<p>John Gruber recently highlighted Google searches for <a href="http://daringfireball.net/linked/2011/06/21/finally">&#8220;finally&#8221; and &#8220;iOS5&#8243;</a>. It seems a lot of people think iOS has now hit a point where it has matured into a really solid platform. </p>
<p>I&#8217;ve been using the <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/touchnote-postcards/id325525543?mt=8">new version of Touchnote&#8217;s iPhone app</a> &#8211; out later today &#8211; and I feel exactly the same. All the niggles that I complained about before have been worked out.</p>
<p>If you&#8217;re not aware of <a href="http://www.touchnote.com">Touchnote</a>, it allows you to send postcards &#8211; real, physical ones, not eCards &#8211; using photos from your iPhone.  I loved the idea when the Touchnote app came out in 2009, and used it to send a few cards on holiday. </p>
<p><span id="more-4575"></span>There now are other apps that offer the same sort of service, such as <a href="http://www.printyourlife.com/">goPostal</a> and <a href="http://postagramapp.com/">Postagram</a>, but these only work in the US, and in the case of Postagram, only work with Instagram photos. </p>
<p>Unfortunatey, using Touchnote&#8217;s app was always a bit of a hassle. Creating the postcards was fine, but paying for them was a complete faff. You were directed to a mobile Paypal gateway with a tiny font, so it required zooming and panning. I remember I tried to send a card while I was in France, and the just as I&#8217;d pained my way through Paypal to pay for a card, the wifi crapped out, and I had to start all over again. And if you wanted to send another card &#8211; same process. I gave up sending Touchnote postcards after that.</p>
<p>But the new version of the app? Superb. </p>
<p>There&#8217;s a very simple interface to add a photo, caption, text, address (more than one if required), and an optional Google map showing where the photo was taken. The interface has been simplified and expanded &#8211; so you can now crop, zoom and rotate your photos.</p>
<div id="attachment_4578" class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 210px"><a href="http://www.allaboutiphone.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/photo.jpg"><img src="http://www.allaboutiphone.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/photo-200x300.jpg" alt="Touchnote iPhone app interface" title="Touchnote iPhone app interface" width="200" height="300" class="size-medium wp-image-4578" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">The Touchnote iPhone app interface</p></div>
<p>However it&#8217;s the payment that&#8217;s way easier. You can now log in with your Touchnote account, just as on <a href="http://www.touchnote.com/">touchnote.com</a>. So if you&#8217;re in credit, there&#8217;s zero friction to sending cards. It just depletes one credit per card. You can also buy credits from within the app using Paypal or credit/debit card, both with native interfaces. This alone means I&#8217;ll be sending quite a few cards. At £1.49 a pop, it&#8217;s not much more than the cost of getting a photo printed out and posted, and certainly a lot less hassle.</p>
<p>I would love to see Touchnote continue to improve:</p>
<p>* You can send cards to multiple people, but sometimes it&#8217;s not just a case of adding another address &#8211; I&#8217;d like to be able to edit the text. So I want to be able to re-open a postcard that I&#8217;ve already sent. </p>
<p>* You also can&#8217;t save a card in draft to edit later, unless you hit Send then Cancel. </p>
<p>* The ability to move the caption around and resize it would be good</p>
<p>* There&#8217;s no in-app purchasing, which would make payment even easier, but Apple doesn&#8217;t allow physical goods to be purchased in-app.</p>
<p>* Maybe integration with Facebook or other sources to print and send photos from there? <em>EDIT:  I&#8217;ve just found out that Facebook integration is coming soon. Result.</em></p>
<p>It has been a long wait for a decent upgrade since the app was released, but the new version is great. The only real problem I have with Touchnote now is that I may never have to say &#8220;Deux timbres pour l&#8217;Angleterre&#8221; again!</p>
<p><strong>Touchnote</strong><br />
Version reviewed: v2.0<br />
Category: Photography<br />
Developer: Touchnote Ltd.<br />
Price (at time of review): Free to download, £1.49 per card<br />
Platforms: iPhone (version reviewed), iPod Touch<br />
<a href="http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/touchnote-postcards/id325525543?mt=8">UK App Store Link</a></p>
<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/allaboutiphonedotnet/~4/SyYGl1RPIV8" height="1" width="1"/>