A few publishers (and Wired US, pictured) have become associated with new media development over the past year. iPhone apps were shown off, betas have been seen on video clips prior to the iPad launch...and now another clip has appeared courtesy of Adobe who seem keen to be associated with 'the next generation of reader technology'. This struck me as odd though, as, if media reports are to be believed, the iPad doesn't support Flash Video (nor the iPod touch) - Apple have stuck once more to their belief in HTML5 and the H264 video codec due to their opinion that Flash is detrimental to multi-application RAM use. (I maybe wrong here, but that's how I read it. My mind isn't that technical).
But hey - doesn't the graphic look good? Wow! Look at it move about the screen! Look at the...content... oh...look at how it...looks like...like...a digital edition...oh.
An admission here - I dislike digital editions - I dislike them enough to recommend to clients to drop them from their strategy. They do two things - they ape the feel and UI of a magazine while engaging with new media elements - but they do both less well than a good magazine and an engaging website (and I've yet to see someone sell into one successfully). There are much better options out there that are more satisfying to the user.
My interest in the iPad isn't because I use Macs (I do) or because I crave another brushed silver addition to my briefcase (I don't) - my interest lies in the user interaction, navigation potential, and the ability to create new and engaging user interactive environments. But this demo just left me dry...the copy in the same columns as the magazine, the website style hover-overs...and what feels like a lack of...
...it's boring, basically. The iPad gives us the start of the technology needed to create new forms of media with new concepts of interaction and distribution. Lets hope the start of this new form of media isn't just a collection of magazine pages chopped into flash with a badly coded and embedded video stuck in just to fill the 'new media quota'.
I might be completely wrong. I kind of hope I am.
No comments:
Post a Comment