The Latest App That Closes The Gap In Long-Distance Love

At best, long-distance relationships are hard to handle. At worst, they're downright miserable. Unfortunately, for online daters they're a simple fact of life. When you're meeting potential mates that could live anywhere in the world, you're bound to run into at least one who catches your eye but doesn't live nearby.

One solution for long-distance couples is to cover each other's Facebook walls is sappy, sickly sweet messages that make their friends want to vomit. But the better option is Pair, the newest app that attempts to close the gap for long-distance lovers.

Pair is a bit like a private version of Facebook's new Timeline profile. The app creates a private, shared timeline for couples on which they can easily share messages, photos, videos, and locations with each other. Users can also draw pictures together in real time using the Live Sketch function, create a joint to-do list with the Shared Tasks feature, or give each other a ThumbKiss (a vibration that occurs when both users place their thumbs on the same spot on the screen). Setting it up is as simple as pairing the app with your partner and posting, then enjoying the real-time connection that lets you know when your partner is looking at the same thing as you are, at the very same time.

Thanks to all that extra functionality, Pair calls itself "Super SMS." "Our goal is to make Pair the first thing that pops into your mind when you want to share something with your partner," says the Pair blog. "These days, it's not only text messages that you want to share, but also photos, video, your location, and even things like sketches. Instead of treating these other types of messages like second class citizens, we treat them the same as text messages." Put all that together and you get "a very fun and intimate timeline between you and your partner" that "helps you feel close even when you're apart."

And perhaps best of all is the contest that celebrates the app's debut: one lucky winner will walk away with a pair of brand new iPhones.

The app is available now from the Apple App Store, and an Android version is reportedly on the way. Cross-platform functionality will be available, because it would be a true tragedy if a relationship that could survive the distance couldn't survive incompatible operating systems.