect with and support other artists in the community and the company stages celebrations of creativity in different places around the world, like Times Square, that mean your image could be up in lights.

Waze your true colours

Navigation and community sharing app Waze, is giving users a chance to nail their football colours to the mast. The Waze soccer face off (you say soccer, I say football), Waze users join the country team of their choice, with that badge displayed when they use navigation. If your team starts to do badly, you can join another team, but whichever you choose will give you a badge there’s no hiding from. The app’s also added sporty goodness to the road goodies you ‘munch’ over, namely footballs, and you can check in to see your team’s standings. Even the spoken directions have been given a makeover with the voices of renowned football commentators.

Contented cohabitation

It’s true that the best apps often come from the simplest ideas. Cohabi is one such app: it’s the chore assignment equivalent of randomly choosing a prize draw winner. Not just for parents to fairly set weekly housework for their kids, flatties can use it to divide up tasks and prevent stand up arguments.