Connecting the Dots

Acrobat Labs: Presentations

Yesterday Adobe released Acrobat.com Presentations and I was alerted to it through a post by Ryan Stewart, Adobe evangelist and energetic geek who knows how to position it.

There is a lot of competition in this space from delivery vehicles like Slideshare to what I believe is a better implementation of online presentation creation than what Adobe is offering in this beta release, 280Slides.

The issue I have with all of the offerings on Acrobat.com is this: I want to use the functionality (especially embedding) but I do NOT want Adobe's branding all over the container I embed on my site(s), blogs, etc.

As the economy tanked and free, branded offerings morphed in to paid, put-your-brand-on-it ones, these deliverables finally got to the point where they should've been all along. I want generic looking containers and just about everyone else I know does too. 280Slides understands this and you can see their non-branded container below.

The other thing I find intriguing is how much effort is put behind online slideshows and how a bunch of slides doesn't tell the story anymore. When more people are adhering to the PresentationZen philosophy of not packing slides with tons of bullet points, without the presenter telling the story, these embedded slideshows have minimal value.

Skype Awareness Builds

 

Forget the AT&T Picturephone shown at the 1964 World's Fair. Dismiss satellite transponder delivery of video (and its huge cost) and instead take advantage of what Skype can deliver...and for proof here's a one hour Oprah show devoted to Skype video sent from planes, submarines and explorations. (via GigaOm).

I know all too well how powerful Skype can be. Two years ago I did an event in Minneapolis for a small group where the speaker came in live from Sydney, Australia over Skype. This man, Malcolm Cohan, directed television commercials in that country so set his lighting -- and projected his personal energy -- in a way that came across quite well. I setup a video camera so that he would have a great experience (and closer connection to audience members) since I could pan the audience, zoom in on a questioner, and Malcolm could even see them laugh at his jokes (essential feedback when doing thing like this virtually).

Like Oprah did with Twitter, this sort of awareness of Skype is certain to continue its acceleration and its adoption by mainstream users.

No Facts on the Today Show

On almost every 'news' show I watch today, I'm almost always stunned by some supposed fact (or the way it's positioned) that makes me say, "Huh!?!"

This morning's NBC Today show was no exception and I call "bullsh*t" on their report.

A segment about rising gas prices was one I wanted to see so was flipping back-n-forth between CNBC and NBC and caught the segment in its entirety.

The report illustrated one main point -- about how rising gas prices were affecting average Americans this upcoming summer driving season -- by showcasing a San Francisco family who'd decided to forgo a driving trip to the Grand Canyon and instead opted to drive to Orange County, CA (and then Today noted that the family would try to save even more by staying with family on their trip vs. staying in hotels).

This was my first 'Huh?' as I know the rough mileage from SF to AZ and from SF to the Los Angeles area, and this factoid about gas prices didn't add up so I grabbed my laptop and looked up some rough and conservative stats about the difference in mileage and what gas might cost this struggling family:

• San Francisco, CA to Grand Canyon, Arizona
  765 mi – about 14 hours 19 mins

• San Francisco, CA to Long Beach, CA
  406 mi – about 6 hours 16 mins (up to 7 hours 50 mins in traffic)

• Mileage difference would equal 359 miles. Even if this family drove a Ford Expedition and averaged, say, 10 miles per gallon and gas was at $2.75 per gallon, the cost of the driving trip one way would be $98.72 or less than $200 total for the family vacation.

My second "Huh?" was the probable real decision making criteria for this unfortunate family of four: The total cost of the vacation, not just the gas prices.

Even if they'd stayed at Motel 6's on the trip and ate all meals at the cheapest possible restaurants, their vacation cost on a Grand Canyon trip would undoubtedly exceed $1,000 and "staying with family" on an Orange County, CA trip would save those hotel costs, many meals out, save that ~$200 in gas, and so on.

Positioning this family as making their decision on gas prices alone was disingenuous at best and flagrant misrepresentation and a breach of journalistic ethics at worst. In any event, this is a perfect example of why there is such low regard for TV news reporting among those of us who think for ourselves.

Apple Ad in New York Times

Yep...I notice this is my second post about the New York Times, but the last couple of times an ad like this has run I've been busy and missed it. Snagged it today and here's the video should you miss it too:

Is "The New York Twitter" the Future of News?

I've been in dozens of conversations over the last several weeks about how "blogging is dead" and "Twitter is the future of news" to "people only have time for the headlines" and the inevitable, "Of course newspapers are dying, whose got time to read an entire article?"

Oh really? If that's the case, we've got really big problems kids (and they go beyond accelerating panic and fear about swine flu pandemics). If the objective with all of these new communications technologies is to be able to simply skim over the surface of news and information, then expect to see only the skin-deep stuff, the superfluous, and the inane.

It's one reason why I gravitate toward those on Twitter who add value through linking to articles or posts. Yep...if something intrigues me I'll go out and read it. In depth understanding is what I try to gain and maybe go off on tangents finding other opinions, perspectives and relevant information.

I reject those who think that we can truly know something through only the headlines.