The TrendWatch » adobe

I Wish I Had Designed It: The Adobe CS3 drag-it-it-expands banner

olivier PEYRE [FullSIX USA] — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 16:27:27 +0000

Just plain simple and beautiful. Visible on the Layer Tennis site.

Recommended by Edgard, who will be joining the Trendwatch team very soon. More details and his bio to come, stay tuned!

In case you have been hiding all day, Microsoft licenses Flash Lite ; Apple says no thanks

thomas SARLANDIE [Backelite Paris] — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 00:09:27 +0000

Since last october and the annoucement of Flash Lite 3 by Adobe, there has been a lot of buzz around this new technology and what it means for mobile web.

Flash Lite’s main challenge is to reach a critical percentage of device coverage … over half a billion devices shipped so far, thanks. More important is the future: Will Flash Lite reach the same level of ubiquity it has on the web today?

Last week a joint announcement made by Adobe and Microsoft that Flash Lite will be integrated into Windows Mobile is a major step forward.

On Apple’s side, things are more confused …

Steve Jobs said two weeks ago that Flash is not the right solution for the iPhone. The Adobe CEO announced last week that they would start working on it themselves … and changed his statement a few hours later because Apple’s SDK license will not allow them to distribute a Flash Lite plugin for the iPhone.

A battle is raging, and there is so much buzz going on that it seems pretty likely that Flash (or Flash Lite) will make it on the iPhone soon.

With or without Apple, Flash Lite will change the mobile web, and mobile advertising. New ad-formats are being prepared and will be launched in Europe before this summer. They use Flash Lite to provide full-screen interstitials ads and sponsored mobile videos. Expect more from us soon…

If we all play we all win

manuel FAISCO [FullSIX Lisbon] — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 10:43:52 +0000

A couple of hours ago I was at my friend’s house testing Mosh on his N95, and we just wanted to keep going, installing all sorts of themes and applications like the inclinometer for your car or a divx player. It was a downloading frenzy and it was fun.

Mosh really surprised me, I visited it months ago but I just didn’t find the time or the “drive” to give it a run (I don’t own a Nokia). So, the opportunity came naturally.

This is Nokia’s fans and developers community (Beta) open for all who wish to register. All content available for download is free.

Contributors really participate in this network; I counted 15.608 themes, ring tones, wallpapers and widgets. Users also experiment, with a grand total of 30.261.665 downloads – and counting. They also give ratings and other feedback on all sorts of issues.

Nokia is truly listening to its consumers and has now this huge virtual-commune-lab at its disposal, with a tremendous amount of valuable marketing intelligence that needs to be processed in order to build better applications and cell phones most consumers want.

And now for something completely different: have you seen Adobe’s wonderful playing cards animation? If not, you should. I guess more than anyone, the toolmakers know their tools.