The Academy Awards are just around the corner, and magazine Vanity Fair is launching a free branded iPhone app to promote its Oscar-related content. Famous for its Oscar night party and Hollywood pics, Vanity Fair is also encouraging users to make your Oscar picks on the app. You can download the app here.
Within the app, you make your picks for the award categories and receive realtime results on the night of the big show. You can also invite your friends to vote for the people you think have the best chance of winning, compare your selections to those of friends and Vanity Fair editors, and chat within the app via Facebook chat. On Oscar night, the app will show you who is winning from your picks. Of course, the app also offers access to Vanity Fair editorial content including background information on nominees, stories, photos, profiles, trailers of nominated films, and slideshows.
This is Vanity Fair’s first iPhone app so it should be interesting to see if the magazine decides to launch a more comprehensive app for its content, a la Lucky Magazine (Both are Conde Nast publications). Other Oscar-specific iPhone apps include The Envelope, from the LA Times and Oscar Edition.