FITC Mobile's Unofficial Keynote Address - State of the Mobile Nation

Shawn Pucknell, the program lead of the FITC Mobile development conference didn't schedule a single unifying session for those in attendance.  FITC Mobile did bring a terrific conclusion to Toronto's Second annual Mobile Innovation Week, with its sessions covering everything from advanced Android development to stories about iPad DJs.

As mentioned, there was no scheduled session to act as a unifying keynote at FITC, but one did take place.  Thomas Purves presented a session titled “Canada's State of the Mobile Nation – 2010,” which gave a 45 minute long snapshot of exactly what is happening in regards to the Canadian mobile industry and market.  Tom has generously provided his sides, which are more do a great job of convey a great amount of extremely relevant and current data.

Tom made a few very important points that may note be not clear in his slides. First, cell phones and even mobile data connections are rarely considered luxuries anymore and we should begin considering them instead as utilities. Second,  Telcos are in the business of leasing handsets – it’s new smartphones that sells plans these days. Finally, upon moving to 4G systems, there is no reason other than to maximize profits to offer anything but a data connection – AKA dumb pipes.

Tom's presentation is available online here.

Alternate Reality Game Brings Objects to Life

During the gargantuan annul Hobbie Star Fan Expo held this year in Toronto a rather peculiar guest named Professor Declan Grey gave a presentation and provided welcomed guests to his quirky and mysterious booth.  The professor laid a challenge out, to go and scan QR codes around the Expo in order to solve the secrets of a macabre place called God’s Lake.  For those with an iPhone there was an App for that and those without could use a standard QR code scanner.  

Declan was in fact an actor and the main character of an alternate reality game designed by Vancouver’s Zeros 2 Heroes (Z2H) Media, an incredibly inventive social media firm.   Z2H‘s current alternative reality game, which they featured at the Fan Expo is entitled Animism: Sacred Sites and it requires users to go on a digital and real world scavenger hunt to locate clues and puzzles, which will unearth what is shaping up to be a grand narrative.   

What differs Animism from other such games is it that thus far it is just the tip of a multimedia iceberg, which will become progressively richer and will progress off the net and into traditional media. Details concerning the growth of the Animism world will be unveiled as the game progresses, but the names funding the project seems to allude to broadcast; being Bell Broadcast , New Media Fund, Aboriginal Peoples Television Network and British Columbia Film; this is not going be a web exclusive.

The amount of mixed media present for this project seems to be growing all the time.  Web sites, live action, interactive games, web comics and traditional broadcast are making Animism out as the perfect example of transmedia.  Transmedia is the telling of stories or the building of worlds that use content that span multiple media platforms, users can engage in some or in all of the content depending on how rich of an experience they are looking to have.

If you are into really progressive, experimental media and gaming it is highly advised you have a look at Animism: Sacred Sites.  Not only is the momentum starting to build but it seems that further broadcast media will actually be impacted and developed based on the input of players at this early stage of the experience.

Here’s a great quote from Zero’s 2 Hero’s Media about ARG: “There are no set rules in an ARG (alternative reality game). The possibilities for a player are only limited by their ingenuity and creativity.”  

Visit: www.thegodslake.com

Ryerson DMZ Helps Paris' Special Travelers, Soon Toronto's

Researchers at the Ryerson DMZ (Digital Media Zone) have developed an app that helps special needs individuals navigate complex transit systems. This novel app will act as a guide, communication system and accessibility system for a variety of different users. With its first implementation in the Paris Metro, the Mobile Transit Companion is now being developed along with Go Transit and Metrolinx for use in Toronto.

What makes this app unique is that it is contextually of a few different variables, including location, time, traffic in the subway and the profile of the user. With these data-sets a custom application can be served to each user. Poor sighted users traveling at 6pm (rush hour) will have a very different experience with the app from say a deaf user travelling at 1pm.

Developing for the Toronto market poses new considerations for creators the Mobile Transit Companion app. The version currently being used in Paris works only on the Android platform; there is a relatively high level of adoption in France for this mobile OS. Widespread Blackberry use in Toronto requires that the Mobile Transit Companion app be ported over, to ensure adoption.

Unfortunately, there are no plans to further develop this The Mobile Travel Companion for the TTC subways. An obvious reason for this is that no cellular service in the TTC tunnels, but perhaps the streetcar and bus system could use it.

Initial Toronto pilot projects of this app will begin this summer with alpha and beta's to begin in the fall. There is an expectation that this app will be fully available in Toronto within 12 months.

Branded Content Summit hits Toronto

The first Branded Content Summit was held at the Toronto Board of Trade and it was clear there is a renaissance in the field.   Justine Batemen, described the en masse shift into branded content method -- the integration of commercial promotions directly into production – as reflective of early television and radio shows. 

 

While traditional broadcast media was present at the Branded Content summit, there was an overwhelming presence of online media, specifically online video. 

There was some tension present between representatives from the television world and online video, primarily in the world of statistical measures.  An Ipsos Reid study  from March, 2010, was brought-up showing that Canadians for the first time used the web more than they watched TV.  Paul Street, director of research at CTV, explained that is simply not true and TV vs. online video is not a zero-sum game. 

The shift towards online video content was clearly the standout focus of the summit. Ashkan Karbasfrooshan founder of WatchMojo.com gave some great insight about how “content is king and distribution is queen,” when it comes to online branded content.  He mentioned that he was more than willing to share his PowerPoint deck filled with related research but was unable to find the opportunity to do so during the summit. 

Ashkan provided Techvibes.com with the PowerPoint deck, which can be downloaded HERE.

For all those who missed the Branded Content Summit and are interested in emergent media platforms, you should certainly try attend the Cross Media TO.

FITC Toronto underway

Flash in the Can (FITC), Toronto's massive Adobe Flash and interactive conference is well underway. Adobe gave their first keynote on Flash since the official launch of Creative Suite 5 (CS5) earlier this month.

Smooth run throughs of the newst iterations of both Photoshop and Illustrator were provided during the hour and a half presentation but Richard Galvan, Flash's product manager and Mark Anders Flash's lead designer are used most appropriately on what is new in Flash CS5. The most significant enhances has been the addition of a broad range of tools and utilities specifically for mobile development.

Be it the inclusion of virtual devices such as Google's Nexus One or new multi-touch specific code, Flash has shaped up to be the ultimate mobile development suite. Adobe explains that Flash is perfect for developing for web apps and Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) is perfect for standalone apps.

Richard & Mark explained that Adobe and Google are really warming up to each other. Google's Android operating system is perfectly compatible with Flash and the newest Android version- 2.1- works very well with Flash's new multitouch capabilities. During Adobe's entire presentation, Apple or the iPhone was not mentioned once, which was very telling of the current stand-off between the two companies.

Another interesting Flash-based addition to CS5 pertains to Adobe InDesign. While CS4 allowed for buttons and page turning effects, CS5 kicks it up to the next level by including everything required to author a complete interactive, animated and rich media digital magazine. It's to bad that anything designed on the platform will be unable to run on the iPad.

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