This week in apps: Alexa on your iPhone and yet another Snapchat clone
With news that Netflix is changing up reviews, Google Home is playing unwanted ads and Spotify is hinting at premium-only albums, you may have missed some of this week's best new apps.
We've kept up for you. Each week, we round up the latest app news, along with a few of our favorite new and updated apps, to keep you in the loop with everything coming to your phone.
SEE ALSO: I'm starting to love Instagram Stories more than Snapchat because I'm incredibly thirsty
Here's what caught our eye this week. If you're looking for more, make sure to check out last week's look at top apps.
Facebook launches a FOURTH Snapchat Stories clone
Image: facebook
Image: facebook
Yep, that's right. We wrote about Facebook's third Snapchat Stories clone just last week and there's already another one. Now, Stories are rolling out to Facebook's News Feed. Stories works a little better than in Messenger, feels more natural and is far less intrusive.
For now, the feature is still being tested in a handful of countries and the beta versions of the app in the U.S., but you'll probably see it soon enough in your own News Feed. Meanwhile, Messenger Day is making us unfriend a lot of randos on Facebook, and maybe it's for the best.
This app will call Congress for you
Image: stance
Image: stance
A new app called Stance wants to make it easier than ever for you to contact your representatives. The app, which was made by one of the cofounders of Venmo, aims to make contacting your representatives as easy as leaving a voicemail. The team behind Stance is an audio messaging company called Ense, which leverages Twilio's API to automatically send the message through congressional call trees. They're also tweeted directly to representative's Twitter accounts, where they can be played on Twitter.
Download it on iOS and Android.
Amazon is bring Alexa to your iPhone
Image: amazon
A new update brings Alexa directly to your iPhone via the Amazon shopping app. You can talk to Alexa while you shop and ask questions like "search for paper towels," "reorder batteries" and "track my last order." By bringing Alexa to the Amazon app rather than introducing a separate app on your phone, it's likely Amazon wants people to get used to Alexa in a familiar environment before making it more widely available.
Elsewhere
Image: spotify
Image: spotify
Spotify and Waze announced a partnership that allows users to seamlessly switch between the two apps and play music through the Waze app. The integration is currently Android only and
requires users to have both apps.
Image: supersonic
Image: supersonic
Google's Area 120 incubator has launched an experimental new messaging app called Supersonic. The app is slick and fun messaging app without a keyboard that transcribes what users say and replaces text with emoji when appropriate. Download it on iOS and Android.
Image: LILI SAMS/MASHABLE
Google launched a new app called Family Link to make parental controls easier and more convenient for parents and kids. Mashable's Pete Pachal tried out Family Link and wrote up what they got right and what they didn't.
Apple's next version of iOS will kill hundreds of thousands of apps due to a change by the company. Here's how to check which of your apps may be in trouble.
And finally, that creepy Facebook stalking app was a hoax, but here's why it should scare you anyway.
