Printed media vs iPad

Posted on Sep 13, 2010 by Neil to General

The speed at which digital media is moving these days is incredible. Mobile devices and more specifically touch screen smart phones have clearly fueled the recent explosion in streaming media. This sudden burst of digital media has spurred a huge upsurge in the amount of users who view information online that may have previously been viewed in magazines or books.

The great thing about the internet is that it allows media to stream which basically makes traditional books and magazines obsolete for obvious reasons. Recently retail giants like Barnes and Noble and Amazon have followed suit by released their own platforms in hopes of retaining market share through their nook and kindle respectivley. These devices are able to pull down books and information for display in the form of a digital book.

Unfortunately neither device has been able to keep up with Apples market shattering IPad which frankly caught most us off guard. Apples IPad is not only more robust visually it also has the backing of itunes which adds an audio / video edge that amazon and Barnes and Noble cant compete with. Recently Barnes and Noble and Amazon have had to reavaulate their business models and both have had significant stock valuation setbacks based on the overwhelming success of the IPad.

Personally I dont think its the end of the road for printed media. Picking up a magazine at the newsstand before a long flight will always be part of my routine. One advantage of magazines and books is that they dont need a powercord or signal so if you end up stranded on an island, they still work.

Tags: iPad, Kindle, Nook, THAT agency

The Bread and Butter Theory: SEO and Outbound Links

Posted on Mar 18, 2010 by Tommy to SEO

So, Rick and I were having a conversation the other day about the many nuances of outbound links and their effect – or lack there of – on search engine rankings. Yes, we may have been travelling down the “rabbit trails” of the topic a little too far, but we did manage to derive an interesting theory out of our speculation.

Introducing the “Bread and Butter Theory of Outbound Links” by Tommy Bussey and Rick Maggio, understanding this will be the best thing you’ve learned about Search Engine Optimization since sliced bread…

Now, through the course of our discussion on this topic we journeyed down a few of the beaten paths of search engine optimization; not forgetting page rank, quantitative back linking, qualitative back linking, on page optimization and the rest of the gang. For some reason, we ended up discussing the importance – or triviality – of outbound linking.

You may have heard that linking out from your site can hurt your search engine rankings. Well, there’s not much truth to this rumor. Obviously, if you have 1,000 links from your site to web properties that encourage toddlers to play in traffic and other “less-than-reputable” topics and practices, you may experience some (sarcastic) poor search engine rankings. But linking out to other websites that are reputable will not hurt your website.

So, what is really important to know about outbound links? Well, you need to start thinking of outbound links in terms of “slices of bread.” Now, at the same time, you need to think of the authority of the sites linking back to you as “butter.” If you can consistently get links back to your site from sites with lots of authority (butter) and fewer outbound links (slices of bread) your website (slice of bread) will receive more authority (butter) and satisfy the algorithms (appetites) of the search engines in a more pleasing manner. Why? Because with less slices of bread (outbound links) there’s more butter (authority) to spread on your slice of bread (your website).

Feel free to take a look at this chart I quickly put together to illustrate the bread and butter theory

Talk soon,

Tommy

Tags: search engine rankings, SEO, THAT agency

Advantages of actionscript tweening vs timeline tweening

Posted on Jan 11, 2010 by Neil to General

So what is a tween? As defined by wikipedia:

“Inbetweening or tweening is the process of generating intermediate frames between two images to give the appearance that the first image evolves smoothly into the second image. Inbetweens are the drawings between the keyframes which help to create the illusion of motion. Inbetweening is a key process in all types of animation, including computer animation.”

In adobe flash, an easy way to tween is using the timeline. place an object on your stage add a keyframe then dupicate the keyframe, drag it across the timeline to the required location then select the two keyframes. now in the properties panel with both keyframes selected add a motion or shape tween. At this point the two keyframes are grouped and you can move the object in the first keyframe to one location then move the object in the next keyframe to another location. You can even change its color, rotate , scale, etc. since the two keyframes are tweened when you publish the movie you will see the object move in the whichever way you have defined. The tweening creates all the frames between the two keyframes.

At this point you can chose to make this animation its own movie clip then assign that clip to play when you hit a button or you can use the movie clip to add transitions to your flash presentation.

However using the timeline to tween has many limitations.

More advanced users use actionscript to create movement on the stage. Actionscript allows you to use math to create advanced forms of tweening with properties such as easing, elasticity, bouncing, and more precise color control. Additionally, actionscript tweening allows for sequencing of movements, delays, and even callbacks which tell the movie to execute the next action only after the previous event has taken place.

The best part of using actionscript is that it is non linear. Meaning that its timeline independent. With a timeline tween, once you define its movement it cant really change. You can tell it to stop then go again but its still linear. If the animation was done using actionscript I can at any point tell it to do something else. For example I could make a button that on press tells the logo to turn black and rotate 360 degrees while increasing to 250% of its original size.  I can cause this action at anypoint during the previous animation and it will affect the animation seemlessly. In other words midway through an animation i can tell it to start doing something else and it will smoothly change its course and begin its new set of instructions. you cant do that with timeline tweening.

Using actionscript to create tweens also has its own limitations. For one thing its much harder to do. For basic tasks such as fading imgs or moving type its a good idea to stick with basic timeline tweens. In fact most animators use a combination of timeline and actionscript tweens. Since timeline animation is quite visual it can be a good starting point to make things look nice -then more advanced interactivity can be added using actionscript.

for more information on tweening and actionscript visit adobe.com

Tags: actionscript, THAT agency, timeline, tween

Polaroid

Posted on Aug 26, 2009 by Neil to General

Its hard to believe but Polaroid, a true pioneer in photography, is winding things down. The allure of Polaroid technology or ” the ability to capture and develop an image almost instantly” is gone. Today digital cameras capture stunning images electronically that post to blogs and social networks which can be accessed by anyone from anywhere at anytime of the day. The technology brought by digital cameras  revolutionized photography. Polaroid didnt stand a chance and now the film giant has been forced to abandon the very technology that made their company famous.

So where do they go from here? Its uncertain where Polaroid goes from here, but one thing is for certain, the days of Polaroid Instant film are numbered. However a brand name as recognizable as Polaroid will surely adapt to the changing playing field. Basically a household name, Polaroid carries a great deal of brand equity. This allows many options in the field of licensing and cobranding. Recently, Urban Outfitters saw value in the brand for promotional purposes. Upon hearing of Polaroids intent to stop production of cameras, Outfitters stepped in and acquired the rights to their remaining inventory. They plan to launch a promotional offer including Urban Outfitters co-branded Polaroid cameras. It makes sense – imagine a free safari style Polaroid camera to go with your new shorts and flip flops. The retro camera will not only generate sales but will also create hype for both brands. I’m sure other marketing tactics can and will leverage the value the polaroid as a brand in interesting ways.

You have to admit that there will always be a certain cool factor to Polaroid. In the 70s and 80′s Polaroids were high tech. In the 90′s they were kind of a novelty. Today? The Polaroid camera is a legendary throwback. A retro artifact – not sure what the younger gen Ys think but I think polaroid is hotter than TAB and almost as a cool as the A Team. How awesome would it be to break out an original Polaroid camera at a party to get things going? Well, I guess that depends on how old you are…..

Tags: best in the business, digital camera, THAT agency, website design