There were a lot of reactions around the last post on Cinch. And some folks might be curious about the service and the iPhone app. So I decided to write a follow-up post (the title is possibly borrowed from someone else by now).

Cinch, the iPhone app, allows to share audio-notes taken with the iPhone, complemented with a photo and a 140 chars message. Cinch also works with regular mobile phones as you can call a Cinch number and record your audio-notes. Your "cinches" are forwarded on RSS stream and they'll pop-up in your Google reader, Twitter and facebook stream in near real-time (as good as it gets - except for Google reader, as I don't think they use the pubsubhubhub tech, yet). In the last post, I said that it was better than Twitter and Evernote combined together :) So, is it?

First of all, the good news: I may find it absolutely more interesting than Twitter, but it doesn't "replaces" Twitter. In fact, it *feeds* Twitter with more interesting links to rich audio content. It also feeds your facebook stream. I can say that I got more reactions than average over at Facebook because of my cinches. And *that* is what matters to me.

Second, Cinch *is* a lot better than Evernote for audio notes. The iPhone app just works, whereas Evernote's iPhone app has bugs and failed on me several times in the past. The sound quality is way better than Evernote. However, I wouldn't mind if my cinches were duplicated on Evernote's servers. In fact, I wish they were...


Finally, Cinch is *well-implemented*. They did it the right way. I won't enter on details, but I know a good implementation when I see one. (Ok, I wouldn't have implemented the front-end in asp, but that's me...).


Thus, to sum up, Cinch is for audio-notes what Twitter is for 140chars text messages. Cinch is not a reason to ditch Twitter (au contraire) nor is it to ditch Evernote (I duplicate all my flickr uploads on Evernote using this custom workflow I made with Tarpipe).

So, the only "bad news" is that you're going to spend 20 minutes to try it out. If you've got an iPhone and if you're an iphone app addict, it sure is definitively worth it. Best app in its category. If you don't like texting your tweets (like myself) you may consider calling the Cinch number (us only) and voice them (though Twitterfone is perhaps better for small audio-notes).

Here are my Cinches: I cinch mostly to share all my sound and visual experiences, like music concerts, new city sounds, strange eery magical atmospheres, friends chatter and laughter... all those beautiful sensorial experiences that a simple photo just cannot keep. I do it for me, for my friends, for my future memories of my past :D

Disclosure: I have no connections with CinchCast or BlogTalkRadio. First, I liked their app. Then, I enjoyed some amount of feedback from the Silicon Valley tech-sphere with the last post. So, I try to keep it up =)