Reading my work, podcasts, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and more...
When the call button on my old phone started wobbling like a loose tooth, it was time for some drastic action. I found a (cheap) smartphone and over the past month I've been discovering all the things I had missed in my pre-Android days. I'd worried about enormous phone bills, but I've disabled mobile roaming and just hook into the wifi when I'm at home or near another connection - problem solved!
Here's how the smartphone works for me and improves my writing life at the same time!
Reading my work
I can email myself a copy of my manuscript, download it and read it on the go. Great for when I'm out-and-about. Another bonus is that
Scrivener (writing software I bought last year) can export to an .epub file and it's just like reading a published version of an ebook!
Podcasts
I can now download Podcasts directly on to
Stitcher Radio and use the 'Listen Later' feature to download them. I must thank the
Australian Writers' Centre for this discovery as I needed an app to download 'So you want to be a writer'. Until I bought the new phone, I thought I could only find it on iTunes and used to transfer it to an iPod. Now it's all in one place on my phone.
My writing podcast list has grown since this amazing new discovery and now includes:
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So you want to be a writer - AWC, hosted by Allison Tait and Valerie Khoo
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The Creative Penn - Joanna Penn
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The sell more books show - Jim Kukral and Bryan Cohen
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Writers on writing - Barbara deMarco-Barrett
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The Writing Biz - Laura Williams
Instagram
Even though I've used
Instagram for a while, before now I bluetoothed pictures from my computer to my tablet and uploaded them from there. Now I can take photos on my phone and upload them when I'm near a wifi connection. Win, win!
Twitter
App installed,
can access any time I'm near the afore mentioned wifi - easy! Again, something else I'm more likely to do now it's right there on the phone.
Pinterest
Now I can browse something on my phone and
pin it from there - I'm using this program a lot more since I've installed the app. It was always an afterthought before now. Particularly good as I'm looking into book cover design...
And more
Emails, text messages, diary, notes and alarm clock all in one place. While I keep a back-up diary, the alarm clock feature is fantastic and I have reminders going off at various times of the day - school pick-up, finish work (I do tend to forget!), whatever. It's also great to set a timer for an uninterrupted writing session - no need to stop and check to see how much time is left, the alarm does it for me.
Do you have a smartphone? Have you discovered the ways it can help further your interests?!