Thing 17: Connecting to community

Thing 17 is a call to use locally-focused apps to connect to your community. I downloaded the St. Cloud State University app, as well as the MN Museums and MPR News and Radio apps.

I like the idea of the SCSU app more than the actual app. I could see how the Campus Map would be helpful and the 360 panoramas are interesting and helpful if you aren't familiar with campus or haven't been there in a while (I graduated in 2003 but my husband attends grad school at SCSU now so we are both very familiar with campus). I don't really care about sports, so that feature wasn't important to me, but the news feed has not been updated since 2012, which was strange. Perhaps a glitch?

The MN Museums app could come in very handy. You can browse by looking at a map, which is useful for museum-dense areas like the twin cities, and also nice to see what museums might be nearby if you're traveling somewhere. You can also browse by categories, so if you're especially interested in, for example, science, you can find out the locations of the Bakken Library and Museum, Headwaters Science Center, MN Discovery Center, etc. all in one place. I'd really like to visit the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis and some of the historic homes on the list.

I really like the MPR News app, makes it very easy to find shows and recent news item quickly. The MPR Radio app is also good to have. I'll be keeping both of these on my phone.