Sevnthsin would like to announce the launch of Get Sleep Ready, a microsite for Select Comfort. Follow Russ and Sally as they discover the things that effect their sleep and how they can make a few simple changes to go from ‘Disastrous’ to ‘Top-Notch.’
A big shout out to the crew over at Select Comfort for being such an amazing partner to work with as well as to the team here at Sevnthsin for diving in head first and bringing this to life. We got our hands dirty on every component of this site, from the concept and strategy to the illustration, animation and voice over work.
In what may be one of the least surprising pieces of recent iPhone App Store news, Apple has officially rejected the Google Voice application for the iPhone. Now I’m sure everyone saw this one coming, but it is a huge testament to the concept of Net Neutrality and its non-existence on the mobile platform. This is not Apple’s first case this year, or even this month of taking steps to deny the release of apps that may take away from or potentially put too much demand on any portion of the services offered by their precious business partner, AT&T. In a great little write up over on Wired, they very simply point out “this creates the impression that the “Think Different” company is mired in the old think of protecting a lucrative business relationship, rather than letting the innovation chips fall where they may.”
My prediction, in the next year, Apple will be forced to open its app store up and the concept of “App Stores” will be drastically altered. There’s something to be said about guaranteeing a quality product, but the inconsistent approval process is causing Apple to lose ground against its competitors (Palm Pre, Google Android… I’d say Blackberry, but they’re still way off the mark, but that’s another post for another day) and making the company look more and more like a regulator and less of an innovator. Its a fine line to walk, but in the end, innovation will always prevail, and Apple, for one, should know that. Its up to them to make the decision as to how they proceed, but the idea of an open app store and open network providers doesn’t seem like an all to distant future.
That’s right everyone. Another year has gone by, that means its time to battle for a new champion. Get your agency/firm’s team signed up before September 1st and prepare to battle. Read the rules, practice your game and don’t bring anything but your A team, as it’s gonna be epic.
See you here on the 11tt/12th of September. Brackets will be posted prior to the event.
Is the world of the App store ending? Google seems to think so. Its no surprise that the whole concept ‘Mobile Apps’ was capitalized by Apple, but is Google just bitter, or are they on to something?
Last week, Vic Gundotra (Google’s VP of Engineering) claimed that the way of native apps are fading fast, and web based apps are the future. This could be simply because Google’s new Chrome OS for their Netbook is all Web based, but he could also be on to something.
Now, there are the arguments that the reasoning behind native apps lies in their ability to utilize the device’s processing power, which is a great argument, but it also limits the apps ability to dynamically evolved. Checking for updates can be annoying at times, and from a development standpoint, anytime you need to make a change to your application, you need to resubmit your fix (and in Apple’s case, you wait weeks for it to then go live). Web based apps, as great as they all sound, also have inherent issues. What if I’m mid flight? What if I’m in the middle of the lake, fishing? What if I’m in my old stucco/plaster walled apartment in St. Paul where even making a PHONE CALL was a challenge? The ability to dynamically update/change content is a huge key for Mobile Apps going forward, but where is the middle ground between processing power and content flexibility. Hybrid apps are becoming more and more frequent, and for all the right reasons. Building a shell for the native system that can store content and render local operations more efficiently, while pulling content from the web, makes for a perfect marriage between both worlds. The native shell means less of an application to manage/memory hog/bug fix, while the web based content means more frequent content updates and significant flexibility as the app goes forward, and if the app includes functionality to cache web based content and only refresh when new content is found, there’s no reason one couldn’t pull up whatever they were last using wherever they are, data signal or not.
It’ll be interesting to watch where this all heads, as the operating system wars wage on. We now have approximately 4 app stores and all seems to be following one another. Will Google be right and take the lead going forward? Or is Apple already secretly all over it and will launch their web-based platform with the next round of iPhones (or Apple Tablets… c’mon, you all know they’re coming soon)? I guess we’ll find out soon.
Sevnthsin would like to officially welcome Pabst Blue Ribbon into the mix here. We’re looking forward to working with you and are excited about what’s to come! This is definitely the beginning of something lovely.
What a week, after a HUGE iMated push, we also just got a nice little feature on the Twin City Scene website. Our good buddy Andy Santamaria (ConnectingMeToYou.com) recent got added to their mix of contributors and his interview with us went live yesterday.
Give it a read! Andy’s a great guy doing some great things in Minneapolis here, really doing a lot for the design community.
Norm and Jamey got to sit down with the Fox 9 morning crew and chat a bit about iMated. Can you tell the parts where we didn’t realize the camera was on us?
iMated, our first non-client iPhone app, went live in the iTunes Store today. A hilariously creepy blend of facial feature melding in one fun little app. Take a sec and check it out over at iMated.com. There’s even a little demo!
Big shout out to PopLife and &Yustin for all their support on this epic quest for iPhone hilarity.
This week Facebook’s new “Messaging Service” went into Beta Mode, allowing users to have any post they make be pushed to the ENTIRE world wide web, just their friends list or just specific friends, another blatant attempt by Facebook to emulate their increasingly popular competition, Twitter.
As of late it feels like Facebook is becoming less and less original, which is what cast them into the forefront in the first place. Facebook was a novel invention that re-cast the mold of ’social networking,’ and now that they have the slightest bit of real competition for users (because, lets be honest, MySpace is long gone the way of the Friendster) they’ve spun into panic mode. Facebook, take a second and relax. Evaluate what it is you do better than Twitter and capitalize on that. Twitter does an amazing job of fulfilling people’s desires to have their random thoughts heard by everyone at any given time, no clutter, simple interface. Facebook excels at creating the complete community aspect where you become part of a group and can interact with friends via messaging, updates, photos, videos, etc, etc. So why try and cram yourself into the one dimensional aspect of Twitter? Twitter was innovative in the sense that it took one simple aspect and made a mountain out of it. Facebook, you’ve got the mountain already, just continue to focus on what makes the WHOLE experience better, not what one component you can change to be more like your competition (a competition who doesn’t provide a fraction of the services you provide, nor intends to).
There. Got that all out in the open and we can all be friends again.
