Revised Pages appified Revised Pages Revised Pages a p p ified Culture in the Age of Apps Jeremy Wade Morris and Sarah Murray, Editors University of Michigan Press Ann Arbor Revised Pages Copyright © 2018 by Jeremy Wade Morris and Sarah Murray All rights reserved This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publisher. Published in the United States of America by the University of Michigan Press Manufactured in the United States of America Printed on acid- free paper A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication data has been applied for. ISBN: 978- 0- 472- 07404- 4 (Hardcover : alk paper) ISBN: 978- 0- 472- 05404- 6 (Paper : alk paper) ISBN: 978- 0- 472- 12435- 0 (ebook) Revised Pages contents Introduction 1 a. welcome to the app store App Annie— Patrick Vonderau 23 App Industry Rankings and Infrastructure Ashley Madison— Ben Light 31 An Introduction to the Walkthrough Method Tencent MyApp (Yingyong Bao)— Luzhou Nina Li 42 Android App Stores and the Appification of Everything Exodus International— Tarleton Gillespie 51 Banned Apps, App Stores, and the Politics of Visibility b. productivity/utilities TaskRabbit— Sarah Sharma 63 The Gig Economy and Finding Time to Care Less Carrot— Sarah Murray 72 Productivity Apps and the Gamification of Shame See Send— Greg Elmer and Bahar Nasirzadeh 82 Antiterrorism Apps and Suspicious Activity Reporting Is It Tuesday?— Jeremy Morris 91 Novelty Apps and Digital Solutionism c. health/fitness LoseIt!— Natasha Schüll 103 Calorie Tracking and the Discipline of Consumption Fitbit— Kate O’Riordan 115 Wearable Technologies and Material Communication Practices Revised Pages vi contents d. lifestyle/relationships Tinder— Stefanie Duguay 127 Swiped: A Focal Gesture and Contested App Visions Hollaback!— Carrie Rentschler 136 Harassment Prevention Apps and Networked Witnessing The Sex Offender Tracker App— Sharif Mowlabocus 146 Tracker Apps and the Individualization of Risk Companion— Elizabeth Ellcessor 156 Personal Safety and Surveillance Apps e. social networking/communication Yik Yak— Tamara Shepherd and Christopher Cwynar 169 From Anonymity to Identification WeChat— Finn Brunton 179 Messaging Apps and New Social Currency Transaction Tools Snapchat— Jill Walker Rettberg 188 Phatic Communication and Ephemeral Social Media Foursquare— Germaine Halegoua 196 Checking In and Checking Out of Location- Aware Social Media WhatsApp— Radhika Gajjala and Tarishi Verma 205 WhatsAppified Diasporas and Transnational Circuits of Affect and Relationality f. news/entertainment This. Reader— Devon Powers 219 Trending Topics and the Curation of Information Periscope— Megan Sapnar Ankerson 227 The Periscopic Regime of Live- Streaming Tubi TV— Gerard Goggin 237 Free, Mobile, Moving Images: TV Everywhere Revised Pages contents vii Hillary 2016— Fenwick McKelvey 246 Appified Politics in Campaign Apps g. music/sound Shazam— Elena Razlogova 257 The Blind Spots of Algorithmic Music Recognition and Recommendation iMaschine 2— Victoria Simon 266 Music- Making Apps and Interface Aesthetics Here: Active Listening System— Mack Hagood 276 Sound Technologies and the Personalization of Listening h. casual/games RuPaul’s Drag Race Keyboard— Kate Miltner 289 Affect and Resistance through Visual Communication DraftKings— Jason Kido Lopez 299 Daily Fantasy Sports Leagues, Legality, and Shifting Mobile Spaces Kendall & Kylie— Jessalynn Keller and Alison Harvey 308 Girl Affects, Celebrity, and Digital Gaming in Millennial Culture Neko Atsume— Shira Chess 317 Affective Play and Mobile Casual Gaming References 327 contributors 365 index 373 Digital materials related to this title can be found on the Fulcrum platform via the following citable URL: https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.9391658 Revised Pages Revised Pages acknowledgments This book is about software that resides in our pockets and offices and homes and cars and nightstands. It is about software that embeds itself into our daily routines, contacts, and communications. But as with most stories of technol- ogy, it’s not the software that matters as much as it is the people who make, use, play, create, subvert, chat, buy, sell, discover, hurt, trust, deceive, and love with it. Similarly, this book is about the editors’ research interests, but it would be nothing without the wonderful, insightful, and challenging contributions from our thirty- four authors. Our first set of thanks, then, goes to the names listed in the table of contents. When we circulated our call for proposals, we knew that even with a hundred chapters, we’d barely scratch the surface of the app- o- sphere. There are just too many apps to analyze and too many issues they raise. We knew we were asking our contributors to do some heavy lifting, to cover a lot of ground in a relatively short amount of words. We couldn’t be more thrilled with how they’ve taken up ideas about mundane software and digital everyday life and woven them through their respective research inter- ests to truly expand the scope of how we study software and culture. From popular apps to little- known gems, serious programs to novelty jokes, brand new trends to obsolete ones, our contributors have helped us corral and make better sense of this dynamic and ever- changing industry. Our second set of thanks belongs to the other group of people who made this book a material reality. To Mary Francis for her support pushing this project through to completion and her patience and good humor on count- less three- way conference calls. She tirelessly challenged, championed and protected the original vision for Appified from day one. To our diligent and understanding production editor, Mary Hashman, Sarah Dougherty, who shepherded this project into the production phase, Pilar Wyman for indexing, Sam Killian in marketing, and everyone else behind the scenes at University of Michigan Press who helped turn the messiness of our early ideas into a physi- cal book readers can hold with pages to turn (or scroll, or swipe). We’d also like to thank the various audiences and colleagues at ICA, SCMS, and other venues where the editors and contributors have talked about this work publicly over the past couple of years. Your collective criticism, insight,