How do you judge coolness — what criteria do you use? Sheer number of friends? Number of Facebook friends? Athleticism? Fashion trendiness? Maybe in the past, but with a new generation comes a new measuring stick. It is no secret that apps on the iPhone, iPad, and iTouch have forever changed the way modern technology is seen. The variety, knowledge, and entertainment accessible to anybody are beyond incredible. Through the vast amount of extraordinary applications that are looming at people’s fingertips, a decision on which ones are the coolest must be made. Let’s get to it.

This game has become overwhelmingly well -known amongst the mass majority of people. The sole idea is to load up a slingshot with a tiny “angry bird.” Pull back the slingshot and let it rip at towers being placed in front. While this is a very basic idea, it has caused what could be described as a revolution.

Students like Greg Shikowitz ’13 have claimed to have phases where they are playing Angry Birds almost every day. They are certainly not the only ones who have gone through these Angry Birds addiction phases. The popularity that has ensued has redefined the way society has come to look at casual games. More than 500 million people have downloaded Angry Birds in less than two years since its launch. From the people that have downloaded this game, over 44 billion stars have been collected, and 200,000 years have been played. (Statspotting.com) With statistics like these, it is clear Angry Birds is no longer just a game to people. It could very well be put on the same level as crack. That gives me enough reason to put it on the list of coolest apps.

Sleep. The thing every high school student is dying for. If we could steal it, we would. Unable to get to bed early or wake up late, it is nearly impossible to feel well-rested in the morning. That was before Sleep Cycle.

“It measures how long you sleep, how deep you sleep,” Ethan Bradeen ’13 explained, “ and it wakes you up in the morning when you’re least tired.”

By monitoring your breathing and movements, the app can pick up on how deep the user’s sleep actually is. When the app identifies the moment that the user is at his or her lightest sleep, within the 15-minute time frame the user chose, the app wakes him or her up.

Sleep is scarce to come by; this application is a lifesaver. It is because of this there should be no dispute that Sleep Cycle is one of the coolest applications on the market.

Technology always seems to find a way to shock and awe people. Word Lens is very difficult to outmatch. This application could be the new worst enemy of language classes today. You open up Word Lens and direct the camera at any phrase in any language, font, size, or shading, and the phrase is translated into any language you want. Talk about a good way to cheat. But, Word Lens will not just be a great resource for cheating in language class. This app can help bridge the lingual gap that has separated people for a millennia.

An application that can bring people closer together and help kids cheat definitely deserves a spot in the list of coolest apps.

The “iRevolution” all began with a simple piece of technology known as the iPod that letpeople enjoy the music of their choosing. Getting back to its roots, SoundHound is an application that continues the tradition of helping people enjoy music. There are many apps that can identify music by hearing it. However, SoundHound takes music identification to a whole different level. This application doesn’t even need to hear the actual song to determine what it is. By simply hearing a tune played from a guitar, piano, drum set, or even a person humming, SoundHound can determine what song is being played. There is nothing more frustrating than knowing the exact tune of a song and forgetting the name of it. The irritation of having the name of a song on the tip of your tongue and forgetting couldn’t be worse. Thankfully, that has been eradicated.

That is why Sound Hound deserves a thank you. That is why SoundHound deserves a spot on the list of coolest apps. And that is why SoundHound rocks.

Pun intended.