What does the Gemara say about airplanes? What did Louis Armstrong say about the Jews? Where is Hebrew hidden in a Shakespeare play?
And which iphone app keeps Shabbos?
The newest entry into a narrow field of only a few hundred Jewish-themed apps is The Amazing Jewish Fact-a-Day Calendar, created by Alexander Seinfeld, a Baltimore based rabbi-educator.
Each day, a new amazing Jewish fact appears on the screen, with compelling graphics and links to further online reading, audio and video. It also will tell you both the Western and Hebrew date. And it doesn’t work on Shabbos. Instead, if a user tries to open it on Shabbos, the app will display the message, “Shabbat Shalom, see you Saturday night!”
“We weren’t trying to impose Sabbath-observance on anyone,” Seinfeld said, joking that “you have no idea how much time and effort went into researching each day’s fact and all those links. By excluding Shabbat, I saved myself having to create 52 additional facts! But seriously, this feature adds an extra Jewish touch that I think users are going to appreciate.”
The app stands out in a more fundamental way as well. Most of the Jewish apps available fall into very narrow niche-markets, for example, the Talmudic-dictionary app. The Amazing Jewish-Fact-a-Day calendar was market-tested across the entire range of Jewish and non-Jewish audiences, from the most to the least learned.
The most common reaction: “Wow, I didn’t know that!”
The Amazing Jewish-Fact-a-Day Calendar is not merely trivia. It includes a wealth of ancient Jewish wisdom on life, relationships, ethics, and spirituality. Favorite Jewish Facts may be bookmarked and even emailed to friends.
The Amazing Jewish Fact-a-Day Calendar can be downloaded on the itunes store (search the store for “Jewish wisdom”). Even someone who doesn’t own an iphone or ipad can give it as a gift to a friend who does, making it a simple yet powerful outreach tool.
For more info, visit here.
{Noam Amdurski-Matzav.com Newscenter}
