They say that imitation is the highest form of flattery, in which case the guy who invented the iPhone must have the biggest head in the World by now. It seems that any new mobile MP3 player that comes out these days borrows something from the Apple creation.

FlipSide adopts the scrolling album cover approach, giving you the ability to quickly flick through your music collection in a highly visual manner. The installation process is painless enough and once launched, you'll notice immediately how streamlined and lightweight FlipSide is, as it quickly searches for and displays all the audio files it finds on your device or storage card.

It then displays the artwork for each album on there and you can skip effortlessly through each by hitting the left and right buttons, or scrolling with your finger or stylus across the touchscreen. This will prompt the art to smoothly animate left or right. Don't worry if some of your music is lacking artwork, because you can add the album cover manually or search for it online at the click of a button.

Aside from the ubiquitous support for playlists, FlipSide lacks a little in terms of its options. You don't get any tools for sorting or categorizing your music, and there's no EQ or other fancy advanced playback options like cross-fading. Personally though, I'm willing to sacrifice the lack of options in exchange for a bloat-free application that runs quickly and is so wonderfully easy to use.

One of the best ways to experience the joys of the iPod touch MP3 player without actually buying one.