BENTONVILLE — Scott Bedwell, a Bentonville High School senior, essentially exhausted the school district’s computer science curriculum by the time he completed 10th grade. Nonetheless, he continues to achieve in the field of computer and technology.
As an eighth-grader at Lincoln Junior High School he petitioned school administrators to let him take a course in computer applications which was normally restricted to ninth-graders and older high school students.
Once he was in the class, a self-paced series of three courses that can be spread out over three semesters, Bedwell tackled the material at a pace that felt natural.
“To my knowledge, I was the first — and probably still the only — one to do Computer Applications I, II and III in one semester,” Bedwell said.
Bedwell, as a ninth-grader, won a state computer programming competition — not against other ninth-graders, but against a field including juniors and seniors throughout Arkansas.
Bedwell began working for the Bentonville School District Office of Technology and Information Services as a sophomore in 2007, after he completing courses in computer programming and advanced placement computer science,. Bedwell said his understanding of computer applications accelerated as he worked as an apprentice to the center’s web development team.
“Those classes at BHS were helpful and everything,” Bedwell said. “But this is where I really learned to program.”
Working 40 hours a week in the summers and 15 to 20 hours a week during the school year, Bedwell began experimenting with various programming languages, including Objective-C, the language used for iPhone and iPod Touch applications.
Earlier this year, Bedwell began creating an iPhone application called My DJ. The application, which works within Apple’s iTunes music framework, skips randomly from one song to another at preselected intervals between 10 and 90 seconds.
“Basically, it’s a new way of listening to music,” Bedwell said. “Most people who have an iPhone, or any MP3 player, listen to an entire song, and then another entire song, because that’s just how most people listen to music, because that’s what the players do by default.
Bedwell said he found many teenagers tend to not listen to music that way, “especially when they’re in the car. They’ll be flipping through the songs a lot faster than the songs would normally play. So I thought, well, why not create an app that does that for them?”
Over the course of about a month Bedwell developed the application, then uploaded it to Apple. After a process of quality and legal review, Apple published the application in mid-October.
“I’ve heard people say that it’s an ‘ADD way of listening to music,’” Bedwell laughed. “But a lot of people seem to find it just a refreshing way to listen.”
Bob Shull, senior developer with Rockfish Interactive, a Bentonville web development and advertising agency, said iPhone applications are a likely sign of the future of the development industry.
“The shift is definitely more mobile,” Shull said. “I don’t know if it’s specifically the iPhone. We’ve developed things for the Android phones and Blackberries, in addition to the iPhone platform. I think the future of development is mobile in general.”
Between 260 and 270 users from around the world have downloaded Bedwell’s application in the past month. Bedwell set the retail price for My DJ at 99 cents, the lowest price developers can set for iPhone applications without making them free. Bedwell said that for each sale, he keeps 70 cents.
“Considering all the services and support Apple provides, 29 cents is pretty modest,” Bedwell said.
Bedwell said the application’s initial release was primarily intended to give him an idea of what users are really looking for. Based on user feedback, Bedwell said he plans to use his time off over the Thanksgiving holiday to develop the 2.0 version of the application.
Bedwell said one of the most surprising things about response to the application is its relative popularity around the world.
“I check it every morning, to see what the sales were for yesterday, and I’ve only had one or two days when someone from a foreign country didn’t buy it,” Bedwell said. “It’s available worldwide, and almost every day, someone from a random country buys it.”
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