You spend more and more time liking, tweeting, following and checking in, and not nearly enough time using the telephone for what it was intended for – talking to someone. Language skills not what they used to be? Fear not – there is a happy medium between LOL and a live conversation. Give your thumbs a break and work your voice box. TalkBox Voice Messenger brings sound back to communication by integrating voice, music, laughter and crickets with social networking and instant messaging for iPhone and iPad users.

TalkBox blends push-to-talk messaging and visual voicemail, allowing users to send short voice messages to their contacts. Messages can be read immediately, or played at the convenience of the recipient. Voice messages can be one-on-one conversations or group discussions, across the street or across the world – messages are instant, free, and do not require a cellular network to be sent. First you have to add friends and contacts, but after the initial setup, recording and sending a thought is as easy as dialing 1-2-3. The app integrates with Twitter, Facebook, your Address Book, and a special “Voice Broadcast” contact which will send a message to all of your contacts at once.

TalkBox is available on the App Store for free. Singing happy birthday in your best Marilyn impression to your BFF and posting it on her Facebook wall – priceless.

The MediaPad Pro app for iPad was co-developed by Craig Orsini, an award-winning photographer and director who wanted a better way of presenting and sharing work with potential clients. He custom-crafted MediaPad Pro to allow artisans of any discipline to easily construct their portfolio of content into an intuitive and highly customizable format, ideal for photographers, artists, models, designers, or just about anyone with a portfolio. It comes equipped with all the tools you’d need to bring your portfolio into the modern digital lifestyle.

The app is really big on personalization, so the entire interface is fully customizable. Initial upload of your media files is fairly straight forward, you simply do it through iTunes while the iPad is plugged in. Once all the media is in, you can organize it into sections on the iPad, adjust the color palate and modify the font scheme. Select from one of the included background images, or upload your own to make it consistent with your personal branding.

When presenting your work to the clients, you can choose from a variety of included transitions and timing options to automate your content into a seamless slideshow. If you have a VGA adapter, you can even mirror it on a TV monitor or an overhead projector. If however you suddenly notice a mistake or decide to reposition an image while on your way to a meeting, just swap out the pieces you choose and you are instantly ready to go. We also like the way MediaPad Pro helps you stay in touch with potential clients, for that the app includes a guest book for viewers of your portfolio to sign and leave comments. You can easily keep track of who viewed your portfolio, delete individual records or disable the guestbook entirely.

Mediapad Pro was clearly born out of an immediate need for a better tool, and it shows. It creates an environment essential to people showing off their multimedia content, it’s impressively powerful, yet simple and friendly. Its modern take on the traditional portfolio format not only makes your work come alive in your hands, but also eliminates the costs of paper stock, print runs and portfolio cases, not to mention the constantly increasing costs of shipping – it’s a win-win for everyone.