App review: AudioBoo

We all have a voice, and we all want our voice to be heard. Combine that desire with an iPhone, and you have quite a few apps to make that happen. The one that’s in the spotlight this time is AudioBoo.

What is AudioBoo? It’s an audio microblogging platform, much like Twitter, but with audio. Posts are kept to at most three minutes long, though for most of us, that’s all we need.

To use AudioBoo, you’ll need to register an account on audioboo.fm, as it’s not just something like TweetMic or FaceMic, which just let you publish audio directly to Twitter/Facebook. AudioBoo is a full fledged audio blogging platform for the iPhone, and a social network on it’s own that offers integration with the standard social networks (aka your favorites, Twitter and Facebook). You will need to have set up your account first before you can use the app (and make sure to set it to post to Twitter and Facebook if you desire).

The iPhone app is a bit simple for the time being, since it’s only in its infancy stages at this point in time. When you launch the app, you’ll be presented with the Recent Boos screen, which is the default screen it will launch on. Here, you’ll be able to see the most recently uploaded boos that people from all over the world have done. So if you care about random strangers blurbs, then you can listen away to your heart’s your heart’s content. If you need more than what is on the screen, you can always refresh with the button at the top.

The Record screen is where you should be spending most of your time with in the app. Simple tap-to-start-recording that gives you a countdown on screen so you can prepare yourself 3 seconds prior to actually talking. You can pause the recording and then pick up exactly where you left off, so if you need time to think about what your next thought is, this will be especially handy. You can even listen to your recording as you make it, so if you’re not satisfied with it, you can start over sooner rather than waste your time finishing and then hearing it, only to want to start over.

What’s great about AudioBoo is that if you have to exit the app for any reason while in the middle of a recording, it will save your progress and your recording will still be intact the next time you open the app. When you’re ready to publish it, you can add a title, a photo to go with the recording, and tag it with appropriate terms. Also, the recording quality of the app using even just the iPhone’s mic sounds quite exceptional and comparable to decent standalone microphones for computers.

Publishing your recording to AudioBoo.fm is actually pretty quick, regardless of what connection you’re on. It’s a beautiful screen that accurately displays your upload progress, and once that’s done, you can create a new one or go back to listen to worldwide boos.

While you may think this is just another social networking site, there is one thing about AudioBoo that is extremely nice compared to other audio sites – you can subscribe to someone’s boos by iTunes RSS. So in a way, these can all be considered mini-podcasts.

There is much more good than bad for AudioBoo, but it does have its own flaws (as does anything, really). Currently, there is no way to leave a comment about someone’s boo from the app – comments can be made on the website, though. This is a poor implementation of what is considered a ‘social networking’ app, and hope it will implement a commenting or replies feature in a future update. And while the current three minutes may be enough for most, some might want to use the app to make podcasts (the iTunes RSS makes it easy), so upping the time limit or removing it completely would be a plus.

If you’re looking for a good audio blogging app, then AudioBoo is definitely one you should consider picking up. And at the price of free, there’s nothing to lose!

AudioBoo in the App Store

review by Christine Chan