I woke up yesterday morning to an update notification on my iPhone (5 – yes, I love it) for my flashlight application (and a couple others). I clicked “Update All”, and moved on to get ready for the day without thinking much of it. Shower. Ready. In the car. And on my way to the office, it hit me…  “Why the heck do I need to update the flashlight application?”

It’s kinda weird to *have* a flashlight application in the first place, but it makes sense if you think about it. So does the “mirror” application, and the “compass” app (don’t actually have one of those, because my flashlight has a compass built into it), and countless other “basic utilities”. Calculator, weather, camera, map, etc.

But my favorite is my Starbucks card. This app and the flashlight deal have something in common… they’re the wave of the future. The goal: to eliminate the need for having much on your person other than your phone … to allow me to collapse my entire bat utility belt into a single device. Well, for men that is. I’m skeptical that the “lipstick” app will ever take off. But I digress.

The credit cards are working on apps like these too. Why have a plastic card (or cash) in your wallet, when you can just scan your phone? And 30 seconds later, you’ll be scanning the phone to buy a soda from a vending machine, or ride in a cab, or buy a TV, and so on. And if you doubt it, then you may remember having said to yourself, “Who would ever write a flashlight application?”

Once the credit cards and cash aren’t in your wallet anymore, what’s left? Photos? Nope, they’re on the phone. Receipts? I hope the go the way of the credit card (how easy would that be!?). And that pretty much leaves the driver’s license. Ok, that one will be “hard”. (Read: will take another couple years). But we’re getting closer to the day when the biggest question left will be, “How do I secure this device that now has every imaginable element of my life on it?” That is the question of the next 5 years.

But for now, I welcome the one-device utility belt. Having upgraded my flashlight, anyone else have tips for great “tool apps” you consider a necessity?