moments

It’s one of the biggest risks for independent software developers — the chance that the company responsible for the underlying platform will incorporate the features of your app directly into the software that ships with the device. In the world of Apple, it has its own verb, “Sherlocked,” after the Apple search tool that mimicked the functionality of the popular Watson third-party app for Mac OS X.

sorth
Stephen Orth

Seattle-based indie software developer Stephen Orth experienced the tradition first-hand today, sitting in the audience at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference as the company unveiled the new features of iOS 7. Among them: A feature called “Moments,” built into the iOS 7 Photos app, which lets users automatically organize pictures and videos based on date and location.

That’s essentially the same functionality that Orth released last month through his 99-cent Photowerks app for iPhone, iPad and iPad touch.

“I guess the good news is it proves that I had a good idea,” said Orth, laughing as he spoke with GeekWire via phone this afternoon from San Francisco. “That puts a positive spin on it.”


It wasn’t a complete surprise. Orth said he had a feeling this would happen. The good news is that his livelihood doesn’t depend on this app. He works on development projects for a variety of companies and also developed a successful mobile billing and invoicing app called Timewerks for iOS.

photowerks2The other good news is that iOS 7 isn’t due out until the fall. In the meantime, Orth is working on a smart album feature for his app that will let users set parameters to automatically sort images into albums even going into the future. Depending on the details of Apple’s Photos app in iOS7, that feature could provide some extra differentiation for the Photowerks app.

Also, given the timing, this doesn’t appear to be a case of Apple directly borrowing his idea. Chances are that he and Apple’s developers were working on it at basically the same time.

Orth set out to make the Photowerks app based on the fact that the existing Photos app in iOS doesn’t fully leverage the metadata embedded in photos to create categories and group pictures. He wasn’t able to find any alternatives in the App Store that met his bar for quality.

Now, he’s hoping that Apple’s announcement will actually bring more attention and sales for Photowerks. “I’m hoping there is some kind of halo effect,” he said.

In the meantime, he can take solace in the fact that he experienced one of the fastest Sherlockings in history. And he’s taking it all in stride.

“I do really like iOS 7,” he said. “I think it looks great.”

Download the 99-cent Photowerks app here.

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