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Idea Flight harnesses multiple iPads for presentation mojo
What could be more engaging than presenting from your iPad to a roomful of seen-it-all colleagues or clients? Sure, it's keen and different, but when you come down to it, slides are slides. Pushing up involvement by distributing printed copies of the deck is one way to level up the amount of information you can convey -- but the back edge of that sword is watching your audience page ahead in your carefully-crafted content, getting distracted by shiny objects and generally splintering off in different directions. A small team at publisher Condé Nast has come up with one approach to reining everyone in during a presentation: a new app called Idea Flight. This iPad application is free for the audience ('passengers') and a US$7.99 in-app purchase for presenters ('pilots'); it lets the pilot walk through the presentation on his or her iPad while the passenger iPads follow along in sync. Once the deck is done, the pilot sets it free -- then the passengers can roam about the cabin, so to speak, and explore the presentation at their own pace. With full buzzword compliance (Dropbox integration, LinkedIn logins, GameKit and Core Graphics implementation), it certainly sounds good; you wouldn't even need a fully iPad-equipped audience, as you can present to screen from your iPad 2 while running the app. How well it will work in the real world of sketchy networking and complex PDF downloads is another question entirely. I'm going to check out a live hands-on demo of Idea Flight this Friday, so once I see it in action, I'll report back.
Samsung's CTIA press conference posted online, skinny new Galaxy Tabs shown off (video)
We were there, talking you through the entire thing in our liveblog, but if you want a more personal taste of what Samsung's CTIA Wireless 2011 keynote was like, the company's thoughtfully put it up on YouTube for general consumption. It features the introduction of the audacious new Galaxy Tab 8.9 and 10.1 models, both ever so slightly thinner than Apple's iPad 2, with the latter also claiming the title of being "the thinnest and lightest large-screen tablet in the industry." You can see it above, right alongside the Galaxy S II, which is in itself one of the skinniest smartphones you can hope to buy. Make your way past the break for the full presentation.
EVE Evolved: Planning for the EVE Fanfest
Every year, the developers at CCP Games host the truly massive EVE Online Fanfest. Players from all walks of life and countries will soon gather in Iceland for the world's biggest event dedicated entirely to internet spaceships. Fanfest originally started as a small gathering for the game's most dedicated fans, but over the years, it has grown both in size and in its importance to players. CCP often uses Fanfest to give EVE players a sneak peek of what's to come and to showcase what the company has been working on. We look forward each year to CEO Hilmar's keynote speech, in which the year's big reveals typically take place. Over time, the EVE Fanfest has become an integral part of CCP's feedback-gathering mechanisms. Developers run a series of presentations on game design, work being done at CCP, and the lessons learned from previous projects or expansions. Round-table discussions give players the opportunity to raise questions directly to developers, and Fanfest in general gives players a way to mingle with developers in a very informal way. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at how to prepare for the EVE Fanfest and how you can get involved even if you won't be in attendance.
Present PDFs with style using PDF to Keynote
So, your boss just dropped a 25-page PDF document into your lap for a presentation he is doing today using Keynote for iPad. In typical fashion, he needed it done yesterday, but is handing it to you now for a presentation he is doing in a little over an hour. He utters the obligatory apology for the delay and re-assures you with his vote of confidence when he says, "I know you will be able to get it done on time." While your blood begins to boil and you break out in cold sweat due to this looming deadline, you may want to take a few deep breaths and point your browser to the computer science department at Harvey Mudd College where you will find a handy tool called PDF to Keynote. PDF to Keynote is a Mac application that takes a PDF document and converts it to Keynote format. Each page in a PDF file gets converted to its own slide within Keynote. Though you cannot change the text or images on each converted slide (they are imported as images), you can add in new slides and overlay content to spruce things up. Once you convert your PDF document to Keynote format and make changes to it with Keynote '09 for the Mac, you can save the document and sync it to your iPad using iTunes. The whole process should take 30 minutes tops, and your boss will be ready for his presentation. Even if you don't find yourself in this aforementioned situation on a semi-regular basis, it is worth keeping PDF to Keynote in your mental file cabinet as you or someone you know may need it for a future presentation.
The Matrix app turns iPads into a video wall
I spoke with someone from Anywise Enterprises at CES this past year, and they told me about The Matrix, an iPad app (that's now out on the App Store) that will network a bunch of iPads together to create a video wall of whatever size you want. We've seen this idea custom implemented in art installations and design ideas before, but this is a one-touch implementation for broadcasting a multimedia installation across a set of iPads. When we talked about the app at CES, I asked the developer to make a video of it and send it out when it was done, and sure enough, you can see the app in action after the break. He's only got a set of three iPads running it (1x3), but I was told it can run on any "rectangular" group of iPads, so if you have a wall full of iPads, you can run the video across each one. The app is US$4.99, and you'll have to install it on every iPad you want to use -- there's no free version if you just want to receive a broadcast from another controller iPad. Still, $15 is cheap for a 1x3 video wall of something you'd have to code and design yourself. And if you have enough iPads to make a bigger Matrix, you can probably afford the app a few more times as well. Then again, if you're doing this regularly (for a trade show or demo), you would probably just use the same iTunes account and install the app across all iPads for the one-time cost of $4.99.
Watch Google's Android event in full: Honeycomb on the Xoom, Android Market website, in-app purchases, and Cee-Lo Green
There was plenty about yesterday's Android event that didn't make headlines but was worth noting. Hardware acceleration of both 2D and 3D UI elements -- shown off to great effect by Google's Hugo Barra, who managed to scroll through three lists simultaneously without inducing any lag on the Motorola Xoom -- should make Honeycomb as delicious to look at as it sounds, while our personal favorite, the new tablet-specific email interface, should be part of Gmail yesterday. The email UI is built out of elements Google calls fragments, which will supposedly be easy to transition down to smartphones, so thumbs up all around. The video above also runs you through the big news of the day, namely that Android Market can now be accessed via a dedicated website and apps downloaded to your device remotely, along with the equally important (for devs) addition of in-app purchases. Finally, Cee-Lo Green pops in for a video chat session from wherever he is on the internets, and we're all treated to an exhibition of lag-afflicted, awkward conversation. What's not to love?
Papershow for Teachers introduced at Macworld 2011
Papershow made a big splash last year at Macworld during its introduction, and since then has apparently sold fairly well in business circles (the product is now being sold in Staples as well). This year, Papershow is introducing a new edition styled for education applications, called Papershow for Teachers, that features not only a few upgrades to the functionality, but a few targeted extras meant specifically for the classroom. Just like the previous edition, Papershow for Teachers has a special pen (with a camera built into it) and a Bluetooth-enabled USB drive that hooks right into your Mac with all the necessary software pre-installed on it. The pen's camera can only be used with special paper (a pad is included with the package, and you can, of course, buy more) that has a series of dots on it to tell the app where and when you're drawing on the screen. So very easily, anything written on the special paper gets translated up to the screen. That's the basic functionality, but a printed toolbar on the paper adds a lot more. By "pressing buttons" on the printed toolbar, the pen can change colors, change shapes, or even do things like pull up graphics or draw shapes on screen. The new teacher edition includes an extended toolbar with even more functions -- teachers can now pull up a virtual calculator on screen, and even do things like draw an angle and then ask the software to calculate exactly what it is. Any images created with the app can be exported out to email or PDF, so teachers can share notes with their students right away.
Microsoft's answer to the iPad: attack its enterprise weaknesses... even if nobody cares about them
If we were running Microsoft, we'd stop trying to pigeonhole the iPad and focus instead on reversing Apple's domination of the burgeoning tablet market. Alas, for better or worse, we're not the ones in charge, so all we can do is cringe at the news that Microsoft has put together a marketing campaign for its reseller partners that highlights the iPad's enterprise shortcomings. Yes, the device that was patently designed for consumer-centric accessibility is being tarred with the damning brush of being unfriendly to business. The thing is, business customers are indeed deploying iPads in their workplaces, but we're pretty sure none of them are throwing out the ThinkPads in the process, which kinda makes Microsoft's furrowed brows and highfalutin concerns -- such as the lack of enterprise OS patch management tools -- seem, well, disconnected from reality. Still, we know trash talk when we see it and there's a whole ten slides of the stuff at the source link below.
Google Docs presentation makes PowerPoint weep, beg for mercy (video)
And you thought your year-end PowerPoint -- complete with that snazzy "Ding!" after every slide -- was something to admire. The video below is a Google Demo Slam entrant, going up against a Voice Search piece featuring Maria Sharapova. We know precious little about what it took to create, but somehow or another, a trio of animators created a mind-blowing 450 page presentation in just three days, and none of 'em were located in the same space. Thankfully for you, it's all explained in a blistering one minute, twenty-nine second YouTube clip. Enjoy.
SlideRocket brings web presentations to iPhone and iPad with HTML5
Since the dawn of time, traveling professionals have sought easier ways to present on the go. Pico projectors! Netbooks! Converting presentations to video to show them on iPhones! Then there was Keynote on the iPad, and it was good. Not great, however: presenters with libraries of PPT content have had to convert them over, and keeping your decks up to date with the latest and greatest from the sales department is a drag. Wouldn't it be better and easier if there was a nice cloud-based solution that played well with Mobile Safari? Enter SlideRocket's new HTML5 player; the freemium web service now supports playing back (not editing) presentations on iPhone, iPad and iPod touch with full-screen video, a handful of good-looking builds and transitions, and all the analytics and version control you want. While the normal SlideRocket player requires Flash or AIR to show content, this one works fine without them. Click on to learn more about SlideRocket's capabilities, and see a video demo of the HTML5 playback in action.
First look: Fuze Meeting extends remote presentation mojo to iPad
Modern meetings are a marvel. With strong competition in the remote presentation/conferencing product space, we now have plenty of capable and feature-rich platforms that offer affordable (sometimes free) remote meetings, most with a good Mac compatibility story to tell. The catch, of course, is that all these technologies depend on Java, Flash/AIR or a bespoke browser plugin to deliver the goods -- meaning that the iPad and iPhone are largely left out of the fun. Given the demand, it's clear why the Adobe Connect iPhone client and WebEx player for iPad deliver meeting attendance options for iDevices; who wouldn't want to attend a web meeting from the beach? Still, if you want to host a meeting from your iPad and show off the content stored there or in the cloud, there hasn't been a solid option [Commenters noted Mighty Meeting, which includes straightforward PPT sharing from the iPad to remote or local displays]. Now, with the introduction of Fuze Meeting HD for the iPad, there is a new contender. Callwave's new & free iPad client for Fuze, released today, gives you access to your Fuze Meeting account on the go. Want to host a meeting? Three taps and you're rolling, including any PPT or Keynote presentations on your device, photos, videos and more. You can include local content or tightly-synchronized media playback from files stored in your Fuze account, including HD media. Pinch to zoom in, point to show a 'laser pointer' indicator -- just like being there. Read on for the video demo & more features.
The app market, by the numbers
The very insightful Stuart Dredge over at Mobile Entertainment has compiled an amazing primer on all of the numbers behind the app market (which you can also see by clicking the "Read More" link, although it's not viewable on an iPad or iPhone). If you want to know anything about how many apps are rolling out of the store, how many apps are installed on the average device, or what kinds of apps those are, Dredge's presentation will tell you. It's a really excellent compilation of everything we know about the App Store and the app market at large thus far. I don't think anything here is new or really that surprising. We already know that Apple is, by far, leading the race on number of apps (both created and sold), and we've heard before that games tend to do very well on the marketplace in a number of demographics. The end of the report has some great numbers, too, on standout applications like Angry Birds and the eBay app. Otherwise, it's basically a big round-up of a lot of the stats that we've heard so far. But having them all in one place gives a nice overview of just how big this little software ecosystem has become.
Voices that Matter iPhone: How Ben Newhouse created Yelp Monocle, and the future of AR
Yelp's Ben Newhouse (who is actually still a student at Stanford) gave a fascinating talk this weekend at the Seattle Voices that Matter iPhone conference. He talked about Yelp Monocle, the augmented reality (AR) iPhone app that he created, and revealed the surprising (and somewhat scandalous) story behind what's known as the iPhone's first-released AR app. He gave some technical details about how he designed the code to make it all run and speculated a little bit about where augmented reality and camera vision are headed. It was very interesting stuff. Newhouse seems like an extremely smart, young guy who already knows this burgeoning technology very well. When it comes to augmented reality, it certainly seems like the iPhone is leading the charge as a relatively cheap device that will eventually replace more expensive and cumbersome technologies.
Apple offers Keynote for iPad advice
Several weeks ago, we described how Keynote for the iPad suffers from formatting and other issues when sharing presentations with a Mac. No support for custom fonts, disappearing presenter notes, and trouble with screen ratios were some of the problems we encountered. As if they were listening, Apple has published a support document on Keynote for iPad best practices. It's a nice overview. Apple suggests which theme to use (options include Black, Craft, Harmony and Parchment), the proper size (1024 x 768) and fonts available to both platforms. Fonts not available on the iPad will be replaced with Helvetica. As for images, Apple recommends scaling them to their intended size before adding them to a slideshow (kind of a hassle), and sticking with the PNG format. There are a few more tips listed, but we'll let you read for yourself. Hopefully these suggestions will improve the experience for those who wish to present from their iPads.
Real-life iPad: Presenting with an iPad, Keynote, and VGA connector
When I'm not having fun as a Mac consultant and TUAW editor, I teach community education classes at the Arapahoe Community College in Littleton, Colorado. Last night was the scheduled night for my blogging class, so I decided to see if I could teach the class from my iPad. I had mixed results. Normally, I use my MacBook Air to show my Keynote presentation, then occasionally bring up a web browser to demonstrate some of the finer points of WordPress or some other blogging engine. To move the Keynote presentation to the iPad, I had to sync it over via iTunes. It would be nice to see a way to grab that presentation from Dropbox, where I store it, and just open it in Keynote, but that's not currently possible. Last night (see photo at right), I plugged in the Apple Dock Connector to VGA adapter, plugged that into the PC projector in the room, turned on the iPad, and popped into Keynote. The moment I started up my presentation in slideshow mode, the Keynote slides appeared on the screen as they should have, and the text and graphics in the presentation looked great.
3M's MPro150 pico projector now shipping to highly-mobile presenters everywhere (update: not quite yet!)
We caught a quick glimpse of 3M's MPro150 at CES a few weeks back, and while the performance of this pico projector didn't exactly blow our minds, we were quite intrigued by its ability to give PowerPoint presentations without a laptop or, indeed, any wires at all -- assuming your speech will be through before the thing's 90 minute battery is. It has 1GB of internal memory, plenty for slideshows filled with the most tacky of sound effects, and 3M even includes a 2GB microSD card to boot. But, for the $395 asking price, we're thinking that was the least it could do. Update: Seems someone jumped the gun a bit, and 3M has clarified that shipments have yet to begin. Should be soon, though.
Ballmer reveals some 'slate' PCs, but does not thrill
There was quite a bit of anticipation that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer would upstage Apple with an exciting new tablet design at his CES keynote last night, but it pretty much turned out to be a dud. After more than an hour of bobbing and weaving through several topics, and quickly skipping over Windows Mobile, Ballmer showed a prototype tablet from Hewlett-Packard and two other suppliers. They were running Windows 7 and looked a lot like other touchscreen prototypes we've seen, but none of them seemed to do anything special. You can see the tablet presentation over on YouTube. What we really saw was Ballmer trying a pre-emptive strike against the probable appearance of an Apple tablet later this month. He even referred to 'slate' PCs, a bit of a swipe against the oft-reported Apple-owned iSlate name. I suppose this is better than Ballmer's 2007 interview where he dissed the iPhone when it launched. He's trying to get ahead of the curve, but his keynote got pretty ho-hum reviews and Microsoft really didn't show anything of interest. There was a buzz that Microsoft might show the Courier device it hinted at in September, but it didn't appear yesterday. We don't know if Apple will reveal a tablet, although it seems pretty likely. Do you think Apple can trump Microsoft with a tablet and dominate the market as they have with the iPhone against Windows Mobile phones? Or has Microsoft learned their lessons by trying to be a little more pre-emptive with a tablet release?
Reminder: Rise of the Godslayer preview today at 3 PM ET
It's been a few days since we announced it, so we thought we'd be a kind website and drop you a friendly reminder that you can catch a preview of Age of Conan: Rise of the Godslayer today on Xfire at 3 PM. Today's streaming preview will be composed entirely of features and areas from the new expansion, played by the developers themselves. The presentation will last about an hour and will be streamed entirely from the Xfire site, so no need to rapidly re-install Xfire if you're looking to watch. Just go to the page at a little before 3 PM, watch the video, and chat live with other viewers. If you can't make it, don't feel like you're missing out! We'll be putting up a synopsis of what went on in the presentation after it ends to keep you in the loop. So don't fear, we've got your backs!
Lenovo's ThinkPad doyen Arimasa Naitoh speaks about life, liberty and the T400s
First thing's first: the video beyond the break is certainly not up to our usually stellar standards. That said, the voice recording is clear enough, so you may consider it an audio presentation with the bonus of a shadowy figure making occasional hand gestures in time with what's being said (lighting also improves as you go along). Arimasa Naitoh is the man behind the ThinkPad line, having joined the product engineering team at IBM during the 1970s and shifting with the ThinkPad brand on to Lenovo in 2005. Currently the VP for Notebook Development and the head of the Yamato Development Labs, Naitoh-san was kind enough to do a presentation in London yesterday, in which he touched on the history of the fabled laptop line and was also not shy about trumpeting the key advantages of the latest T400s flagship model. So click past the break, turn your speakers up, and get educated by one of the true founding fathers of mobile computing as we know it today.
Sony expects PSN to pull in 50 billion yen in FY 2009
Though yesterday's Sony investor's conference featured a concerning reference to the PSN's "new revenue stream from subscription," another slide from the presentation seems to indicate that the platform is already making money hand over fist. According to the slide (seen above), the company has set a lofty goal for the current fiscal year: It expects the PSN to bring in ¥50 billion (roughly $561 million) in revenue by the end of FY 2009. That's three times the amount of cash collected by the platform in the last fiscal year. Exactly how Sony plans to boost its revenues so drastically is outlined by other statistics on the slide. According to the company's calculations, the PSN currently has 33 million registered users, 1.4 million of which visit the PlayStation Store on a daily basis. We fall into the latter group -- but only because we can't stop window shopping for celebrities we can fling into oncoming traffic. We confess: It's one of our dirtiest, guiltiest pleasures. Source – "Media / Investor Conference - November 19th 2009" [PDF]
