“How truly open is Flash? Do we need "Open Flash”

The article I read online was called “How truly open is Flash? Do we need "Open Flash”?” written on Wednesday, January 03, 2007, and posted by D. Nickull. It made some interesting points, about whether or not Flash is a proprietary technology.

Some of the basic points he made were the following:

“ 1. The Flash programming language (ActionScript) is 100% ECMASCript, a standard with multiple implementations and is open. You can script using ActionScript with a plain old text editor. Which what means that it makes it easier for anyone from an old user to a new user to use. They have made it easier and more versatile for more users to use.
“ 2. The internal Flash Player VM, “Tamarin” is an open source project run by the Mozilla foundation (donated by Adobe). It also helps people who use Flash for internet gaming or advertisements. It puts flash projects on the net faster.
3. The Flash file format, *.SWF is a published format.
4. The Adobe Flash Player (the reference implementation) is free. So are several others like the Gnash player.
5. The Flash Player is available on Mac, Windows, Linux, Playstation, Nintendo Wii, Symbion, and many other platforms.
6. An SDK for building, compiling, debugging Flash applications is available for free on Mac, Windows and Linux
7. There are over 100 third party, free, commercial, open source and closed source products that produce, edit, generate, and otherwise manipulate Flash files, Flash Video files, etc.
8. There is a very active Open Source community around the Flash runtime. For better or worse (I do work for Adobe -;) many people take full advantage of the Flash Player without using any commercial products from Adobe (or anyone belse). See http://www.osflash.org/ to get a good view of this.
9. Flash itself makes use of several standards such as JPG, AVI, GIF and PNG's as outlined here.”

After reading the article, I feel that the author did a good job at addressing all the issues at hand in a fair and even manner, as well as all the points to be had.
While I can’t pretend to understand all of everything it talks about, I gather that this is a new debate, with people still weighing all the options. I myself am still in the process of learning Flash, so some of the above is vague to me. However, I still have faith in Flash and its abilities to create what I need.

Flash Enabled Mobile Devices Pass 200 Million

Adobe Press Release
02/12/07



This weeks article I took, once again, from Adobe’s Press Release. Just this past Monday Adobe announced the marker of 200 million mobile devices having flash on them. Today, more than 300 Flash enabled phones and consumer electronic devices have been manufactured, and more that 70 percent of all Flash devices now ship outside of Japan, forging new markets for Adobe. This opens up more avenues for flash developers to use. There are two types of mobile Flash programs: Adobe Flash Lite (for the consumer) and Adobe FlashCast (for the developer or client-server). With these two programs the amount of flash content will on grow. Adobe also has a new delivery service powered by FlashCast technology. They currently have 8 million subscribers to it.

The senior vice president of Mobile and Device Solutions Business Unit at Adobe said, “Japan was the early adopter of mobile Flash technology, but today it is a worldwide phenomenon with some of the hottest mobile devices. Adobe is banking on the creativity of FlashCast’s users. It basically depends on how the designer will take the technology and mold it. Adobe is currently giving training to companies like Nokia, NTT and Verizon Wireless to know how to fully use Flash Lite development content.

By using Flash Lite for our Shockwave Mini mobile game service, people like Shockwave can offer a unique selection of Flash Lite games to millions of Verizon wireless customers in the United States. The CEO of Mobitween, Philippe Chassany said, “As our mobile technology of choice, Flash Lite enables us and our partner developers to truly create rich and interactive games and application at unprecedented speed and reduced costs”. In a nutshell, Adobe is a nice little “monopoly” over the mobile software market.

This issue is very important to mostly to flash developers. It gives them hope in where to spend their time developing. If Flash Lite is the new things, people are going to develop more of it. This issue is also important to anyone who has or is looking to buy a phone. With this advancement in phone technology, you may want to keep your eye out for a nice flash-enabled phone.

My position on it is simple. I think Flash is ingenious. It is flexible, easy to modify, and fun to look at. With the Flash technology on getting better, it will be hard for any other program to surpass it. My only concern for Flash is that launches like the iPhone may shatter some dreams. Because phones seem like they are moving towards an “OS” to run on, more option will become available that may be better than flash.

Current Event 2

Only as of recently, Macromedia has teamed up with a digital broadcasting solutions leader of the market today, VitalStream, Inc. What this does for flash is it allows the company to deliver quick video-enabled flash content all over computers that support flash and that being over 600 million computers today with flash being installed. The partnership will allow companies to have high-quality, reliable, on-demand video in the fastest possible time without having to install and maintain streaming video servers. VitalStream also quotes “by working with macromedia, we are providing the infrastructure for companies to reliably deliver great user experiences that can scale to meet the needs of any size deployment.” Which brings up a good point of just being another support of an infustructure.
I think in general this is a great idea to help eliminate those messy Video streaming servers and allow people to come up with new and exciting ideas. Somewhat like what the Sundance film festival which is going to use this new service provided by VitalStream to their web site to provide a new and creative experience for the visitors of the site.

Flash as a delivery platform for the disabled.

Flash has some unique abilities, that when harnessed, can produce a highly effective medium to deliver communications with the disable or impaired. Some of Flash's standard features are now effective two-fold, not only in the conventional sense, but also in that of a new form of communication.

One method of doing this is "multiple ways of communication" through one flash document. For instance, you can have an image animate to show the message while text is captioned on the bottom, explaining in words, what is going on.

Another technique is the use of vector-based scalability. The flash animation/document can be enlarged infinitely for ease of viewing for those who may be visually impaired.

A third perk is the integration of the keyboard as part of the interactivity of the Flash document. Users dont have to have a super-refined motor control (using a mouse) and even for those who aren't impaired, browsing can be expedited via keyboard shortcuts.

Flash is a multimedia vessel for information. Text, sound, images, movie clips, and animations are easily usable and highly effective by being able to translate the same message into audio/visual forms.

One must keep in mind that all of these areas must be focused on for an effective product that is easy to use but does not make the user feel like they are at a disadvantage. This idea is a new one to me and I think that this idea is a fantastic one and has plenty of power to back it.

New Flash Lite 3

Flash lite hits the news again. This time it was the release of the new Flash Lite 3 which will allow for streaming video using flash lite. It will be released by april 2007. The new platform allows for the integration of media rich applications in the cell phone world as well as great online video delivery. This will also allow many more types of signal providers access to the spectrum of flash abilities. The use of Flash Lite will also reduce costs of implementation of video by 5 times.
This will help to bring the new mobile devices which are more like computers to the market. This allows for the mobile life completely. There is an ever growing need to have constant access to your digital life. This will allow the delivery of mobile media content effortlessly. Things like the i tunes revolutionized the music industry it is doing the same for t.v. Flash Lite is the logical choice for mobile content delivery.
In my opinion this is one step closer to the entire digital package which media providers such as comcast and verizion are striving to encompass. In the age of media giants shifting from theatres and the console tv to your ipod and mobile phone this can only help to create revenue and jobs for young designers like myself.This can be acheived through interactive screen savers custom home screens and game and video development.In summation the release of Flash Lite 3 will herald in a new age of Flash development and developers.

Flash Lite

Macromedia has launched a mini flash player application for cell phones. This application makes it able to view flash movies, work with flash maps, and view streaming cable tv shows. Macromedia is also avoiding creating windows mobile programs and is sticking with other mobile operating systems. The technology is mainly based in japan but will shortly come over to the untied states on select phones.
I think this is a great thing for a lot of mobile users, I mean think of a day where you could create your own flash application, export it in a format that can be read by the phone send it via blue tooth to your phone, and there you go your own mini application. I’m viewing this for mainly making little flash games you could send to your friends, or maybe even make a super compact flash portfolio to send in messages to prospective employers.
I don’t know too much about the future of this, I mean it could just flop because it isn’t adapted to windows mobile which most of this countries businesses have tried to build upon on as a lesser foundation for communicating. If this does happen to go as planed in macromedias views they are sure to have a certain success with this and a lor of consumers will enjoy this.

Mac vs. PC

Meredith Helms
January 29, 2007


The article I read, called “Apple revs up Mac attacks on Vista”
POSTED: 1:25 p.m. EST, February 1, 2007, explains how Microsoft has come out with “Vista” a newer vamped up version of windows, the first revamp in 5 years.

Apple is of course, amused, being that the features Vista brags about, Apple already has had, for quite a while. Ever since the dawn of both systems, Apple has stayed a step ahead in technology versus its Windows counterpart, always managing to be more innovative then Windows, and sighing as Windows tries in vain to copy everything they do.

The article explains how the latest sweep of “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” commercials has helped with the spreading of Apple brand. The commercials are simple, and hilarious, with the PC character constantly trying to outdo the Mac, who with ease and a smile, outdoes the PC every time.

Personally, sense I agree that Apples are better than PC’s any day, I’m curious to see how Vista compares to the newly emerging Leopard version of Mac OS. X.
Something tells me that my mind will never be changed, that Apples are the way to go, considering my field.

motionartist

Bridgette Blenker
Flash
4DA
“Flash Animation Software offers rapid prototyping tools”


The article I picked was Flash Animation Software Offers rapid Prototyping tools” This article was released January 26th of 2007 It talks about The Program Motion Artist 4. This program makes Flash animation easy for artist and businesses.
This program is released to windows programs, It is Inexpressive and easy to use. This program can help you Banner ads, digital photo albums, and websites, ECT. In this new version there is new wizards, templates new timeline, new browser preview, ECT.
To use this program you do not need any prior knowledge of web design.
I think this program is very special in that it can do what flash can do but in an easier way for everyone. I never heard of the program but it could be a very big success if given the chance.
I think it’s important because everyone wants things to be easier now days. When it’s easy especially in business it gets faster and less money the company has to spend. Plus cheap program very beneficial to the businesses, educations and artists to use it.
The program seems to come out February 1st 2007. So I don’t know what will happen yet with it but like I said I think it will be big or flash will sew it very bad.

Flash 9 Finalized for Linux

Adobe on Wednesday released the final version of Flash Player 9 for Linux, bringing its multimedia offering for the open source operating system up to date with Windows and Mac OS X. Linux developers can now build rich Internet applications using Adobe's Flex 2 SDK.

Flash Player 9 for Linux includes better memory utilization, advanced features for graphics, video and text, as well as ActionScript Virtual Machine 2, which Adobe recently handed over to the Mozilla Foundation for a project called Tamarin. "Now the Linux community has full access to the high volume of Flash content and applications available on the Internet today, bringing Linux developers and users to the forefront of the Web 2.0 experience," remarked Emmy Huang, senior product manager at Adobe.

Using Flash As An Online Video Delivery Application

Flash is now one of the top-most vehicles of online video delivery today. This is likely due to the fact that the Flash program itself has integrated tools that make publishing uber-web-ready videos, animations, advertisements and so much more, right out of the box. This makes it very simple for nearly anyone of any capability to upload a quality, easy to use video for literally the world to see.

Most videos placed online are in a format that is only conducive to straight playback with little to no user interactivity, much like watching tv. This provides a rather flaccid experience and is not really web-friendly. Users come to a website to have interaction, to choose what they view, not have it dictated for them.

A program named "Flix" has been released, making encoding video into a swf file easier than ever. Flix offers numerous compression and authoring choices for anywhere from a 56k modem to a broadband connection, from 1fps banner ads to full out videos. Flix offers a versatility and functionality unparalleled in today's market. However, the downfall of Flash, and Flix, resides within itself. An SWF file can only contain 16,000 frames, which roughly equates to just over 22 minutes of the standard 12fps. It's second downside is that it is not a streaming format, but rather is of the progressive download format, meaning it is not a good choice for live broadcasts.

Advantages are present as well; the ability to combine video/motion images with vector graphics, all though one program is a huge plus. Flash is capable of producing a high quality fusion of the two that is viewable on 99+% of browsers worldwide and therefore can reach a vast audience quickly, easily, and all while being user friendly.

I believe that Flash as a video delivery platform is a great idea and I see it more and more everyday. We are saturate with advertisements, YouTube, and an unmeasurable amount of Flash online games and movie clips. There is no way to deny Flash's usefulness or presence due to it's shear magnitude on the world wide web.

-Keegan

Adobe wins Emmy Award for Flash Video

Adobe Press Release
11/02/06



The 2nd article I found was straight from Adobe’s Press Release section. This article was on Flash Video and how it won Adobe a Technical and Engineering Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Science. Today, shows like Lost, Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy are being delivered online thanks to Flash Video, while the technology also powers the video capabilities of social networking sites such as YouTube and MySpace. The award is actually formally being accepted this month in Las Vegas at a CES trade show.

The president and chief operating officer at adobe, Shantanu Narayen, stated “Flash Video is fundamentally changing the role of video on the Internet, and this prestigious award is further proof of this technology’s profound impact on how broadcasters deliver their content”. All of the “Video Player Websites” now rely on Flash to stream video content of all types. Narayen went on to say, “Winning this Emmy is deserved recognition for our engineering teams and Adobe’s continued commitment to innovation in dynamic media”.

Flash video is used by companies to stream video content in a smooth yet secure fashion. The program that makes it possible it called Flash Media Server 2. It gives organizations a scalable and secure way to stream video content, and partnerships with leading content delivery network providers. Statistics show that over 700 million Internet-connected desktops and mobile devices currently use Adobe Flash Player.

This issue is very important just because so many web sites and web applications use flash as their front end content. With that said, you must have the flash player to view any of their sites. As designers, I find that we need to keep up with the trends of online content and interface. So it is important to know that successful landmarks that Adobe continues to achieve. We should be excited for them and encourage them to continue to put out quality and useful software tools so we may be better at what we do.

After reading this article, I have gained a little more respect for Adobe and how much they do. It is very cool to see that a software company that I frequently use, wins Emmy Awards. I now want to get involved with online video stream and learn more about it.

Flash On Phones

This week article concerns the growing use of a program called Flash Lite. It is a development program that exists for mobile phones that is in many ways like Flash 8. This Article focused on the Japanese users and their willingness to adapt to this new platform. The Japanese are far more about the use of their phones as personal statement rather then just for communication. On average the Japanese schoolgirl spends about $127.00 a month on downloaded content. That makes for a viable market for Flash Lite based applications. This opens the way for developers and freelance artists to tap into the mainstraem. Also it has become one of the new trends in Japan.
This is important because we can really create more user friendly cell interfaces. It also allows for the growth of an entirely new market. Here in the states we use our phone for pretty much just communication. However with the release of amazing new products such as the i-phone and other multi touch devices the idea of a personalized mobile device is becoming more appealing. The projected revenue of such development platforms is unimaginable.
In my opinion this is that it is nothing but a good and really cool thing. We as Americans are spending less and less time at home the need to bring our electronic lives with us is growing at a substantal rate. Its awfully hard to evaluate your stocks and investments and make changes to them when you are watching billy at his soccer practice. Think about it you could have a trading alert and it's sitting at home in your laptop on your desk. Oops you just missed out on 2% net gains. That is just one of many examples. The thing that makes Flash Lite the perfect candidate is that it conveys things in such a visual manner and is so interactive. The biggest thing that puts Flash Lite in the foreground is its ability to be personalized.

The Flash Gaming Network Takes the Next Step in Featuring Online Flash Content

The aricle I chose for my second current event talks about Flash Games. Mostly, how they don't get the respect they deserve and how Shawn Tanner, a flash game producer, has made a site that features these games. Not only does it feature the games but it also gives in-depth reviews, comparisons to other games, and gives full credit to all the flash animators that made the games. It is the first of it's kind, so to speak. Other websites such as small blog sites will review games, but not that many, nor do they usually have any idea what it takes to make these games.
I think that it is a good idea to have such a site because the amount of flash games coming out since the early 2000's is overwhelming, and only a select few are worth your time and "effort" to play. So now instead of sorting through all sorts of games and websites looking for fun addicting flash games, this site is pointing them out for you. Let them do all the work and let the designers and animators tell you how good a game is. Besides they probably know more than some 12 year old kid who puts up blog reviews on games.
This article I feel was important because I am a flash game player and to have someone out there doing the dirty work for you and letting you know what the best game is awesome. I'm sure im not the only one who feels this way either.

Sony to launch flash-based Mini-Vaio

Sony to launch flash-based Mini-Vaio
InformationWeek
Antone Gonsalves
http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=1970014888

In an article written just days ago (1/29/2007), Sony has made an announcement about launching their latest project. New from Sony is a flash-based Mini-Vaio, which is to be released sometime in February. This will be a flash-based Vaio UX Micro PC. a full-function, pocket size computer. This flash-based version will include the same features as previous versions: Inter Core Solo processor, wireless LAN and WAN access capabilities, a 4.5 inch touch screen and a keyboard that slides out from behind. There is one main difference between past versions and this one. This version will have a 32 GB flash memory drive. This means faster booting up speeds and accessing programs, plus you will be able to use the device for storing files. Another bonus will be that the flash memory will use less battery power than a spinning hard-disk drive. The UX Premium Micro PC will come in black and cost just around $2,500. It will also be available with Microsoft Windows Vista Basic. As of right now this is all the information Sony has released

With a growing world wanting smaller and quicker computers, Sony is smart to release the UX Premium Micro PC. Using a flash-based memory drive rather then the usual spinning hard-disk drive is genius. This pocket PC will run so much faster and be able to hold so much more. Not to mention the flash drive capability makes for even more convenience for its users. Although to most people $2,500 is a lot of money, for the target audience, most likely upper class businessmen and women, the cost is mere pocket change. This revitalized PDA will look like Fabio compared to the others currently out there. All the programs this thing will be able to hold and do just blows others out of the water. Not to mention to businessmen and the like, time is everything and with the flash-based memory drive, the time it takes to do things will be reduced greatly.

It’s in my opinion that this Mini-Vaio is going to be an instant hit for Sony simply because of the flash-based memory drive. If I could afford it, I would buy it, not only because of the memory drive, but also because of the touch screen and keyboard which is one thing not all PDA’s offer

Donna Shearer