What struck us after the show recording was how far the world has come with technology since that shows debut in 1960…in black & white. Rotary dial phones, cooking only on stoves (what, no microwave?), and a community isolated due to the slow movement of communications (huh? no internet?), we’ve come a long way.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson as “Floyd the Barber” (Graeme Thickins is off this week).

Discussed during the show:

• Bing deepens Facebook integration, connecting searchers with friends and New Bing calls on Facebook and Twitter to beat Google’s Search Plus Your World and Head-To-Head: Bing’s Social Search Vs. Google’s Search Plus Your World
• Apple reportedly dropping Google Maps, launching new 3D mapping service in iOS 6 and Apple’s Coming Map App Will “Blow Your Head Off”
• Are Smart Phones Spreading Faster than Any Technology in Human History? and Samsung Galaxy S III and The Samsung Galaxy S III: The First Smartphone Designed Entirely By Lawyers and HTC One X & S and HTC EVO 4G LTE
• Pebble smart watch sells out and The Vergecast 030 (Pebble founder interview)
• Apple making a $799 Air in fear of ultrabooks? Nope
• OpenStreetMap
• Confirmed: European mobile data roaming costs to fall 
• Bluetooth 4 

Upcoming Events:

• May 18-19: DrupalCamp Twin Cities
• May 21st: Predictive Analytics Forum, Medtronic’s Mounds View Campus
• May 22nd: Collaborative tech.2012 
• May 24th: MSP WordPress User Group Meeting at 7pm, The Nerdery
• June 1-2: Duluth Android BarCamp, Duluth Convention Center
• June 5-8: eyeo Festival, Walker Art Center
• Weekly: TechMasters is a new Toastmasters chapter in Twin Cities for tech professionals

Press to Play Podcast:	Link to Podcast (mp3)

Minnov8 Gang 168 – Goober says “Hey!” is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off today)
Music: Kaimoku & the song “Honolulu Shuffle” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Flashback Mac Trojan Horse Infections Increasing with New Variant 
• Apple getting ready to ditch the traditional iPhone, iPad, and iPod dock connector
• What we learned from the ‘Nightline’ report on Foxconn factories
• Nielsen: 66% of Americans ages 24-35 own a smartphone
• 2012 Mobile Future in Focus-comScore 
• Tablets, Tablets, Everywhere: The iPad 3 Rumor Roundup and Amazon said to be launching 10-inch Kindle Fire in coming months and  Nook Tablet 8GB official at $199, Nook Color price down to $169 and Google may enter tablet market with 7-inch design 
• Publishing tools for tablets: Adobe Digital Publishing Suite and  Apple posts gorgeous new ‘how to get started as an iOS developer’ guide and Publish Your Own Book With WordPress and the Anthologize Plugin and Baker Ebook Framework and 3D Issue and Booktype (open source publishing)
• App development for normal people?: 13 Tools for Building Your Own iPhone App and PhoneGap and Appcelerator
• Box bets on Android in business with new update, gives all users 50GB storage free
• Garrick Van Buren’s Typerighter

Upcoming Events:

• March 16-17: MobileMarchTC; Mobile March (Mobile 3D); NEW! The Agenda
• March 24-25: Overnight Website Challenge by The Nerdery
• April 7th: MinneBar, Best Buy headquarters
• April 16-17: MinneWebCon at the U of MN
• June 5-8: eyeo Festival, Walker Art Center

Press to Play Podcast:	Direct Link to Podcast MP3

Minnov8 Gang 158 – Aloha Smartphones & Tablets is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

I’ve known of the Center for quite some time and been interested in what they describes as their mission to, “…enhance health and well-being by educating health professionals, empowering consumers, and fundamentally transforming the delivery of health care through the creation of interdisciplinary academic, research, clinical care, and outreach programs that advance integrative health and healing.”

Mary Jo Kreitzer, PhD RN

No question that new models of integrative healthcare are accelerating and what the Center is exploring is proving to be the right path. But an iOS app?

In order to understand a little more about the Center and to understand more about why they delivered an app, I talked with Dr. Mary Jo Kreitzer, the founder and director of the Center and someone who brings more than 20 years of leadership and expertise to the field of integrative health and medicine.

I started off asking Dr. Kreitzer to give me some background on the Center and we took it from there…

U of MN Center for Spirituality & Healing’s Mobile App is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off this week)
Music: “Kitchen Sink Boogie” by Big George Jackson Blues Band via Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• UofMN Google Apps
• Google joins MHTA
• Google generates $1B in economic activity for MN in 2010
• MN Cup Division Winners
• Adobe offers Flash on iOS
• Adobe Digital Publishing Suite to Support Apple Newstand in iOS 5
• MN Blogger’s Conference
• Amazon’s Kindle Tablet Is Very Real. I’ve Seen It, Played With It.

Upcoming Events:

• Tuesday, Sept 20th: Mobile Twin Cities
• Thursday, Sept 22nd: WordPressMSP
• Saturday, Sept 24th: She’s Geeky Unconference
• Minnedemo – Tentatively scheduled the first week of October

Minnov8 Gang 136 – Pedal to the Metal is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Graeme Thickins (Phil Wilson is off).
Music: “Leave This Town” by Jake Lear via Music Alley.

DISCUSSED DURING THE SHOW:

• The launch of three local news apps for the iPad in one week: St. Paul Pioneer Press, StarTribune & WCCO
• Lots of Android tablets (shown at CES…not yet all shipped) and Ars Technica explains Android Fragmentation

UPCOMING EVENTS:

• Sunday, August 22nd, Noon-4pm MinneBar-B-Cue
• Friday, August 26th, 8am, SMBMSP: Social SEO with Lee Odden
• Thursday, September 8th, 5-7pm, MN Cup 2011 Final Awards Event, U of M McNamara Center (NOTE: the finalists in six divisions to be named August 19th)

The Minnov8 Gang will off the next two Friday’s and back on Friday, September 2nd with an all new show!

Minnov8 Gang 135 – Take a Tablet is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

That old black and white photo above of the woman holding some sort of portable videophone is from this surprisingly prescient Modern Mechanix article from 1956 that starts out with this:

“ON SOME night in the future a young man walking along Market Street in San Francisco may suddenly think of a friend in Rome. Reaching into his pocket, he will pull out a watch-size disc with a set of buttons on one side. He will punch ten times. Turning the device over, he will hear his friend’s voice and see his face on a tiny screen, in color and 3-D. At the same moment his friend in Rome will see and hear him.“

We can now laugh at how quaint this seems coming from a 1956 perspective, but when you think of the collision of technologies available to us today (e.g., GPS; fast wireless networks; Wifi; voice apps w/video; tools to develop and create apps) and the huge numbers of people rapidly acquiring mobile devices that are ‘always on and always connected’, you can understand why so many ‘marchers’ were marching forward at Mobile March. See the full 1956 Modern Mechanix article, scanned and on their blog, here.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: David Bennett Cohen is the artist & the song is “Blues for a Summer’s Dream” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• QR Code definition and 50 Creative Uses of QR Codes
• Lisa Foote MixMobi
• Mobile 3D presenters and specific mentions of Locate my Deal and Scrimmage
• Apple XCode & Appcelerator Titanium
• WordPress plugin: WPTouch (free/pro); TurboCSV & MapPress Free/Pro
• From 2006: Borsch’s Rise of the Participation Culture (PDF)

Minnov8 Gang 115 – Mobile March Marchers Marching is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Graeme Thickins and Tim Elliott (Phil is off this week).
Guest Host: Julio Ojeda-Zapata
Music by: Charlie Crowe and the song, “Vegas Hard Rock Shuffle” from the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Graeme’s DEMO adventure
  • Interview with Lief Larson and Tanner Thompson from Minnesota-based Workface
  • PhotoRocket
• Unemployment dips to 8.9 pct., 192K jobs added
• Apple iPad2
  • John Gruber’s thoughts on iPad2
  • Engadget editorial about the “post-PC” era
  • Wall Street Journal: Tablet Computer Demand Putting a Dent in PC Sales
  • iPad 2 wasn’t Apple’s big March 2nd announcement (via Beta News)
• Malware hits Android – Google Pulls 21 Apps
• Publishing discussion:
  • Wildly successful Austin, MN-based indie writer Amanda Hocking (article; blog). USA Today reports that her sales have exceeded $450k for the month of January 2011 alone.
  • Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite
  • Drupal distribution called “Open Publish”

• Upcoming Events:
  • Saturday, March 19th: MOBILE MARCH New part of this years mobile event…Mobile 3D (Note: Only a few tickets remain!)
  • Wednesday, March 23rd: Cloudcamp MSP
  • Thursday, March 24th: MSP WordPress User Group meeting
  • Saturday, March 26th: Overnight Website Challenge
  • Monday, April 11th: MinneWebCon

Minnov8 Gang 113 – Facetime Fever Flabbergasts? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: David Bennett Cohen playing “Cookin’ with Cohen” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• New Macbooks and iFixit tears down the new 15” Macbook Pro
• Daring Fireball’s take on iPad2
• Motorola’s Xoom Starts Tablet Wars With iPad (Walt Mossberg review)
• AllThingsD: Q3 4.5M tablets sold, 4.3M of them were iPads
• Android Book Market and Google Apps Marketplace
• Minneapolis/St. Paul (MSPWordpress) WordPress user group has a new site
• According to a white paper and video from Deloitte, Technology, Media & Telecommunications Predictions 2011, which says there will be a significant consumer and enterprise shift away from the desktop and laptop PC in favor of mobile devices like smartphones, tablets and netbooks in 2011
• Google on mobile commerce. Square…and an article about how they’re now in a mobile payments war with Intuit
• Michael Robertson Launches Cloud-Based Radio DVR
• UPCOMING EVENTS:
  • Sunday, February 27th: DEMO (Graeme will be liveblogging it starting Monday morning, and is also using Fanchatter on his blog to aggregate all the DEMO conversation). Also, DEMO has partnered with FORA.tv to bring DEMO LIVE to audiences around the world.  The full program will be available starting Monday, February 28th at 9:00am Pacific Time, and later on-demand.
  • Saturday, March 19th: MOBILE MARCH New part of this years mobile event…Mobile 3D
  • Wednesday, March 23rd: Cloudcamp MSP
  • Thursday, March 24th: MSP WordPress User Group meeting
  • Saturday, March 26th: Overnight Website Challenge
  • Monday, April 11th: MinneWebCon

Minnov8 Gang 112 – Even Monkeys are Mobile is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

We’ve come a loooong way since 1990 and it’s likely this mobile thingy is gonna be big.  ;-)

Joining us on this episode of the Minnov8 Gang is Justin Grammens, co-Founder at Recursive Awesome, LLC, owner of Localtone, LLC founder of the Mobile Twin Cities User’s Group, and co-founder of Mobile March. During the “Gang Mentality” segment we’re pleased to have been joined by Lisa Foote, co-founder of  MixMobi and a pragmatic expert in the mobile space overall. She also speaks at many industry events (e.g., the upcoming Mobile March) and is a strategist with a global perspective on the mobile space.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: Beyond the Pale is the artist & their song “Faral O’Garas” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• ZDnet report on Macworld 2011
• Macworld site 2011 predictions
• Windows Phone 7 devs get long-awaited pay day
• Tweet Aggregator, Paper.li
• iPad Cases w/keyboards
• Nokia CEO Elop Lays Groundwork for New Strategy, Hints May Be Open to OS Switch
• Gartner: App Sales To Top $15 Billion In 2011
• GlueCon and Glue Hackathon (Minneapolis won vote to be one! Date to be announced soon.)

Minnov8 Gang 109 – This Mobile Thingy Will Be Big! is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

While the Gang could discuss the “why” and “what it means for developers” at length with each other when it comes to the newest entrant in the app store shift the Mac App Store, our frequent contributor, Julio Ojeda Zapata, was kind enough to recommend and invite in this episode’s guest, Michael Wray.

Michael is the president of Mariner Software, a very impressive, two decade old Mac, PC, iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad software firm here in Minneapolis. Besides the groundbreaking Mac apps they’re known for, this company had apps early on in the iPhone App Store and five (with one pending approval as you’ll hear about on the podcast) in the Mac App Store. Listen to what Michael has to say about his experiences with this new model of software distribution.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson with Julio Ojeda Zapata.
Music: Guitar Jack is the artist and the song is, “Roadhouse.“
Music made possible by the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• Cox Digital Solutions Acquires Internet Broadcasting’s Local Network Business
• Mac App Store:
  • Which iPhone flavor? Factors for Minnesotans to weigh (Julio’s article)
  • Local software developers hope new Mac App Store clicks (Julio’s article)
  • Wikipedia’s Jimmy Wales: App stores a clear and present danger
  • Mac OSX Lion Sneak Peek
• Why You Should Never Search For Free WordPress Themes in Google or Anywhere Else
• Bloomberg Game Changers documentary: Steve Jobs

Minnov8 Gang 107 – Is the MacAppStore Good or Bad? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott and Phil Wilson (Graeme Thickins is off this week)
Music: LA Big Daddys & their song “Why I Sing the Blues” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• White iPhone in Minneapolis
• All social media experts “are actually the same person,” Wikileaks documents reveal
• Visi’s ReliaCloud
• Verizon LTE Blows Through Monthly Data Cap in 32 Minutes
• Verizon’s 4G Network Is Windows-Only, for Now
• Comedian Soupy Sales and actress Rita Moreno (starred in West Side Story)
• IDC: IT spending will shift from hardware to software; 25 billion app downloads in 2011
• Events:
  • Saturday, December 4th: (9:00am – 5:00pm) Coworking for startups
  • Thursday, December 9th, 7:30am – 9:30am: MHTA Annual CIO Panel

Minnov8 Gang 102 – Mostly Soupy, Trivial Sales is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Maybe you’re thinking you missed out on the best prices on Black Friday or Cyber Monday? Well, get this: Gazaro’s research shows average pricing on featured products at Best Buy during the 2009 Holiday Season was actually lower in the week before December 25 than it was on Black Friday or Cyber Monday (see chart).  One in three products dropped in price during the holiday season, with an average price drop of about 15%.  Gazaro says its new service helps you take advantage of these price drops.

How does it work?  Using either Gazaro’s web site or its new iPhone app, Gazaro Protect lets consumer electronics shoppers lock in the lowest prices by letting them know when a price drops after they buy, so they can then go get money back. It’s a free web service and mobile app that automatically notifies you of these money-saving price adjustments after you buy. The net advantage, Gazaro says, is you get last-minute holiday prices without having to fight the crowds, or risk a product being sold out if you wait too long. 



It’s common for retailers to have policies to refund money to shoppers when products they purchase subsequently drop in price.  However, here’s the key: most shoppers don’t collect their price adjustments because of the manual effort to track prices. Of the shoppers surveyed by Gazaro in October 2010, fully 68% did not claim a single price adjustment in the last 12 months. 

The patent-pending Gazaro Protect service saves shoppers money by automatically notifying them of eligible price adjustments on the products they purchase.  In an analysis of 2009 Holiday Season pricing on 120,000 consumer electronics products, including computers, 15% dropped in price by an average of $25.61.  And if you doubt just how many products have price drops, check out this following chart showing just how high the percentages are, at several retailers (Best Buy included).

As the company points out, saving money is at the top of most shoppers’ minds in our uncertain economy. Check these stats Gazaro provides: 98% of shoppers surveyed stated they’re willing to claim a price adjustment if they’re notified of it, and 94% are willing to claim price adjustments of anything over $10 in value.

Gazaro Protect is free for shoppers, and is available by email, website, and as an iPhone app.  It is initially featuring only Best Buy products, made available through the BBYOpen platform (an open API), with Gazaro promising “increased functionality for shoppers in the near future.”

Here are three sample use-case scenarios the company provided:

• Mobile: Randy buys a digital camera, and scans the product’s bar code or enters the product’s UPC using the Protect iPhone app.  Gazaro registers the product, and automatically tracks the price drops against the store’s price match policy.  Randy returns to the store to get his price adjustment when Gazaro notifies him of a price drop. Notification can be by text message or email.

• Email: David buys a printer at the store’s website, and forwards the receipt to protect@gazaro.com. Gazaro automatically parses the receipt information to register the product, and automatically tracks price drops against the store’s price match policy.  David calls the store to get his price adjustment when Gazaro notifies him of a price drop.

• Web: Jane buys a flat-screen television in the store or online at the store’s website. She copies and pastes the URL or SKU of the product from the store’s website into the Gazaro Protect website. Gazaro registers the product, and automatically tracks price drops against the store’s price match policy.  Jane returns to the store to get her price adjustment when Gazaro notifies her of a price drop.

I spoke with Alexander Rink, Gazaro’s CEO, who said, “Gazaro Protect enables shoppers to buy with peace of mind, locking in low prices by getting money back if prices drop. And it helps retailers by removing shopper doubt at the point of sale, and by creating a positive experience that encourages customer loyalty.”  Rink sees his company’s technology as a natural evolution for retail. “It’s a clear win for shoppers — they will increasingly demand this type of service. They want to know they got a good deal. Traditionally, that’s meant looking for a good deal before they buy — which Gazaro also helps shoppers do at our web site — but Protect extends that to after they buy.”

Rink said that smart retailers are increasingly thinking ahead about converting transactions into relationships, “where they take care of the customer before, during, and after the purchase, and make it easy for them to return for their next purchase. Gazaro is the leading the way in thinking of the whole ‘customer lifecycle’ in this way.”

The Gazaro Protect iPhone app is now available in the App Store, and the company plans an Android app “in the near future.”  The Gazaro Protect web site is free to use for all online and offline shoppers, and online shoppers can also get protected by simply forwarding their store email receipts to protect@gazaro.com — as noted above, for purchases made on BestBuy.com.

“Gazaro stands for honest recommendations to help shoppers get the best value for their money,” said Sam Zaid, Founder and CTO, in the company’s news announcement. “Gazaro Protect leverages Gazaro’s cloud-based, real-time Retail Pricing Platform to provide a compelling free service for shoppers, and a customer care differentiator for retailers.”

For more about Gazaro, hit the company’s media page and its blog.  The company says it “enables shoppers to buy with peace of mind by certifying great deals in real-time, and protecting them after the purchase.”  It says it analyzes hundreds of thousands of price points on thousands of computers and electronics products every day, identifying great deals. Its intent is to guide shoppers to smart purchase decisions, and provide retailers with real-time pricing data and analytics.

I requested an interview directly with a manger at BBYopen about Gazaro Protect, but got a curt reply back from the company’s PR department saying it did not want to comment at this time.

Here’s a code for the first 100 people reading this post to get 50% off the price of the “Pro” version of the Gazaro Protect iPhone app: gazaroTSB50. The normal price for an in-app upgrade to Pro is $1.99, so the 50% discount will take that to $0.99. The Pro version unlocks the barcode scanner and gives you unlimited “protects,” while the free version of the app only allows you to protect one product.

(UPDATE: We were the first to break this story, but several other sites have since covered it, including CNet, GigaOM, and Lifehacker… so Gazaro tells me they’ve decided to get more generous.  They’re allowing our next 250 readers to upgrade to the Pro version of the Gazaro Protect iPhone app for FREE.  Just first download the free version of the app, then upgrade in-app using this code: FREEMONEYTSM.)

Waiting for a Better Price Before Purchasing at Best Buy? Now You Don’t Have to – There’s an App for That is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

St. Cloud-based W3i is in the app distribution business — in a big, profitable way (33 successive quarters thereof).  But till now that business has been all about desktop apps, and Windows only. Well, mark down yesterday as the day they entered the world of mobile, with this bombshell: W3i Launches New Incented Mobile App Distribution Service for iOS App Developers.  A separate version of the release, for consumers, gets more to the benefit: Consumers Can Now Earn Rewards for Installing Apps.  Those rewards, my friends, would be cash — for consumers who register at a W3i site called Apperang.com.

Naturally, app fanboys and girls everywhere loved the news — after reading about it on some of the sites they frequent the most.  TechCrunch (MobileCrunch) ran this story: Apperang Pays You Cash to Download iPhone Apps… Ka-Ching! And VentureBeat (MobileBeat) ran concurrently — amazing how that happens — with their take: Get paid to install apps with W3i Mobile Solutions and Apperang.  Numerous other sites and blogs picked up on it immediately, and Twitter was going crazy on it (just search on hashtags #apperang and #w3i).  [Oh, sure, there was a story in the StarTrib last week, too, but that didn't light up much of anything... <rimshot>]

I asked the CEO of a local app development company for his reaction to this W3i news, from a business perspective:  ”The model and integration W3i has developed for desktop distribution has been a huge success in the past, so I wouldn’t bet against them on making their mobile version a success,” said Wade Beavers, CEO of DoApp Inc. “For developers wanting to get a core base of users fast, it makes sense to use this service. The key will be how long those users keep your app, because that’s where the return on investment is.”

I also asked one of Minnesota’s most experienced iPhone app developers for his reaction: “Will app publishers readily jump to use this type of service? Small developers, maybe,” said Bill Heyman of CodeMorphic. “But small developers may not have budget to support this type of promotion… Will it be enough to hit the tipping point for more organic sales because of a higher App Store ranking? Well, ultimately, it would depend on how much a company wants to spend to buy a ranking.”

But, actually, W3i signed on some pretty successful big developers for its private beta before the announcement yesterday (the service is now in public beta).  That list of launch advertisers — just those that let W3i use their names for PR purposes — includes these firms, with the name of their app in parentheses: Big Stack Studios (Sigma), Inert Soap (FingerZilla), Booyah (MyTown), Gist (Gist), Thinking Ape (Kingdoms at War), Flixster (Movies), Slacker Inc (Slacker Radio), xCube Labs (My Health Records – Health n Family), and infinidycorp (Zombies vs. Aliens).

I’m sure we’ll be hearing about a lot more, as W3i tells me they are crazy-busy now following up with other app companies who are inquiring.

(Disclosure: the author has had a consulting relationship with W3i for providing PR services.)

W3i Lights Up the ‘Net with Its Latest App News is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

We revisit Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) through Julio Ojeda-Zapata’s experiences talking about the new iPhone 4 and his reliance on the iPad and HTC EVO 4G on his trip. Many other related subjects are explored to their logical conclusions.

Show Hosts: Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson (Steve Borsch was away this week).

Music by AjT “Apple Chunk Guitar” from Music Alley.

Discussed during the podcast:

iPhone 4 live blogs: Engadget | gdgt

Julio’s impressions of iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO 4G  on Your Tech Weblog

Simplenote app for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad

Reeder app for iPhone and iPod Touch

Read It Later

Instapaper

Pulse News Reader app for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad

Readability

Safari 5 Extensions blog

Xmarks extension for Firefox, Chrome and Safari

Apple TV Rumors at Engadget

Julio’s “Twitter Means Business” book website

Julio’s latest TWiT appearance

Events:

Social Media Breakfast, Twin Cities

fontconf

Unsummit 2010

MIMA “Crowd Source/User Generated Content with John Winsor” Event

Minnov8 Gang Podcast 82: Vicarious WWDC is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Image courtesy of Apple, Inc.

As Minnesotans continue to embrace the always-on and always-connected online world — and mobile startups here continue to clock millions of app downloads with their offerings — there is no question that our ability to richly communicate with one another, be more productive, work when and where we want to, and have the world’s knowledge at our fingertips (provided our mobile carrier connection is operational!) took a big leap forward today with Apple’s introduction of iPhone 4.

Taking the stage at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) Monday, CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the new iPhone, a product we unfortunately had already seen in some detail due to April’s leak at tech site Gizmodo, but still eagerly anticipated.

Priced at $199 for 16GB and $299 for 32GB (same as the previous generation 3GS now priced at $99) iPhone 4′s features are impressive: a 5 megapixel camera (which Jobs pointed out was technically far superior to other smartphone manufacturers with even more megapixels); a camera in the front for videoconferencing and one in the back for photos; the rear camera lit with an LED flash; and recording software for HD video capture; and a 960 x 420 display that’s roughly twice the resolution as the 3GS model, now rendered permanently inferior to this new model with its cutting edge features.

The operating system driving this new phone, dubbed “iOS4″ instead of “iPhone OS 4″ since it will also be available to run the iPad come Fall, adds multitasking, clustering apps in “folders” and more. These features are key to keeping up with competitors — like that of Google’s Android operating system running devices such as the recently shipped HTC Evo 4 — but many pundits and bloggers are dissecting Jobs’ keynote and some are wondering if this new hardware and software will be enough to stave off competitors (like Google) and keep the iPhone sales momentum going?

According to analyst firm Nielsen in their “iPhone vs. Android” report, “As of Q1 ‘10, Nielsen data shows that 23% of mobile consumers now have a smartphone, up from just 16% in Q2 ‘09. Between Q4 ’09 and Q1 ’10, Android and iPhone’s share of the smartphone market grew by 2% each. At the same time, smartphone leader Blackberry lost 2% share to fall to 35% of all smartphones while Microsoft’s Windows Mobile OS also lost 2% to fall to 19%.”

While this data certainly indicates that Google is accelerating and iPhone sales continue to grow — though this data was compiled before today’s iPhone 4 release as well as Friday’s introduction at Sprint of the HTC Evo 4.

About the Sprint HTC Evo 4 release — a smartphone that runs Google’s Android operating system, Fortune magazine wrote Monday that, ”Friday sales of HTC EVO 4G marked the largest quantity of a single phone sold in one day ever for Sprint – the record was previously held by both Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre. In addition, the total number of HTC EVO 4G devices sold on launch day was three times the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices sold over their first three days on the market combined.

So, take the two previous record holders, tally up both of their sales for their first three days. The EVO sold three times that total in just one day. Estimates were for 50,000 to 100,000 Pres at launch so that would put EVO somewhere between 300,000 and 600,000 units.”

Pretty impressive numbers and it shows that the iPhone — the now “old” 3GS or this new iPhone 4 shipping June 24th — has good competition from Google and the handset manufacturers who’ve opted to leverage the Android operating system. Though Google’s debut in the smartphone OS space is intriguing, counting out Microsoft, RIM (Blackberry), Nokia (and what HP might do with their recent acquisition of Palm) would be a mistake since each has strengths that will likely see each of them growing market share in the mobile arena.

Is iPhone 4 enough? That’s an open-ended question without a specific answer, but suffice to say that the dozens of heavy use iPhone users I know are all going to upgrade to iPhone 4 (as am I). Using the HTC Evo 4 last evening at a Best Buy store it was clear the operating system is nowhere near as elegant and responsive as the iPhones, though I’ll admit it had a better display, camera and was faster than the iPhone 3GS I had in my pocket.

Comparing the brand new HTC Evo 4 (currently state of the art in Android phones) with my “old” 3GS version isn’t a fair comparison. A better one would be comparing the HTC Evo 4 with this new iPhone 4. Doing so will demonstrate that Apple just made another quantum leap forward in a smartphone experience which is likely to continue to accelerate Apple’s sales of iPhones within the globally growing mobile category.

iPhone 4: Is it enough? is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson
Music by George Fletcher’s Bourbon Renewal with the The Tequila Mockingbirds and the tune is “Rumble Groove“. Brought to you by Music Alley

DISCUSSED DURING THE SHOW NOTES:
+ FiRe: local iPhone audio app made by Audiofile Engineering in Minneapolis and used for last week’s podcast
+ Blue’s Mikey microphone for iPhone/iPod (Note that FiRe is available with this mic)
+ Comcast FCC ruling
+ Julio’s book called “Twitter Means Business”
+ MinneWebCon
+ Apple iPhone OS 4
+ Dan Grigsby @ Mobile Orchard shutting down
+ Adobe backlash (e.g., ”Go screw yourself Apple“)
+ Quit Whining About The iPad Interface
+ Twitter Acquires Atebits, Maker of Tweetie
+ ComicTwit
+ Minneapolis CrowdPitch
+ BusinessCard2 @ AlwaysOn
+ Sh*t My Dad Says (started on Twitter, now with its own site, soon a TV show with William Shatner)

Minnov8 Gang 74: Innovation is Driving Passions is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Here we go, then — five experienced Minnesota mobile app developers tell me, straight up, what’s up with iPad as relates to them.  And, after that,  I include some great insights from a couple of them about iPhone OS 4 — coming this summer for the iPhone, and soon after for the iPad. (Bring it on, Uncle Stevie!)

Joe Sriver, Founder, DoApp Inc. Joe, will your company be developing iPad apps?

“Yes, we do have plans for the iPad, first for our real estate product, then our other products. No ‘made for iPad’ apps are in the store from DoApp on day one, though.  But I did preorder an iPad for the team.”  In a story our friend Julio Ojeda-Zapata wrote in the PioneerPress on April 2, we learned that DoApp was frantically at work on the iPad version of it’s “Home Kenex” app, which is for home buyers and real estate agents.  Maps can be positioned alongside lists or photos of homes to make navigation easier and more intuitive than the cramped iPhone screen allows, said the story, facilitating better house comparisons.  iPad becomes “a coffee table-type of thing, with people in their agents’ offices cruising for properties on the device,” said the story, quoting DoApp’s Wade Beavers.  GPS capability will be added in an upcoming version of the iPad, so home buyers or agents will be able to pull up listings in their vicinity and “drive effortlessly towards them using satellite navigation.”

Bill Heyman, Founder and Lead Developer, CodeMorphic. Bill, what apps are you doing for iPad?  Redoing any of your existing ones?

“No existing apps.  What we’re doing are new ones for various clients.  Unfortunately, I’m not at liberty to say what they are.  I’m also working on a new game app I’m publishing myself, but I’m not ready to submit it yet. I’ll let you know when it’s getting close.”

I assume you now have an iPad in your possession? “Yes, I had one delivered to me while on vacation in Arizona this week.”

What are you finding in regard to how well your iPhone apps work on iPad? “They seem to work fine.
”

What about landscape mode?  Are you concerned that apps should work either way on iPad? “Apple has basically told developers that they MUST support rotation in their iPad apps.  Unfortunately, it can be a major PITA to support it well, but developers are going to have to bite the bullet now.
”

Any other comment? “I think iBooks is the killer feature of the iPad.  There’s been talk about the iPad developer gold rush, but no discussion about the author and independent content provider gold rush.  It’s going to happen — and I think it could be every bit as exciting as some of the apps.”

Matt Bauer, Founder, PedalBrain. Does the iPad fit in at all regarding your app? “Yes, it does — from a coaching or team director standpoint, to track athletes.”

I guess iPad isn’t too “mobile” as relates cycling, huh? “It will be a new application than what we have.  Likely a different app that we will charge for — probably like $20 or so.  I really see iPad apps being sold for quite a bit more than for the iPhone.  It won’t be till late summer we will think of doing an app.”

Your current app, of course, would work on the iPad, right? “App, yes — but hardware, no.  Apple hasn’t given the okay for iPad accessories from third parties yet.  Once they do, our hardware accessory will work.”

Terry Anderson, Founder, Handcast Media Labs. What’s up with you and iPad? “We also got our first iPad on Saturday.  We’re within a few days of having our next release of the SparkRadio app, which will work on either iPhone or iPad.  In the future, we will optimize a version for iPad that takes advantage of the increased screen real estate in a cool way, but that’s further out (maybe 45-60 days).  The visualizer screens on the iPad are stunning in full screen mode.”

Did I hear you dropped your price for SparkRadio on the iPhone from $5.99 to $1.99? “The price drop is temporary and is part of our experimenting with promotional tactics and pricing to see the effect on demand.

“Ultimately, we’re likely to end up with this scenario:  A free version called Spark Radio Lite that will be full featured, but will only stream 200 selected stations (maybe two weeks away)
…  A full version that will sell for between $5 and $6 (ultimately 30,000 stations) – so the price drop is temporary…  And note that both versions will support iPhone and iPad equally –  the software will detect the device and will load the appropriate interface… And we may come up with an enhanced iPad version, which could be sold as a separate product, but that’s down the road and still undecided.  Now that I see SparkRadio on the iPad, I can imagine a scenario where the iPad is docked in a stereo (many companies make them for iPhone and I assume we’ll see them shortly for iPad), and Spark is streaming audio and providing a pretty cool lightshow.  We think this will be a great way to expose the product and the graphics to a larger audience.  Very excited.”

Bekki Freeman, Developer, TinyMission. Please tell us about your firm’s experience, what kinds of apps you do, and what types of clients you work with.

“Tiny Mission started as an iPhone app development company.  Because of the high demand for applications, and especially integration between web apps and mobile apps, we’ve expanded to other mobile platforms, including iPad, and are eager to integrate these with enterprise systems.  Two of our clients are On Impact Productions and Fraser.  We work with both small and medium-sized companies, writing apps to enable their corporate and customer visions.”

How many apps have you published, and in what categories, for iPhone and other platforms? “Tiny Mission has published one iPhone application for On Impact Productions, and is preparing to submit a second for them this month, in addition to a BlackBerry and Android application.  We are submitting two iPhone applications for Fraser this spring, and are part way through development on an enterprise application that will be centered around the iPad.”

What are your plans for iPad apps, and what do you see as being different or challenging compared to iPhone? “We are very excited for the iPad because of the endless possibilities for very feature-rich applications.  The iPhone has been great for enterprise, but it is just too small to do complex business tasks.  We plan to bring web apps, smart phones, and the iPad together to fully integrate our clients’ business applications.  Our vision is for our clients to answer all of their customers’ questions and needs without ever going to a desk.”

——-

So, enter the Apple sneak-peek media event yesterday. CEO Steve Jobs outlined what’s coming in the next version of the iPhone operating system, called OS 4.  He highlighted seven new features:
•    Multitasking
•    Folders to organize apps
•    A unified inbox
•    iBooks is coming to the iPhone
•    More features for the enterprise
•    A social network for gaming
•    Mobile advertising with iAds

I asked Bill Heyman of CodeMorphic, What’s your reaction to the iPhone OS 4 sneak-peek announcement yesterday? “Multitasking is a great feature, of course, but still keeps the iPhone OS in control — to prevent bad apps from monopolizing the feature. It’s probably not enough for real-time, time-critical apps for the iPhone, but it’s a step in the right direction. Apple’s drawn a line in the sand for how apps are developed — Adobe Flash, Corona, and other platforms appear to be screwed, as they’re currently architected.  Basically, Apple wants native apps to use native code (Objective-C, C++, C, JavaScript).  So, for these other development platforms to survive, they’re going to have to ultimately be code generators for code types that Apple approves. I suspect Apple is following up the release of the iPad with the new iPhone OS to maintain momentum and to blunt criticisms of the iPad (and iPhone) as new Android-based tablets and phones start to appear in the next few months.”

I also asked Bekki of TinyMission, What are your impressions of iPhone OS 4? “Obviously, multitasking is huge.  We’ll be able to offer our clients’ users so many more options for delivering functionality, such as location-based notifications. Local notifications will give many of our small business clients the ability to offer reminders and user-specific content without having to manage external servers and user databases.  We believe our clients will really benefit from the new enterprise features.  The agility and flexibility of wireless enterprise app distribution and the improved data encryption are very exciting.  By breaking down barriers to enterprise deployment, Apple is opening up a whole new market segment with opportunities for companies like Tiny Mission to expand into.”

Finally, I wanted to ask Joe Sriver of DoApp about the *other* announcement that came out at Apple’s media event yesterday — that being their “iAd” platform — in light of DoApp having its own such platform, called “Adagogo.”  Joe, what’s your reaction to Apple’s “iAd” announcement?

“iAd sounds like a good product.  I haven’t delved too deeply into it.  It’s another network that we will look at adding to our Mobile Local News platform.   I guess I don’t see it as a big competitor to Adagogo, since Adagogo is built into our products by default.   It will become more of a competitor if we release an Adagogo API for developers to add Adagogo ads into their apps.  Obviously, it’s a potentially big threat for Google and Admob — or both together if that deal ever goes through.  Google has the resources to compete, so I’m not going too worried about them!”  Nice touch, Joe — spoken as a loyal former employee of Google…

Minnesota iPhone App Developers Talk iPad and OS 4 is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

In the movie The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Humphrey Bogart’s character Dobbs, and two other gringos, embark in to Mexico to find gold in the Sierra Madres, an area in great flux and riddled with banditos, but policed by the Federales. In one of the signature lines in the movie the banditos, trying to convince Dobbs and his cronies that they’re Federales, say, “Badges? We ain’t got no badges! We don’t need no badges! I don’t have to show you any stinking badges!“ (usually misquoted as “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!“). There are several moral and philosophical questions in the movie and Dobbs dies, the banditos are killed by the Federales, the gold is lost and thus the analogy might as clear as mud: chasing opportunities won’t be easy but they’re out there; barriers and obstacles (and bandits) stand in your way; but we thought exploring opportunistic thoughts in this podcast was worthwhile.

Special Guest: For part of the podcast, Meg Canada joins us to talk about libraries, the iPad and more. Meg is a senior librarian for Web Services and Training at Hennepin County Library and currently coordinates public training and  social media efforts for the library. She volunteers helping with the Unsummit, recently presented at MinneWebCon, and is a regular contributor to Social Media Breakfast.

This Week’s Show Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Opening & closing music is “Santa Maria” by Will Kriski from Music Alley, purveyor of podsafe tunes.

Discussed during the show:

+ Past Events: CloudCampMSP (see Minnov8′s coverage here); IgniteMPLS; Social Media Breakfast;

+ Upcoming Events: Mobile March; MIMA; DEMO; SxSWi; MinneWebCon

+ Mobile: MixMobi; WordPress mobile plugins (Mobile Edition; WPTouch); Square (mobile commerce)

+ Devices: Apple iPad; Microsoft Courier; Dell Slate

+ Other: Google pagerank to require speedier websites?; Hacker News.

Minnov8 Gang 69: “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!” is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

I grabbed it the day it came out and have used it multiple times since, in a variety of situations — at home, on a road trip, even in a foreign country (Iowa) — and I must say I’m impressed.  Right now, I’m listening to a great station that’s all Grateful Dead all the time, which I discovered via the app. It’s called RadioIO Dead, and “Big Boss Man” has been my favorite track so far.  I’m on wifi in my motel room at the moment, and the sound is perfect — and I’m not even using an external speaker.  On the way down here to Des Moines, I used the app via my iPhone on AT&T’s 3G network (note: I was in the passenger seat!) to tune in multiple stations, including WSL in Chicago, and the sound was way better than any station I could tune in on the car radio.

Spark Radio not only gives you tons of station choices and social media features designed to make radio listening more interactive, but it also features visually stunning animations. Far out, huh? Its robust, visual radio tuner uses the guide from a company called RadioTime.com to give you access to more than 10,000 terrestrial and Internet-only radio stations worldwide.  Handcast says it’s adding new stations to Spark Radio daily, and will support more than 30,000 stations by April.  You can listen to precisely what you want to at any given time — music, talk radio, sports events, public radio, or special programming from around the world.  Its elegant interface lets you search for stations or programs by keyword, location, or the station URL, and you can browse programming by genre or location. (I’m still looking for two of my fav genres: rockabilly and surf.)  A GPS component lets you find local stations in any given city based on current GPS coordinates.

I took the opportunity to dial up the founder of Handcast Media Labs, Terry Anderson, whom I’d met in 2008, to ask if he’d be up for an interview. That follows.

Minnov8: Terry, I know you’re no newcomer to interactive and Internet marketing here in Minnesota. Give us a synopsis of your background.

Terry Anderson: Well, I’ve been involved in technology for almost 30 years now.  I founded e.Media group in 1995 and we were one of the early interactive agencies in the Twin Cities, with a lineup of really great national clients.  That was incredibly fun.  I sold that agency in 2004 (it’s now known as Idea Park) and have been involved in entrepreneurial ventures since.  I got energized by the iPhone platform in 2008 and have been working in that sphere since then.

Minnov8: How did you come to start Tiny Wonder Studios, and then Handcast?  And tell us about the rest of your team.

Terry Anderson: Tiny Wonder is a division of Popular Front, an incredible interactive agency here in the Twin Cities.  I’m involved as a consultant and helped form the new entity and create Pixi, their first iPhone app.  I’ve been close friends with Laurence Bricker of Popular Front since we were young. Laurence is a true visionary in the interactive world and it was great to collaborate with him once again.  HandCast Media Labs is my own startup, specializing in iPhone applications.  I needed a place to pursue my own ideas, so started HandCast in the spring of 2009. We’re trying to push the limits of technology and creativity.  There are a number of people involved, but the nucleus includes Greg Sharp, a visionary and longtime partner of mine, and Jesse Hemmingway, who is simply the best developer I’ve ever worked with.  It’s an incredible group and we’ve been collectively pushing the boundaries for a long time now.

Minnov8: I grabbed that first app from Tiny Wonder, the Pixi drawing app (see screenshot), right when it came out.  Refresh my memory — when did that hit the App Store?  And how has it done since then?

Terry Anderson: Pixi was developed as an experiment and hit the iTunes store about a year ago. (It’s available for $1.99 at this link on the App Store.)  We wanted to learn the intricacies of iPhone development and start figuring out what it would take to successfully market an app on iTunes.  It’s a beautiful and highly creative application.  It continues to sell moderate amounts on the store, but we never really put enough marketing energy behind Pixi.  We get comments all the time that Pixi is the best app on the store and we know we have a significant audience if we can reach them.  Look for a Pixi re-launch in the upcoming months.  We have some very exciting things planned.  One thing we’ve learned is that iPhone apps need a formal marketing plan, just like any other consumer product.  There are simply so many applications available on iTunes that you need to find a way to become visisble.  We’re excited about the future of Pixi.

Minnov8: Did you develop any other apps after Pixi, either for the iPhone or other mobile platforms?

Terry Anderson: Before we began work on Spark Radio, we began a prototype of what I’ll describe as a geo-spatial game.  That project has been put on a back-burner for now.  I believe if we can make it work, it could be a mega-hit.  But the scope is very substantial and we decided to focus on titles we could get completed in a reasonable period of time.  Stay tuned.

Minnov8: So, let’s talk now about the Spark Radio app. What made you decide to do a radio app? What did you think you could bring to this category that others weren’t doing already?  Aren’t there tons of streaming radio apps?

Terry Anderson: When we launched Pixi, we were overwhelmed with the number of people who asked if the Pixi animations could possibly interact with music from the iPhone or iPod.  It turns out that Apple has made that impossible.  We began looking at other ways to make that happen and came up with the idea of streaming radio, where we have control over the audio stream.  We knew that including graphic visualizers would give us a point of difference from the competition.  We also got very excited about the idea of global radio, and decided to include some social features to support that idea.  I think it’s fascinating that someone in South Korea can listen to a hip-hop station out of Paris.  We’re in love with that idea.  The decision to do a radio app was fairly pragmatic.  My research showed that this was a very lively niche within iTunes and that people were looking for quality.  While there were a number of products out there already, we felt that nobody had really developed a robust product with an elegant user interface.  We knew that if we made the experience more fun for listeners, we could succeed.  We launched two days ago and are already #32 on the iTunes list of best sellers, so I think we called that one correctly.  We’re very proud of the product and have some great enhancements coming.

Minnov8: How long did take you to develop Spark?  And do you have plans to do versions of it for any other platforms?

Terry Anderson: It took us eight months to develop Spark Radio.  That was complicated by the fact that our lead developer broke his collarbone somewhere in the middle of the project!  He took a bad fall on his bike one night and it was impossible to have someone take over his part of the project.  So, say seven months if you eliminate the injury.  That was a tense time, but it all turned out well.  We have always planned to do an Android version of Spark Radio.  We’re very excited about Android and hope to support it in parallel with iPhone.  We have some concerns about the graphics performance on Android, but we’ll figure that out as we go.

Minnov8: Being a longtime promotion guy, you have a pretty cool giveaway going on now for the Spark Radio app.  Tell us about that.

Terry Anderson:   I hate to call it a promotion.  We’re simply giving away 500 iTunes gift certificates ($10) to friends as a celebration of our launch, so they can download Spark Radio for free.  If your readers want to participate, they can email us their name & email address and we’ll send them the gift certificate.  It’s a way for us to show appreciation for all the great friends who have supported us over the years.  They can send their info to sparkgift (at) handcastmedia (dot) com.

[Blogger's note to the FTC: no freebie coupon here -- I bought my own app!]

Minnov8: So, Terry, what’s next for Tiny Wonder and Handcast?  What growth plans do you have for your ventures?

Terry Anderson: As I mentioned, we have great plans for Pixi, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it on the bestseller list by summer.  The success of Spark Radio has been overwhelming, but we’ll keep working until we get to the top of our category.  HandCast will be developing a new title soon and we’re also pitching some ideas that are too large for us to execute on our own.  Given the success of Spark Radio, we’re being contacted for some very interesting contract work as well.  It’s all good.

———–

Thanks, Terry.  A company that develops apps “designed to entertain the senses” can’t be all bad.  And I like how Handcast further describes its vision as “empowering users to explore their own creativity by meeting their entertainment-on-the go needs.”

You can learn more at the Handcast Media Labs web site, and you can follow Spark Radio on Twitter and on Facebook.

Minnesota Startup Launches ‘Spark Radio’ iPhone App is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

And that was just the schmoozing part! 

There were lots of live demos going on in the theater adjoining, if you could squeeze yourself in there:

1. ArtsApp – like Monster.com for artists to submit multimedia (Dejen Tesfagiorgis)
2. ReliaCloud – a cloud computing platform that allows people to build scalable computing infrastructure on demand (Jason Baker, VISI)
3. Pedal Brain – advanced cycle computer based on the iPhone platform combined with web-based data analysis (Matt Bauer)
4. MinuteBids – an online bidding platform that makes it easy for property managers/owners to request and get bids for their property maintenance needs from top rated service providers (Jon Coudron)
5. Pedair – a many-to-many market place for people who love bikes (Andrew Korf)
6. MobileRealtyApps.com – Custom branded MLS home search apps for realtors on iPhone and Android (Aaron Kardell)
7. MileMarker - helps organizations capture ideas and prioritize them, making it easier to understand what to work on first (Bill Galfano)
8. Live Information Manager for Business – connects employees of an organization to their data and each other from anywhere in the world, all from within a single workspace (Roger Peters)
9. Mobile Roots – customized iPhone applications for campaigns (Lynn Smith)
10. WebSlide – provides you and your clients with a private, secure, easy-to-use system for uploading, sharing, and collaborating on designs without ever leaving your browser (Paul Armstrong)

Kudos to Luke Francl, Ben Edwards, and their team of volunteers for pulling off another great Minnedemo!  And a shout-out and huge thanks to the sponsors this time:

• TECHdotMN
• ipHouse
• W3i
• Livefront
• Split Rock Partners
• New Counsel

MN Tech Rocks – Last Night Was Proof is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.