"Who's My Landlord?" App Loses, But Still Useful!

Mayor Mike Bloomberg announced the winners of the second-annual NYC BigApps 2.0 Competition on Thursday night. This cool city-run competition gives out cash prizes to software developers who use city data sets to build apps that make it easier for people to navigate the city.

Unfortunately, the app inspired by a Voice story about missing landlords didn't seem to curry too much favor among the panel of tech-entrepreneur judges (The app helps you useful find info about your landlord that currently is only available in a bunch of different places).

But we're not sore losers here. The winning app, called Roadify, seems pretty cool (even if the MTA is already doing something similar). The app gives commuters real-time updates about transit conditions (including road traffic).

The judges seem to like commuters. Another winner, Parking Finder, provides free interactive maps of on-street parking spots.

Fourteen winning apps were selected from a pool of 58 submissions. Another winning app, Sportaneous, "harnesses location-based technology to organize sports games at any time, providing lists of nearby public sports facilities and ways to join games that suit the user's schedule, location, and skill level."

And we liked this app http://donteat.at/, which was developed by a high schooler NYU student Max Stoller. It sends you a text message any time you step into a restaurant that is at risk of being closed for health code violations.

The winners will receive a total of $40,000 - double what the city originally promised -- thanks to a BMW sponsorship. BMW is also going to launch a software business incubator in the city.