A little over a decade ago I bailed on the Ph.D. program that had consumed my life for three years. The piles of papers—filled with highlighted quotations—had started to look like skyscrapers. Keeping all the whole mess organized felt like rebuilding the Golden Gate Bridge from its component atoms. My soul screamed for an app that would let me compare photos on the fly. I had better reasons for jumping ship, of course, but it’s these frustrations that slice through my memories all these years later. All things considered, I don’t regret my decision.
And yet.
All the recent talk about the App Store’s 10th anniversary makes me wonder if I’d have finished it if I had access to the same apps I now enjoy on my iPhone and my iPad. That sometimes makes the frustrations feels almost fun. Discussions of the App Store’s impact tend to focus on how it gave thousands of small-time developers a good way to make money or how it changed our social lives; we give relatively little attention to how it simplified our routines. I don’t think I’d be the same person I am today without it. Heck, I’ll bet the same could be said about you.