Prologue: Tom attended the Flash in The Can 2010 event in San Francisco and has documented his experience. The opinions and/or views expressed in this series of posts are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Springbox.  

I love technology, especially when it comes to my iPhone. I also love public transportation, and what better place than San Francisco to find an easy and cheap commute from the hotel to FiTC. Or not. First, the buses couldn’t keep up with people walking on the sidewalk due to all the construction going on. Second, the iPhone mapping failed to inform us of closed streets, so we had to backtrack in order to make it to the conference. I know, cry me a river. 

I was a little surprised at the small amount of attendees. The last conference I went to for Microsoft development had probably 10 times the number of people. (The dark side is strong.) It actually ended up being advantageous, as it was easy to ask questions during the presentations and you got to know other people in the field. Matt and I broke off. I went to check out a presentation, gave it about 5 minutes and realized it was a dud, then headed over to a different topic on (breathe) creating cross-platform mobile apps in Flex with OpenPlug ELIPS Studio. It’s a very interesting tool that allows you to create one Flash application and deploy it to several phones. It comes with a price, but is worth looking into.

Mobile is the hot item at this conference. It’s no surprise. The developer community as a whole was pretty upset given Apple’s rejection of Flash. We are nervous and excited to see what Adobe will do about it.  The Keynote address was next, put on by Kevin Lynch, the CTO and VP of Adobe. Unfortunately no mountains moved, nor did any bridge sway or building crumble. I wanted to hear the “F*** APPLE!” speech with crowds roaring and shaking fists. Alas, Kevin only skimmed over it and didn’t use a single F-bomb. I decided this was probably best. It made Adobe look like the better man, not taking cheap shots at someone who so publicly shot them down. What also struck me are Adobe’s actions since this big Apple debacle. They aren’t just sitting around doing nothing. They left Apple doing whatever Apple does, and focused on another platform: Android. It’s taking a market share larger than the iPhone, and it’s a ripe time to start developing Flash content for the smartphone. Droid 2, to set themselves apart from Apple, is even providing Flash on their phone right out of the box. That’s bad ass. The other key item to note is AIR 2.5 will support publishing as an Android application. Capital BAD ass. Listening to these speakers today, I get the strong sense that the market for Flash is about to get bigger… and fast. 

After the conference was over we headed to Slide, a small basement club a few blocks from our hotel. Disney was hosting a party there, and when you walk in, you literally take a slide down into the club. What a perfect fit for a club on 6th Street in Austin! Except, well, there are no basements in Austin. We ended up meeting a few developers at Disney Parks and overall had a great time with these guys. They too are facing the challenge of the iDevice and are developing plans to tackle it. After a couple of drinks, we walked over to Chinatown for dinner. I absolutely love Chinese food, and unfortunately the Austin selection is weak at best. My friend Lindsey Simon who lives in SF and works for Google suggested we try the R and G Lounge. He was across the street at some Chinese dive where you have to have an invitation to get in. But whatever, the R and G proved to be way above any standards in Austin. Chef’s Special Beef melted in your mouth, and the Peking duck was a greasy mess of decadence. We closed the night listening to Willie Nelson with Mark at his Buddha lounge around the corner. What a great guy!  And kind of crazy.

To get in the spirit of our client Central Market’s Hatch Chile Festival, today we held the first annual Springbox Hatch Chile Cook-Off. By lunchtime, there was quite a diverse spread, with everything from homemade Hatch Chile tamales to savory Hatch cupcakes.   

We ate. We drank. We ate some more. Then we searched for the Tums. 

• Overall – Hatch Carne y Papas con tortillas by Carlos 
• Hotter than Hell – Hatcharitas by Burger 
• Most Original – Brownies con Hatch by Tricia 

In July, I attended the Austin Flash User Group monthly meeting. About 20 people were in attendance, a mix of designers who have never used Flash to hardcore Flash enthusiasts. I met a lot of great people and enjoyed hearing about interesting projects at different companies.

Unfortunately, the Flash User Group has been lacking in leadership and low attendance. There wasn’t much substance to the meeting when it came to Adobe Flash. I’m usually really good a complaining when something isn’t right, much better than actively participating to fix it! Frankly, I’m tired of playing that card. Feeling it was time to jump in feet first, I volunteered to do my own presentation to the group and host the next meeting at Springbox. I had no idea what I got myself into.

I decided to speak about HTML5 and Flash. This topic interests me mainly because of the hype generated by Steve Jobs and his refusal to allow Flash on the iDevice. I thought this would be a good topic for the Flash community since a lot of people, like me, are concerned about how this might change the future of Flash.

Last night was the presentation. The attendance was a record-breaking 45! I say record-breaking, but really I have no idea. It was definitely more people than usual. We started out with my presentation about HTML5 and Flash. Next up was Steve Shipman, an employee at Motive, who gave a talk about a Flash code library he created for face detection. Very cool stuff! Overall, the meeting was a huge success. I met a lot of people who work in Flash as a full-time job. Everyone is hungry for a local community in which they can participate and share knowledge. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for anything more out of the meeting. As a user group, we’re on our way to rebuilding a strong sense of community in Austin, and I’m sure in the future the meetings will get even bigger and better.

Recent reports have surfaced that Hulu’s IPO could come as early as this fall. Hulu, which started as a rival to free video website YouTube, has taken huge strides since inception and is ready for the next step. How will this IPO affect the success of the online video business, especially video content company Netflix? 

Most people first heard of Hulu when Alec Baldwin introduced the brand during the Super Bowl in 2009. Hulu launched in 2007 as a joint venture of NBC Universal, News Corp, and ABC Inc., with some funding from the Providence Equity Partners. Hulu has been building a constant revenue stream, taking in more than $100 million in reported revenue in 2009, and has already crossed that plateau this year. It has operated as a free, commercial-supported website that streams videos of TV shows and movies. Its main revenue stream comes from advertising, with the upcoming launch of Hulu Plus looking to gain additional revenue. 

What does it mean for Hulu?
It will initially alleviate the financial obligations of the original partners NBC, ABC, and Fox, who will begin to have less involvement with the platform. Hulu will also face greater competition. Instead of simply rivaling online video players such as YouTube, it will be forced to go toe-to-toe with the websites of the aforementioned media titans and Netflix. By going public, offering a paid subscription, and streaming video, their core business is looking very similar to Netflix.  In all likelihood, new subscribers will demand an increased number of television shows and movies – similar to what Netflix is experiencing with their subscribers. The big difference between the two is advertising. Netflix offers commercial-free streaming, while Hulu has built its business on advertising.

What does it mean for advertisers? 
Hulu is an advertiser’s best friend, as it requires the user to watch advertisements. In June 2010, it outranked all other video content websites in terms of Ads per US Viewer Delivered, delivering 24.2 ads per viewer in June. It's the combination of fresh video content that is convenient for the user and the offering advertising space that makes Hulu very appealing.

As Hulu Plus adds subscribers, the advertising space within that environment could turn more competitive. Hulu Plus could rival Netflix’s streaming capability and drive up competition for their advertising space. Locking up this content could also lead to higher CPMs for advertisers. Hulu Plus is offering its introductory package at $1 more than Netflix’s basic package.

The tentative IPO is valued around $2 billion, which would be a huge boost to the IPO market that has endured its two worst years since the mid-70s. This IPO also legitimizes what marketing and web professionals have been saying all along: that people are spending more time online and getting their video content delivered to them online. It also helps to open the floodgates for more web companies such as Facebook and Twitter who are currently household names but are struggling to build a revenue stream. The impact of this pending IPO is unpredictable, but it should be exciting to watch. 

As I sit here in Dallas waiting for our plane to SF, I can’t help but wonder if this conference is fruitless before it’s even begun. But maybe that’s the Popeye’s chicken talking. The two of us are headed to San Francisco for Flash in The Can (FiTC), a conference all about Adobe Flash. 

But I don’t think it’s the red beans and rice or the popcorn-butter biscuit that’s making me apprehensive about this trip. I felt this way for at least a couple of months now. 

While waiting for the bus in Austin, a woman sitting next to us asked what the deal was with Steve Jobs and Flash. For a second I didn’t have an answer. Then I remembered (it’s been months now) what some claim are reasons behind the refusal to support Flash on the iDevice.  Steve Jobs has his reasons. Others say that Adobe wants more control over their interface and applications. They don’t want Flash competing with their App Store and hurting revenue. Good thing Adobe was already planning to add iPhone application creation to the latest version of Flash, right? Wrong. Some claim Adobe went ahead with this plan even though Apple wasn’t on board. Adobe went public with it and thought they could win over support from Apple through the threat of public humiliation. Again, all hearsay. Next move by Apple was a big one: Steve announces, right before CS5 is released, that you could not use any third-party tools to build apps, including and most importantly, Flash. So in a swift moment Flash is, well, just a flash in the pan. 

It definitely felt like the end was near after this whole mess. But this is Adobe! Too big to fail, right? I do feel more confident about the future of Flash, especially with support on Android, but the threat is still looming. I planned this trip before any of this mess, and here I am. Heading to Adobe’s hometown, to hear Adobe evangelists preach the word on Flash. One thing is clear. They better have some strong words about the future of this product. I’m expecting the Golden Gate to sway, mountains to crumble, buildings to fall when they preach their message. Am I expecting too much?