No 6. Thrutu – iPhone/Android

Price: Free

Thrutu takes advantage of the fact that once you make a connection by phone, you have formed an ad hoc network over your carrier signal and it then allows you to transfer photos to the person on the other end, share your current location on a map, and trade contacts. One other unique feature is the sort of ‘buzz’; a Prod command which you can send to vibrate the phone of the person on the line.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqAWbXBdOso[/youtube]

No 5. Vlingo – iPhone/Android

Price: Free

A good competitor to the Siri service on the iPhone, Vlingo performs many of the same tasks as its counterpart. It allows you to search for a flight by speaking your destination, or have the app read your incoming messages and emails. As expected (perhaps?), the voice recognition is not quite as good as Siri’s, but it is one fine app that works quickly and can trigger other apps, like Kayak and Yelp, as long as you have them installed on your phone. The app is off course under constant updates and as a matter of fact Nuance has acquired Vlingo to deliver Siri-like experience on the Android.

No 4. SproutSocial – iPhone/Android

Price: $9 per month

The new SproutSocial app for iPhone ties into the subscription-based SproutSocial service on the Web and allows you to post status updates to Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn at the same time, which saves you a lot of time. The app is a little less feature extensive but can be used to search for posts, read direct messages, and scan other feeds.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hipqrliBNDs[/youtube]

No 3. BiKN – iPhone

Price: Free

The BiKN tags are small plastic clips you can attach to a keyring, bookbag, or any object you don’t want to lose. After syncing to the app, you can then send out a chime to the tag to find it. There’s also a way to set up an alert that appears on your phone anytime an object goes outside of a specific radius. The tags will be available to purchase in early January.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2tRxDAnKsI[/youtube]