The Best E-mail I've Ever Written

To: Google
Subj: Refund of Google Voice International Call Credit

If possible, I'd like to ask for a request on this calling credit as I don't need it anymore. The story as to why I need it is rather unusual, so I'll explain as best I can.

I'm a college student who also makes iPhone apps. I found out earlier tonight that one of my applications is going to be mentioned in a New York Times article tomorrow (It's called Battery Go!, you can find the article here, we're about 3/4th of the way down the page. Can't tell you how excited I am http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/11/technology/11basics.html)

Anyways, when they initially published the article online earlier, they misspelled our app name as BatteryGo. We contacted them and they fixed it online, but we were afraid that the change won't get fixed in time for print and that BatteryGo will be found in each New York Times issue tomorrow.

Normally, such a one space error wouldn't matter much, except for the fact that you won't find out app on iTunes App Store if you search for batterygo without the space. Needless to say, we were extremely worried that people would search for our app and then not be able to find it.

We didn't even find the article till late tonight, and we're lucky we found the mistake at all (I should really thank you guys for finding the article before print actually, since I used an RSS feed from Google Alerts for Battery Go!, which I read in Google Reader).

So with the name mistake being a problem, we wanted to see if it was possible to add a keyword of batterygo to our application so that people searching that one word would find our app.

Anyways, seeing as Apple's Developer help line was closed for the night, we were worried that we wouldn't be able to get a hold of them till 10am Eastern tomorrow, which means that we couldn't see any help till noon or so at the earliest and by that time, we'd miss out a huge group of potential customers.

So I did what made sense, I decided to call the Apple Developer help center in Japan (I Googled "Current time in Japan to find out that while it's almost midnight here, it's only 3am in Toyko, thanks again for this help Google). I knew I had 10 cents of Google Voice credit (I should really thank you guys again for that freebie as well) and with Japan being 2 cents a minute through your service, I knew I had 5 minutes to call Japan, use my basic understanding of the language from two years of classes, and then find someone who could speak English and solve my problem.

I should have figured that it would take longer than five minutes, but I decided to take a gamble and go with it. However, once I heard the voice telling me I had one minute left, I panicked. I had just gotten someone on the phone who spoke English, but we definitely weren't going to solve the problem in 60 seconds.

So I rushed to the online purchase center for calling credit and placed 10 bucks of international calls on my account, praying that the transaction would be approved into my account and accepted before my final minute ran out. This would be another fatal flaw. Needless to say, I heard a click and I was disconnected mere seconds after seeing a "Thank you for purchasing" screen.

Now, I probably could have used this brand new 10 dollar credit to call back, but before I could reenter their number, I received a call back from Japan on my cellphone. Apparently they have caller ID in Japan too, so the guy called me back, probably by using my Google Voice number (again, I should thank you guys.)

Since he called me back, I never needed this 10 dollars and as such am asking for a refund if possible. Given the fact that I've thanked you about 5 times for your various services in this e-mail, I should probably eat the loss and be thankful for all the help that your various services have given me in the last 20 minutes alone, which were well worth the 10 dollars. However, I figured it's worth an e-mail to ask politely as I'm a broke college kid and could really use that 10 dollars. I'm taking my girlfriend on an overnight trip to look at a grad school she's interested in tomorrow and at some point we'll probably stop at a Chipotle or something and I'll feel required to be a great boyfriend and pay for her burrito. That $10 would go a long way at Chipotle, as it would buy her burrito (as long as she doesn't get steak, that's expensive), chips, and a pop.

So with that in mind, I beg you to please refund me my 10 dollars. If you don't, I'll understand. It's not every day that you get to call Japan asking for help with your iPhone app that's going to be mentioned in the New York Times which will be hitting newsstands in a mere couple of hours. As such, I'll just let this 10 buck loss make the story that much better.

Thanks for your time,
-Cameron Banga

Fox Business Documentary

I decided to import some video I shot a while ago and export it to a movie. I shot this back when we went to Chicago to be on Fox Business News. Enjoy!

Battery Go! 1.1 Available Now!

After much delay, version 1.1 of Battery Go! is now available in the iTunes App Store. If you have the app already, log onto your device or kick up iTunes and download the update. If you don't have Battery Go!, well go spend the $0.99 on the best battery app on the market.

If you're curious, here's what we have new in this update.

• New colorful icons for device features
• We now support 3G Phone, 2G Phone, WiFi Web, 3G Web, 2G Web, and Standby times
• New sweet lightning bolt icon for scroll bar
• Scroll bar now below percentages so that its easier to see as you scroll
• CUSTOMIZATION! Think that your phone lasts for 8 hours on 2G Talk? We'll let you customize the app so that time times adjust to whatever you feel is accurate for your device

It's a great update and we hope you all enjoy it! Have any comments or questions? Send them to Cameron@CollegeKidApp.com.

Click here to download Battery Go!

Sorry for the Bad Haircut

Hey everyone,

I know its been a while since we've updated, but the beginning of the semester has kinda roughed us a bit up and we've been focused on other things for the time being. Don't worry, CKA still exists and we're working to bring you great apps and post content.

You may also have noticed that our standard template is gone as well. We've been having some problems with it, so we've decided to get rid of it for the time being while we work on a NEW WEBSITE (yeah, I'm pumped dawgs).

So the content is all still here, but we're just changing the format to make sure that you can all check out the site for the time being while we do some internal work. Sorry for the bad haircut and we promise we'll work on looking hotter, but this is going to have to deal for the time being. Still love you all.

Ask an iPhone App Developer (Me!!)

Wanted to spread this link to something I'm really excited about. I've been working recently with AppAdvice.com on a weekly column called "Ask an iPhone Developer", where I'll be answering reader questions on a regular basis. It should be a great little segment and I'm hoping that I can answer a lot of questions which people may have about being an iPhone developer. If you have a question, definitely check out the link and hopefully I can answer it in one of the weekly columns.

Check Out Our Fox Business News Interview!

Here's the video of our interview from this morning! Hope we don't look too nervous haha. Check it out and definitely let us know what you think. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, e-mail me at Cameron@CollegeKidApp.com.

Fox Business News Interview Update

So we've got some details on what's going on with our Fox Business News interview. As of right now, it looks like we'll be on at 7:45am CST to talk about CollegeKidApp and Battery Go!. It should be a lot of fun and if you're up early, definitely look to tune in.

If you're not sure where you can find Fox Business News, here is a finder that will help you locate the channel in your area.

We're What?!

Not sure of the exact details yet, I'll post more as I find them out, but it looks like we may be on the Fox Business News Network nationwide tomorrow morning sometime between 6am and 8am CST. Again, not 100% certain as to when exactly or for how long, but will definite post some hard facts as I find them out. That will definitely be a crazy way to start our Friday.