Flash Platform contest to award $100K to developers

November 25, 2008 · Posted in Flash, Flex, Personal, Technology · Comment

Ribbit has filled a treasure chest full of $100,000 to reward the winners and participants of it’s Killer App Challenge. The contest is mostly tailored towards the Flash Platform community and we expect to see many quality entries building Ribbit into Flash, Flex and AIR apps.

The details are simple. You’ve got 5 categories and an amazing chance to win up to $33,000 in cash. The Ribbit Killer App challenge launched at MAX 2008. I’m part of an incredible judging panel which includes Lee Brimelow, Matt Chotin and Daniel Dura. At the very least, any Flash/Flex developer has a chance to get their work in front of and likely blogged about by some very cool and notable folks. I’m sincerely grateful to have such honorable guys from Adobe participate and reward the community this way with us. We’ll likely be adding some additional judges to make this event even greater.

The contest is very simple, easy to enter and even easier to participate in. We’re going to have 3 checkpoints, the first in early January. There will be a winner at each checkpoint, and the same app can keep winning. Then, on March 12, all apps are to be submitted, and a winner will be chosen from each category and earn $15K. The best app overall will earn and additional $15K. It’s quite an amazing pot. Developers will remain owners of their work and be encouraged to launch on the Ribbit platform to generate even more revenue.

Three of the categories are focused on building the best Ribbit application in Flash, Flex or AIR:

Best Ribbit Entertainment/Media/Advertising App – add Ribbit to a highly interactive application that engages users.
Best Ribbit Social Networking/Communications App – build a Facebook/MySpace widget that will improve communications for millions of users.
Best Ribbit Business/Productivity App – add Ribbit to an app that makes users more productive with voice, messaging and communications.

To get started, visit the contest page at http://killerappchallenge.ribbit.com! What are you waiting for! Here’s your chance to breakthrough in the most exciting way possible!

Personally, I am thrilled that Ribbit is enabling us to reward the community in such a huge way. This is the ultimate excuse to play and code a bit with Ribbit. Take the API for a spin and see what you can do. I can’t wait to see the entries we get and I hope the immense cash prize only adds to the potential and opportunity we have created for every developer to succeed coding on the Ribbit Platform!

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Watch me live on pop17

November 23, 2008 · Posted in Flash, Flex, Personal, Technology · Comment

[re-posting due to blog issues]

I was on, live at 3:00 PM PST with Sarah Austin from pop17 (http://www.mogulus.com/pop17) talking about Ribbit, Flash and Flex.

I join the broadcast about 18:00 into it. It was lots of fun, and she was super nice to talk with on camera.

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Adobe changing the Flex name, now Flash Platform

November 23, 2008 · Posted in Technology · 2 Comments

[re-posting due to blog issues]

I love it when Techcrunch delves into our little world and writes about things Flash-related. On the eve of Adobe MAX 2008, they have broken a story which is pretty interesting (and not in any way surprising). Adobe is no longer going to use the name “Flex” and now all things Flash-related will be referred to as the “Flash Platform”.

Ever since Flex 1.x was replaced with Flex 2.0, I’ve been saying the ‘framework’ deserves a new name. The product we knew as FlexBuilder has really just been a much more code-friendly way to build apps for Flash. This name-changing effort will clear up a lot of confusion, especially to those new to Flash that didn’t quite understand how/why to differently named products ended up producing the same thing — a SWF.

While the name change is very logical from a product stand point, I have to wonder if some company using Flex already (say Ford) may have had a hand in this. Anyway, it’s a good move all around, and I hope it helps unify what is a very divided Flash Platform community.

Reporting live from MAX 2008…

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Best Movie Presidents

November 4, 2008 · Posted in Personal · 1 Comment

In honor of Election Day, here are my top 5 favorite movie presidential portrayals:

	1.The American President I love Michael Douglas’ turn as President Andrew Shepherd. A very like-able leader forced into a character debate over his relationship with a lobbyist. The movie marks a reunion of Douglas with Martin Sheen, who would become a president of his own in The West Wing. It also features Michael J. Fox in a very cool role prior to Spin City.
	2.Dave Kevin Kline is very believable as a presidential look-alike who stands in for office and does a better job running the country than the actual president. He’s got great chemistry with first lady Sigourney Weaver and walks away from the role in the end, only to run for city council. Features Sir Ben Kingsley as VP and Laura Linney as ’special’ assistant to the president.
	3.The Rock/Armageddon Stanley Anderson, in a reoccurring role of Michael Bay films, plays a great president. Three words: "Air strike approved!"
	4. Independence Day Forgive me for this one, but Bill Pullman rocks as president. He’s young. He can motivate an air field full of pilot citizens. And in the end, he grabs a helmet and leads a squadron against the giant alien spaceships. It sucks that his wife dies in the process, but adds to resolve to why he risks it all to fight for the country. Quite a speech when he proclaims, "We will not go down into the night".
	5.The Contender Jeff Bridges, as President Jackson Evans, plays a kick ass president who picks a woman (Joan Allen) to be his VP (what a novel idea). Gary Oldman really steals this movie as the ‘evil’ congressman trying to bring down the VP selection. The scene between Bridges and Christian Slater in the White House is worth watching.