Instagram is the coolest app on my iPhone right now. It’s a simple photo-sharing app that takes the photos on your iPhone, turns them into art, and makes it easy to share with your friends.

Here’s a photo of the Statue of Liberty I shot while on a bike ride Sunday morning:

It’s everything a great app should be:

• Simple: a 4 year old could use it. You choose a snap (or take one), add a filter with a simple menu, then choose where to share it when you publish.
• Does one thing well: Instagram is a photo sharing app. That’s it. You make your photos look cool, and you share ‘em.
• Expands existing functionality: the iPhone takes great photos already, but it’s a bit of a chore to share them and they lack focus and bells and whistles.
• Cool: the product makes your photos look cooler – further motivation to share, and thereby virally spreading the app
• Integrated: Today Twitter announced support for Instagram, photos shared via the app will show up directly within the Twitter user interface

And here’s a before and after of a shot a rugby teammate sent from Afghanistan. His pic:

Then the same pic through an Instagram filter:

Cool right? If you join Instagram be sure to look up paullyoung and follow me!