Android Market

Good news iPad and Android owners — Free App a Day is coming to your town! Already well known by iPhone owners, the Free App a Day franchise is making its freebie fun available for iPad apps, and diving into the Android Market. Both options are available now on the Free App a Day website, so you can begin to get free apps on more devices.

No word on whether or not there will be a Free App a Day App for either of these devices in the near future, but we can only imagine that they'll be on the way soon enough.

You've got an iPhone 4 and want to use FaceTime, but don't have a WiFi connection. What to do now? Well, you can download the newly-updated Fring App (Free) and video chat all you want since it now allows video calling over 3G on any phone, by taking advantage of front-facing cameras (like the one on the EVO 4G).

Take note that chatting over 3G will impact your data usage (unlike the FaceTime feature), so be sure to monitor how much data you're pulling down each month. Fring is available in the Android Market as well, so gather up your Droid-loving friends and start chatting!

• This laser lounge is hot, but wait till you see the rest of the house — Unplggd
• Finally, Android's market site gets a little smarter — Gizmodo
• A collection of board game commercials from your youth — Urlesque
• This time-wasting site lets you guess people's ages and is totally addictive — Lemondrop
• Unshake makes blurry photos better — Lifehacker
• Robot presides over Japanese wedding — Switched

Craigslist has become an invaluable online resource for apartments, cars, jobs . . . and plenty of other services near you. I've detailed how to add Craigslist finds to your RSS reader and preview images from ads, and even profiled a handy desktop download. Now you can keep tabs on your favorite searches when you're on the go with the CraigslistChecker app for Android.

The free app is straightforward and simple to use. Use it to perform Craigslist searches straight from your phone, swipe left or right to browse through listings, and save listings or searches. You can even email them to friends. Anyone who's ever looked for an apartment in a saturated market will tell you that a 24/7 tie to Craigslist is a must — this app is a great way to stay in the loop!

You can make payments and transfer money on your iPhone with the help of Square and your debit or credit card, but now with PayPal's new app, you don't even need that. Just by bumping your phones together, you can transfer money from one PayPal account to the other — no bank, check, computer, or credit card required.

The new PayPal app isn't just for your iPhone though — it works on your BlackBerry or Android device as well. To hear how it works, just read more

While most will agree that the iPhone's interface is pretty, the lack of customization annoys a lot of people! Sure, you can drag app icons around until you're blue in the face, but otherwise you're stuck with the pre-programmed home screen. Android, on the other hand, is completely open-source, which means it's open to a whole lot of customization. OpenHome is a customization app for Android phones that supports custom skins, icons, and fonts, including many already designed and available in the Android Market.

Besides appearance, OpenHome supports other tweaks like widgets, auto-rotate, and keyboard enhancements. The app is free from the Andorid Market; just search for "Open Home" to get the app and view all available themes.

Whether you're going abroad or just want to learn a new language, the Talk To Me app for Android phones is an easy translation tool. Speak a word or phrase into the phone and the easy-to-use app will translate and speak it back to you in the desired language. Talk To Me works with most languages that are based on Roman characters (French, Spanish, German, etc.) and will text translate many others.

It's a lot like the iPhone translation app I wrote about recently, and is just as awesome for travel, whether you need to find the bathroom or just introduce yourself to someone new. Talk To Me is free, and available in the Android Market.

Here's a great Android app for all of you space nerds out there: Google Sky Map. Just like Google Maps and Google Goggles help you discover what's around you, Google Sky Map for Android phones shows you what's happening in the night sky. The app uses the phone's orientation sensors to pinpoint your location and map out the night sky as you see it. You can explore planets, constellations, and stars by pointing your phone to different parts of the sky — the display will move with your hand providing info about what you're pointing the phone at. Or, if you're looking for a specific star or planet, use the app to search, and Sky Map will direct you to the point in the sky you're looking for.

To download, search for "Sky Map" in the Android Market, or download from Google's site. And if you want to keep exploring from the galaxy, don't forget about Google Earth's Sky Feature.

I told you about Snaptell last year, an iPhone app that lets you read reviews and comparison shop by snapping a pic of a book, DVD, CD, or video game cover. It works great, but a new Google Android app is taking things a step farther. Called Google Shopper, you can take a quick photo of barcodes, DVD cases, video games, and the like or just say what you're looking for to activate a voice search in case there's no barcode available. You'll instantly get reviews and prices so you can make a wise shopping decision.

See something you like? Save it for later in your shopping list so you can buy online or head to the nearest store that has it in stock! And in true Google form, there's a demo video to go along with their newest release. Check it out when you read more