We have been covering everything about applications, the App Store, developers, even software updates. This is new; have you ever heard about “Appiphilia”? No? That’s a very dangerous digital ”app”arition and “app”arently that happened to Michelle Maltias. Read on from Michelle Maltais’ blog in the LA Times Blog, published yesterday:

For the last few weeks, I’ve been staying up late glued to my screen, and frankly it has been wreaking havoc on my sleep patterns…I have been obsessively logging in to iTunes….It’s all about the apps…I was so elated that the night the store opened I was there downloading applications I couldn’t even use yet…Which all leads me to this: I’m addicted to apps. The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.

Problem? Not really. It’s rather a phobia. Or a philia. It begins with the innocuous looking free apps. As Michelle would tell you:

My problem started gently with the free apps. They’re free, right? So a Mobile Banking and Pandora Radio app here, a Facebook and an AIM app there. Shazam, Truveo, Mobile News Network. Download as many as you want. Maybe browse through some of the other App Store offerings while the phone is syncing. What’s the harm? That’s how appiphilia starts.

What do these free apps do? Well, they are just the “app”etizer that you need. Why? Because they introduce you to the phenomenon of one-click shopping, another specialty at the App Store. A neat, nifty way of seducing you to the clicking loop. And once you start clicking, it does not take much time advancing from “Get the App” to “Buy the App”.

Why?

The flavor of newness. And the spoil-with-choice syndrome. Everyday you see some, lots of new (and clone) apps at the App Store. And if you are an appo-phobic, or philic, you will go beyond the purely utility value (and boring) apps. If you are the off beat sort, here is a tip - visit the weird domains that come under the categories called “Entertainment” and, of course, “Life Style”. That’s where the cool, or hot apps appear.

Then there is the “Everybody-is-doing-it-why not give it a shot” tendency. If you are completely immune to it, then you are a postmodern Spartan. Remember, half the apps are free.

Steve Jobs was right when he said that he’d never seen anything like this in his career.

Let’s look at a post from Daniel Terman in Asia Cnet.com just a day before. Mr. Daniel decided to “app”endix his life, just for a single day and posted his musings in “Letting iPhone apps run my life for a day”. This is how he begins:

If you’ve ever wanted to hand control of your life off for a day, let me recommend putting it in the safe care of iPhone applications.

His selected apps, however, were meant for “app”ropriately negotiating a range of activities that you are likely to face while on the move. No useless apps, his apps help him whet his “app”etite, help him “app”proximate the weather, let him “twit” around and what not.

Geekculture has the following excellent take on this whole ”app”-normal “app”rentices:

What is yours? Do you “app”rove of this “app”ocalypse? Or are you just “app”athetic? We would like to hear from you. Let us know!