While roaming in the wilderness of Cupertino on a sunny Saturday, I met this geeky–looking guy sitting under a tree feverishly fumbling with his iPhone. The guy looked definitely geeky–unkempt hair and blood–shot eyes possibly the result of dabbling with his iPhone too much through the night.

As I approached him to ask for directions to the Apple Inc. office, he looked up, startled:

“W-w-what?”

“Can you tell me how can I go to Apple’s office?”
“What do you want from there?”
“I want to interview Steve Jobs and ask his opinion on iPhone applications.”

“Why him? I am a better man.”

“W-w-what?!”
“Yes. I am an “app”-o-phobic.”

That’s how I met the guy with 1000 apps on his iPhone. Following is an excerpt from the interview that took place just a little away from the Apple office.

Note: He never gave me his name, so we’ll just call him “Mr. “App”le”.

iphonefootprint: Are you an “app”-o-phobic?
Mr. “App”le: Yes you can say that. With a busy app market out there. You never know which app is really cool. to be frank i wanted to really know how people think.

iphonefootprint: Can you explain?
Mr. “App”le:  which part?

iphonefootprint: You wanted to know “how people think?” Frankly, I think most of them are, you know, a bit crazy. For example, why would someone be so morbid as to build a death calc?!

Mr. “App”le: Yes, it really surprises me. How did Apple even approve these apps?

iphonefootprint: Something more mundane Mr. “App”le. How many apps do you have?                                 Mr. “App”le: 400

iphonefootprint: Something on the technical side. Is it slowing down your iPhone?
Mr. “App”le:  Slowing iphone? I don’t think so. It is becoming a bit difficult to find apps though. Earlier when I was using only 25 apps, it was easy enough to navigate between the apps. I think it would be a good idea to expand the bottom dock and rearrange the most frequently used apps.

iphonefootprint:  Nice idea. Now please tell me, how much space has it eaten up?
Mr. “App”le: 6 GB and counting. Updates are really heavy. So I have mostly avoided them.

iphonefootprint:How much have you spent so far?
Mr. “App”le: Most of them are free apps. So, hardly any.

iphonefootprint:  Now, time-wise!
Mr. “App”le: Some 800 hours in the last 2 months

iphonefootprint: Great. What are your favorite apps? Games, or something else?
Mr. “App”le: Trace, Relax, You Shake i Laugh, Idle Hands, US News, Music

iphonefootprint: Thanks for your time. Mr. “App”le. Now the final question. What got you hooked to the “app”-o-mania? Are you an avid gamer on other platforms as well, or is it just the iPhone?
Mr. “App”le: I love games and iPhone made it simpler for me. Now I have all the apps in my pocket always. And it even talks with me (phone).