A New Middle East – An Israeli Muslim Prayer Bead Application For Smartphones
Not unlike the Catholic rosary, A Misbaha is a Muslim prayer bead necklace traditionally used to keep track of counting in Tasbih, the repetitive uttering of all of Allah’s names one after another. Aviv Heilweil, an Israeli entrepeneur came up with the idea to create a Misbaha smartphone application while sitting in a Tel Aviv coffee shop one day.
“The idea was to create a very simple application that would keep my fingers busy without requiring too much concentration. A memory from one of my visits to Sinai (Egypt) brought the Bedouin prayer beads to mind and I set about replicating its mechanism.”
Heilweil, is a high tech veteran who shifted careers to education, advertising, and now mostly develops computer games for toddlers on his own. He sat down, wrote some code, drew some beads, and ran the result on his mobile phone. With some positive feedback, and a general feeling he wasn’t about to insult the entire Muslim world, Heilweil then uploaded his application to the Android market, Google’s app store for the Android Operating System.
The Android application can be downloaded at no charge, and is free of any advertising, for now. In the two and a half weeks since its launch, the app has been downloaded over 2,500 times, an impressive feat for an anonymous application with no PR or marketing behind it. One third of the downloads so far were from Saudi Arabia, making it the country that has downloaded this application the most (so far)
“There’s nothing like finding a new audience, and it is very gratifying to look and see someone from Morocco is playing with something I developed at this moment”, says Heilweil about his new side job. “It is interesting to see some of the resopnses and mails I’ve received. I was surprised to find out, that for the most part, users like the application, and are happy enough to have it giving it a 4.5 star rating out of a possible 5 (with 27 votes). Those who didn’t like it described it as ‘bidat’, a form of heresy, and gave it just one star”. On the other hand says Heilweil, “I’ve also received some funny responses, for instance one writer hoped Allah would save the developer from his application. Some responses were in Arabic or French.
With regards to the word ‘Peace’ written in three different languages and appears for several seconds while the app is launching, Heilweil says, “maybe the message will seep through”. A few days ago Heilweil launched a new version of the app for the Apple app store. The Apple version is available at the app store for one dollar.
Misbaha for Android
Misbaha for iPhone
This post was originally published in Hebrew by Gal Mor on HolesInTheNet on May 16, 2011
Translation by David Miron
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Author: DavidMiron
David Miron is a Social Media Maven, and Content Curator. He has been following the internet closely since it was measured in Bauds, and has worked for Soluto, Erayo, and Channel 2 News. In the more distant past David was the proud founder, and owner of New York's biggest motorcycle dealership, Cycle Therapy.
1 Comments
2011-09-12
23:47:42
Little more years and israil will be a past .
Remember this !!
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