The 10 most influential smartphone apps
by Alex Hern from on (#2GXB4)
From Maps to Instagram, Uber to Snapchat - the top 10 app developments which have been copied, adopted or simply absorbed into everything else
Once upon a time, there was no "Google Maps" and "Apple Maps". There was just Maps, the mapping app that shipped with the first iPhone. Where many of the Apple-developed apps in the first iPhone have had little long-term influence, Maps more-or-less created the user experience that is still standard across OSes to this day: pinch to zoom, a small blue dot to mark your location, and an in-built compass for orienting yourself. And with Google as the source of data - until the rocky divorce ended that.