Dave Balmer

I was looking some months back at the “Hot” iPhone Web apps, and was amused to find the “iPhone Flashlight” and, later, the various strobe lights and other things which basically set the background color from #000 to #FFF. Not to be outdone, I made the iPhone SOS app one night which used the same “high tech” approach to make Morse Code signals. Then I chuckled, showed a few friends who also chuckled, and I promptly forgot about it.

If you want to preview it, you’ll probably need Safari or Firefox because I’m too lazy to fiddle with IE for something this small and specialized. So point your iPhone to the URL, bookmark it, and use it in cases where all other forms of communication break down:

mtskull.com/sos

Tap the three screen keys (dot, dash and space) to hand-key your code, or tap the input box on the top and key something in using the iPhone text input. Tap “send” and signal that special someone across the crowded room, or call for help in a remote area with no cell phone coverage. You can also play party games with it, learn Morse code by trial and error, or just marvel at the latest thing in wireless communications. Options let you set the color of your light and the speed which it sends your messages.

Let me know if you come up with any other interesting uses for this thing.