It’s kind of hard to believe that it’s already been 10 years since the September 11th attacks. That morning, our CEO was walking across the West Side Highway when the second plane screamed over his head into the tower. So many New Yorkers have stories of loss and remembrance and in these stories we find the common theme of what it is to be a New Yorker (or an American)—grit, gumption and resolve.
We cheer to the rebirth of the new World Trade Center but we so miss the site of the twin towers and the innocence we all felt before.
This weekend there will be a multitude of events held throughout the city commemorating the event (check out a list of them here). There’s also an iPad-exclusive application surrounding the past, present and future of the World Trade Center which will remain free until September 12th. You should also check out the NY Times 9/11: The Reckoning a special report on the costs and consequences of 9/11 (very well designed).
As an interactive agency, we at Squeaky know that our industry is constantly changing and being aware of what’s trending and what’s popular is an important contributing factor to how we go about producing great work for our clients. So we have put together a killer presentation that takes an in-depth look at vital statistics surrounding mobile marketing.
The mobile platform—as you may already know—is growing at an extraordinary rate in terms of users and more people are purchasing smartphones each day. Mobile devices are everywhere we look and have become embedded within our society so much that many of us have grown dependent on them in terms of storing our information. Think about it. How many phone numbers can you recall by heart?
Last year Apple blew everyone away with their new tablet and 2010 was appropriately dubbed the year of the iPad. This year however we can see an emergence of new tablets and mobile devices to compete with it (see 2011 The Year of Mobile). This is good news for marketers and advertisers because it creates a whole new interactive platform on which to engage your audience. These aren’t the—dare we say—lame, barely functioning devices of the Zack Morris era but rather devices that help to create a richer experience for the user as well as provide new ways for marketers to reach their audience and gather data.
Check out the presentation above and stay tuned for more in the near future.
Last year was the year of the iPad. It was the hottest gadget out but it lacked competition. This year, manufacturers will be striking back with their own tablet PCs.
Now the mobile market consists of not only phones but these tablets and their toned down cousins, the e-readers (which have vastly evolved from the primordial Kindle). In 2010 85% of American adults owned a cell phone while about 4% owned a tablet PC or e-reader.
With further competition between manufacturers, these devices will continue to be improved in both performance and price and we predict they will continue to grow in ownership throughout the country as well. After all, when cell phones first came out only rich kids like Zack Morris could afford one but eventually they took off and became a huge deal.
What does this mean for marketers? It means there will be plenty of new mediums on which to market your product or brand. Developers can already include advertising within applications they develop for Apple’s lineup of products and we are certain there will be more of that to come with the release of these new devices.
Overall, the mobile market is a virtually untapped resource but continues to expand which means exciting new opportunities for us marketers to develop creative and innovative ways to reach consumers.
Here at Squeaky our business is digital and that’s what we’re passionate about. With Christmas fast-approaching most of us are scrambling to get those last-minute gifts for the ones we love. The good news is that you still have time to grab one of these hot digital gifts in-store or even online (thanks overnight shipping!) Whether you are shopping for an avid reader, a music-lover or a movie buff; any of these devices are sure to make any digital enthusiast smile.
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iPhones, iPads, and iPods have taken over the world. Apple is everywhere, and as a leading digital agency we need to be prepared to shift gears toward developing web pages that can run on these devices. Add it to the list. It seems every client wants their site coded for IE6, but now want it to be viewed on an iPad. We do to. But, the only problem is your slick flash based website does not run on Apple devices. It’s unfortunate and it’s does not seem like Apple is going to change their possession anytime soon.
Apple has said that Flash is vulnerable to viruses and other malicious software and Symantec also highlighted Flash for having one of the worst security records in 2009. In addition, Flash uses software rather than hardware to decode video and therefore uses more power which is a serious downside for use on mobile devices. One of the biggest problems is the fact that Flash isn’t built around touch-based navigation. A lot of Flash requires hovering over an image for a menu to pop up and there is no concept of this with touch navigation. This would mean Flash would have to be re-written in such a way so as to be compatible with finger navigation.
So what can we do? Developers must consider HTML 5, CSS and Javascript as coding options so that more of the web is accessible to over 50M people (the number of iPhone users in the US). Here’s to hoping that Apple and Adobe can play nice in the future. If you need help give Squeaky a call and we can give you a hand.
