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And then there's Acrobat that's sort of in its own universe, but more on that later when I do my review of Acrobat X, soon to come out.
This was the year of swag. Yes, attendees were able to pick up free pens, t-shirts, tattoos that wear off, the usual stuff that your spouse asks you "why did you bring this home?" But there was other stuff as well that no one really expected: At the end of the keynote we learned that all attendees were getting the new Droid 2 from Motorola. Then on Tuesday, at the end of the 2nd keynote we learned that we were also all getting the Logitech's Google TV device. We're talking serious swag here man.
From a marketing angle, all this makes a lot of sense. Here you have a collection of some of the greatest applications designers in the country. Country? Did I mention that people from all over the world attend this thing? I heard more accents at this thing than I hear at the airport. There were some 4800 people here (plus or minus 200 people, estimates did vary) and they came from all over the US, China, Indonesia, Africa, you name it, there were probably some people from there as well. These are people who design applications not because they have to, they do it because they love doing it. And now they have two new devices that they are thinking "hey, I wonder if my application works on this thing?"
Quick review: the Droid 2 is slick, has one of those slide down keypads, and works pretty well. However, in a shooting match with my iPhone, I'll stay with my iPhone. Sure there's probably some familiarity with the iPhone, after all, I've had it for 4 or 5 months now. But I find the nimbleness of the iPhone 4 makes it work slick. I don't find that nimbleness in the Droid. On the other hand, the Droid 2 does play all Flash things. So, take your choice. As far as the Google TV, sorry, it's supposed to be shipped to me and I've no clue as to when it will get to me. More later…
The other day I commented how there were a number of PCs at the conference. After I had been there several days, my observation is a bit different. Yes there were PCs but the vast majority of laptops were Macs, I saw a number of non-iPhone phones, but I'd say it was about 50/50. I saw iPads all over the place. I saw presenters with a few non Mac devices, but the majority were Macs. Yes there were many snide comments about how Macs don't do Flash, but that didn't stop people from using Macs as their primary device. [One company had a slogan "Flash, I've got a phone for that."] Admittedly, the percentage of Macs might be a bit different if I had attended the coding seminars, but I didn't, so I don't know.
Classes varied from basic information to neat tricks. I took one class on Photoshop that I could have taught and another that I got some nice tricks from. Illustrator is one application that I just do not know enough and was grateful for anything that I could get. I took one class on converting your InDesign book into an ePub that was fantastic. One class I took on Illustrator was a lab that they had filled with Macs. We sat down and were led through a variety of techniques. The teacher started out well, was patient but provided too much information on things that didn't mean all that much and went through things that needed more time way too fast. Yes, that was frustrating.
There are always more sessions than you can possibly attend and the real bugger is that some classes are 1 hour long while others are 1.5 hours long, or longer. Thus, the way the classes are laid out means you cannot take everything you want to take. It's that simple.
I talked with a number of attendees and was pleased how many of them really really really were glad they were there. I only met one person who was disappointed and that was because last year (his first year) there was a lot of new/good information on FLEX. This year not so much. But that didn't make him want to not attend next year. He's already planning on it.
Other than him, EVERYONE was delighted at their attendance. Almost to a person, they were ready to go back to work or home and start their work with new directions and/or expectations. Adobe and all of the companies there were really stressing how it's not HTML 5 OR Flash, it's both. It's not the smart phone's screen or the tablet's screen or the computer's monitor or the TV's screen, it's all of them. People were really excited to go home and do this. Folks, we are in a new wave of media.
I went to one panel discussion on the future of ePub and the future of books. The general consensus is that books will still be around for a long time, but they are more likely to be the expensive books with great photos etc. The novels and other books that are for reading will go electronic because, well, it's cheap. The big questions are the interactive books: will they be having lots of spinning things and movies because they can or because they belong to enhance the value of the book? Textbooks are likely to go digital because of the profound costs of textbooks and the fact that updates can be dispersed quickly and cheaply. When you consider that a typical math book costs hundreds of dollars, it's something that needs to be done. What about these book publishers? Look at the recording industry for an answer. Things will be changing. But for the interactive books, consider the Chemistry and science books, the travelogs, the movie review books, the history books. This is where a looming new market is waiting for the opportunity.
I met people out of work, working but not liking their jobs, liking their jobs and wanting to do more (or do it better). Overall, this was a very uplifting and exciting event. I am sorry if you are a coder and wanted more detailed information on that aspect of this conference, but what can I say, I got into Macs because I didn't want to do MS DOS. I'm not a coder.
Let me leave you with a photo I took showing one man adding his personal item to the comment wall. This wall stood there, both sides covered in comments. Chalk was there to be used. No one added anything profane, there was no politics, nothing rude. It was like the conference: a lot of people got together to make something out of nothing. The only difference was the medium was chalk as opposed to electrons. The focus was the same.
___________ Gary Coyne has been a scientific glassblower for over 30 years. He's been using Macs since 1985 (his first was a fat Mac) and has been writing reviews of Mac software and hardware since 1995.
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