Things more 'physical' than apps have been made and distributed in an attempt to solve a problem the wrong way, or even the wrong problem entirely. History is littered with examples of great aspirations and benign intent that either failed catastrophically or caused more harm than good, or frequently, both.
A somewhat recent example that pops into mind is this PRI story about the Soccket...
I guess 'food' stands for 'poverty', in this list. Seriously though, does anyone believe that these problems can be solved by an 'app'?