Latin America was very well represented among the finalists of the Mobile Premier Awards this year, with no less than four contenders, coming from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico.
While none of them made it to the winners’ list, it would be a mistake not to take a closer look at what we found out to be very interesting apps.
As a matter of fact, the high level of today’s competition is the only possible explanation for The Social Radio not getting an award. The winner of Argentina’s edition of App Circus, this startup first caught our attention when it launched an Android app last December.
On the heels of its participation to MWC, the startup has now launched an iOS app. Although it is currently free, it has nothing to envy to The Social Radio’s Android and web versions.
All of them perform the same task, which is to let their users tune in to their social networks on their mobile devices as if they were radio stations.
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In practical terms, it means that the app uses text-to-speech technology to let you listen to the tweets and Facebook status updates you receive.
It’s worth noting that you can choose to select a specific list or hashtag your full timeline is too overwhelming or diverse. However, even if you don’t, the app excels at detecting the language of each message and reading it accordingly.
While the overall quality of the voice rendering could still be improved, it already provides a very good idea of the direction in which The Social Radio is going.
If you’re wondering why it compares itself to a radio station, it’s because the app does more than playing tweets, as it also plays your favorite music in the background.
In that sense, The Social Radio’s iOS app is even better than its Android app, the startup’s founder Roberto Gluck told us.
The reason for that is Apple’s integrated music player, which makes it very easy for the app to pull not only tracks, but also album covers and other information.
We have tested the app for ourselves, and can confirm its interface is very pleasant. I particularly like the app’s secret feature, which lets you skip songs by swiping over the player.
While The Social Radio works very well with your Apple device’s music library, you may be even more interested in knowing that it can also play songs from other sources.
Besides tracks from platforms such as Last.fm and Spotify, the app can also handle SoundCloud’s content, as it managed to integrate both during San Francisco Music Hackday.
This connection with Silicon Valley is one more sign of The Social Radio’s ambitions as a startup. After being one of the first companies to work with the Argentine accelerator NXTP Labs, The Social Radio is now participating in Start-Up Chile.
➤ The Social Radio, via the App Store
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