Killer apps

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Ever wonder what happens after you publish your first novel? “Four weeks after your book comes out you will be perusing a secondhand bookshop on Charing Cross Road and see a pristine copy of your hardback selling for 20 per cent of its RRP and your little heart will break.”

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You thought the Twitter rebrand to X was exciting? Well, hold on to your hat. The Fence looks at the apps, platforms and start-ups fixed to upend our worlds in 2024. Just don’t forget to accept those cookies…

1. Nomen (formerly Namely)

Customer-facing startup that creates and registers names for startups, including almost everyone on this list. Their intuitive slider system lets you select from three of their patented name-flav™ naming models; baysic™, obleek™ and nscrtbl™.

2. Dowagr

Dating site tailored exclusively to those seeking mysterious, elderly, and extravagantly wealth European widowers, their necks wreathed in pearls, their deep, stoic eyes betraying a sense that their shipping magnate husband was crushed by something other than the mast of his own yacht, and who now cruise the casinos of the Italian coast looking for love, companionship, and the chance to nearly but not quite admit what happened off the coast of Perugia that warm summer’s eve.

3. Mindfull

Synapse-hacking AI that brings mindfulness to its logical endpoint by filling your brain right up. And we mean alllllll the way up, with every memory slot and thought path entirely crammed with surplus cognitional chaff. “They say we only use 10% of our brains” reads their marketing literature, “we promise 0”. You have never known mindfulness until you have rendered thinking itself painful, and speech a harrowing torment.

4. StetsOn

Premium app that uses location data to isolate the nearest location of a regional mall that lets you do one of those photoshoots where you get to wear Wild West garb, and the only such service that mints the resulting, faux-sepia picture as an NFT. A subsidiary of HatsApp.

5. Watercoolr

Using an AI originally developed by the IDF for enhanced interrogation, timid salarymen are given fourteen randomly generated conversation starters every morning, for use during their workday, e.g. ‘indigo and violet just aren’t pulling their weight as separate colors in the rainbow’, ‘Succession is neither overrated nor underrated, its current critical assessment is precisely accurate’ or ‘when did you last shit yourself?’.

6. Likin’

Pinterest meets Shazam, for the ready identification and recommendation of nearby mosses, lichen and surface algae.

7. Browzr

In-person service that sends trained, gig economy readers—or browzrs—to paw through every unread book on your shelves, lending your untouched library a pleasing facsimile of well-worn use. Formerly Barnes & Noble, LLC

8. Hingis+

Fully actualized lifestyle and wellness app based on the teachings and values of 1996 Wimbledon ladies’ singles champion, Martina Hingis.

9. CideHustle

App that uses bespoke AI to oversee the planning, purchasing and logistics of your husband’s murder while—in parallel—using blockchain analytics to draw up a pitch deck and option agreement for a Netflix documentary series on said events.

10. Plnth

All-in-one database, transport and logistics hub for the ordering of plinths, rostrums, lecterns and pulpits. Formerly DaisEx.

11. Greev

Take the misery out of grief by overseeing funeral arrangements with machine-learned detachment. Ceremonial planning, bequeathals, even taxidermy are all delegated to a patented cluster of diligent and respectful AIs, who do all the sadmin so you don’t have to.

12. Wrek, a subsidiary of Greev

Put the misery back in grief by tasking said sadmins with carrying out a cross-platform campaign of public breakdowns. Inserting clauses in wills, sending dead flowers to mistresses, inviting clowns to funeral, etc, etc.

13. NonceBashr

An awkward collaboration between the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills & a focus group on the outskirts of north-west London, wherein half a dozen unemployed men were given £400,000 to develop an app entirely of their choosing, and have it released through government platforms.

14. The London Review of Babes

Nineties lad mag energy meets high-minded literary culture as a parade of straight male novelists—the ghost of Martin Amis, Jonathan Franzen, Will Self, Ian McEwan—write essays of no less than 4,000 words about the most jaw-droppingly beautiful woman they’ve ever seen in London.

15. 14Words

A challenger brand digital media hive bringing a heady mix of outsider views and critical essays, all at the intersection of science, culture and politics, for discerning, patriotic millennials. Formerly Stormfront.

16. Freddie DeBoer’s Infinite Jest

The controversial Substacker writes a whole print magazine’s worth of content—there are no other contributors—but it’s published with all the comments and attempted elisions from the beleaguered editorial team, whose attempts to chop the pieces down and centre the arguments founded against FDB’s granite-like refusal to make changes to his copy. Designed with great skill and at vast expense, an object of bizarre beauty.

17. It Takes Tooze

Carpool Karaoke meets Freakonomics. The world’s leading economists sing for their supper—and occasionally belt out a Broadway number—while James Corden berates a waiter in the backseat.

18. 2BClear

An AI extension that automatically adds harumphs, nose inhalations and throat-clearing paragraph transitions to your Guardian editorials.

19. 「安倍晋三に対する敬意と礼儀」オンライン申請 [“Respect and Courtesy to Shinzo Abe” Online Application]

Platform to share reflections, read biographies and pay tribute to assassinated Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe.

20. Adult Happy Meal

An app that uses geolocation tracking to order fries and a martini whenever you come within 10 feet of a three-star hotel lobby.