Apple iPhone Apps and the Future of Gaming

As we sing Happy One Billionth Download to the Apple iPhone Apps store, up pops a new spin on the future of gaming.

Rob Murray, head of Melbourne game developer Firemint has just hit the big time.

Their game ‘Flight Control’ has just become the top-ranked iPhone application in the world.

Flight control lets you play Air Traffic Controller. As the planes approach you direct their flight paths with your finger on the touch screen.

It’s so simple even Rob’s mother in law is hooked! Flight Control is one of the first Apple iPhone app games to use the touch screen as the key navigation device in a game. It prophets a new era in gaming...

In The Age article, Murray suggests, with these new controls, the future of gaming is mobile! He says,

“The fact that you can carry your iPhone or iPod Touch around with you and have good games digitally distributed that's the big bonus and we think mobile with digital distribution is the ultimate form of gaming.”

"Personally I think it's going to cut the knees off lounge room entertainment in time just the same as the Walkman did for music in the lounge room... eventually games on mobiles, if the user interface is sorted, then there's no reason they shouldn't grow to become the dominant entertainment form."

So if music has left the lounge room, games have too, then what’s next?

Live sporting events are already on your phone.

Books have become audio or YouTubio.

We’ve already got newspaper websites.

Soon we won’t need a lounge room at all. Everything will be portable and mobile.

I’m still waiting for my Dick Tracy watch though!

We Blog - RAP1 - Why Blog? Why create your own Media Channel?

Here's our second slideshow RAP of We Blog: How to Create Your Own Media Channel.
It's derived from Michael A Bank's Blogging Heroes.

This RAP looks at "Why Blog?" Three main reasons for blogging:

1. Self Expression
2. Create Your Own Media Channel
3. Connect to our Species
   

Have a click through, it only take 4 minutes, and let us know what you think of the new format.

We Blog RAP1 Blog Why?

View more presentations from Geoff Mcdonald. (tags: weblog blogging)

Book Rapper Hot Books Hot Trends 2008

Make Money From Niches
Derived from Chris Anderson’s The Long Tail
The Hot Idea: Digitalization has lowered the profit barrier meaning we no longer need to rely on creating big selling blockbuster products. Instead, small profitable niches become a safe and reliable way to riches.
Author’s blog: http://www.thelongtail.com/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/1_The_Long_Tail.html


How to Think Right
Derived from: Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind
The Hot Idea: The reliance on left-brain, logical, rational thinking is no longer enough to be successful in the Conceptual Age. Instead, we also need to be able to use our right-brain, emotional, empathetic, synthesizing brain.
Author’s website: http://www.danpink.com/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/2_Whole_New_Mind.html


Marketing Now-How
Derived from Seth Godin’s Meatball Sundae
The Hot Idea: The new digital and online marketing tools will not be effective if applied to traditional advertising lead, command and control business structures. It’s time to reinvent to take advantage of them.
Author’s website: http://sethgodin.com/sg/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/3_Meatball_Sundae.html


The Four Hour JOLT!
Derived from: Timothy Ferris’s The Four Hour Work Week
The Hot Idea: Our live-to-work culture is obsolete. The Industrial Revolution’s 40 hour a week Deferred Lifestyle has reached retirement age. For the first time in 200 years you can re-frame your work ethic into a personal DIY ethic.
Book website: http://fourhourworkweek.com/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/4_The_Four_Hour_Week.html


Leaderful
Derived from: Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom’s The Spider and Starfish
The Hot Idea: The pendulum is swinging from centralized command and control organizations to decentralized ones. This elevates the importance of personal leadership and creates the demand for the ‘leaderful’ organization.
Book Website: http://www.starfishandspider.com/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/5_Leaderful.html


The Bees Wees
Derived from: Barry Libert and Jon Spector, We Are Smarter Than Me
The Hot Idea: Collaborative communities are the near future now. The power of crowds to innovate, provide customer service, make sales, provide finance and manage projects turns traditional organizations inside out.
Project website: http://www.wearesmarter.org/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/6_We_Are_Smarter_Than_Me.html


The Sticking Point
Derived from: Chip Heath and Dan Heath, Made to Stick – Why some ideas survive and others die
The Key Idea: What’s your big idea? The typical expert spends longer coming up with their big idea than massaging it so it sticks in the minds of its intended audience. This book shows you how to package up your ideas so they’ll land and stick.
Book Website: http://www.madetostick.com/
Book Rapper: http://www.bookrapper.com/8_The_Sticking_Point.html

The Great Web 2.0 Distinction

Web 2.0 is big. I don’t need to tell you that.

I often find myself talking about it to people who simply don’t get it. They think Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube are a waste of time. Perhaps they’re right or perhaps they’ve been left behind…

I’m currently reading Sarah Lacy’s book on Web 2.0. She’s been reporting on startups and venture capital in Silicon Valley, the heart of all things internet, for almost a decade.

She writes Valley Girl, a biweekly column for BusinessWeek and co-hosts Tech Ticker on Yahoo!

If you get the US version of her book it’s called: Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and the Rise of Web 2.0. Penguin publishes this one (May 2008). What a crap title! (View it on Amazon)

If you get the UK version, which is the one I’m reading, it’s called: The Stories of Facebook, YouTube and MySpace; The People, the hype and the deals behind the giants of Web 2.0. Published by Crimson Publishing (November 2008).

The book is an engaging inside story of how some of the giants of Web 2.0 came to be. It’s got some useful distinctions in it and the best one I’ve ever heard to put Web 2.0 into context.

On page 145, Lacy is talking about Sean Parker. He was pivotal in a number of key internet plays, including Napster with Shawn Fanning and Facebook with Mark Zuckerberg.

He gets the web. He gets it at a gut, visceral, intuitive level. He also gets it way before most.

This distinction is attributed to him and it puts Web 2.0 into a context where you can hear the potential opportunities. Here goes…

Web 1.0 was about the digitization of media. Think Napster. You take your content and you make it available in new ways digitally via the net. Why buy a CD when you can get it for nothing online? The recording companies and the movie companies didn’t get it, Napster did.

The holy grail of Web 1.0 was the portal. You built a big website that had news, weather, sport, stockmarket prices etc. It was a one-stop shop and the direct translation of a newspaper. It was the geek’s newspaper because the web really hadn’t invaded everyone’s lives just yet.

Web 2.0 is about the digitization of identity. Sounds impressive huh? But what does it mean?

Basically, it’s the translation of you as an individual online. You get to tell the world who you are online through your name, contact details, photos, likes and dislikes, music, video and anything else you want to link to.

Your blog is one such outlet of your identity. I get to be me and I get to say what I want to whoever wants to listen. No wonder 75 million blogs have been created in less than 10 years!

Now take this one step further. I have my identity online and my friends have theirs online as well, so do a couple of million other people so… let’s hang out.

Facebook is the poster child of hanging out online. Those who get it, live it. They wake up in the morning and log straight on. They find out what their friends are doing right now, they organize their next social event or share their photos from their last one. No spam, minimal advertising and no big media or other company telling them what to do – only your boss at work standing over you!

And the best part… this is public domain. You don’t have to be a geek to join in because the interface is adult-proof. Even better you can socialize without getting out of your pyjamas. The ultimate global village - Long live Marshall McLuhan!

That’s the great Web 2.0 distinction. Do you get it now?