1254813444 Weblog http://www.motochristo.com/index.php en motochristo@gmail.com Copyright 2009 2009-10-06T05:13:22+00:00 Who cares?  This is awesome! http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/who_cares_this_is_awesome/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/who_cares_this_is_awesome/#When:05:13:22Z Adobe announced on Monday at Adobe MAX, the company’s worldwide developer conference, that its Flash Professional CS5 developer tool will enable developers to create interactive applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch. A public beta of Flash Professional CS5 is expected to be available later this year.

Read more…
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10368171-64.html

As long as I have a full-ish featured SDK for creating Rich iPhone Apps my iPhone shop is officially open.

Anyone got an idea?  I’ll develop it in 3 months with this tool kit and split the profits with you!

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Web World 2009-10-06T05:13:22+00:00
My Updated Resume http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/my_updated_resume/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/my_updated_resume/#When:13:40:30Z Believe it or not my resume page is the most popular page on the site behind my homepage. 

For that reason, and since it’s about time, I have recently updated my resume.

Mainly I just added a section to describe what I’ve been doing for the past 7 months and attempted to add more continuity and clarity to my Expertise section. 

Check it out and let me know what you think…

My updated resume

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motoChristo News 2009-07-02T13:40:30+00:00
The Lucky Winners http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/the_lucky_winners/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/the_lucky_winners/#When:22:52:41Z A few days ago I launched a photo-blog for Carolina and I on WordPress.

You can check it out at theLuckyWinners.com

My hope is that it will slowly grow over time, much like our friendship.

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motoChristo News, On a lighter note 2009-07-01T22:52:41+00:00
A clever little mobile development tool http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/a_clever_little_mobile_development_tool/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/a_clever_little_mobile_development_tool/#When:20:18:29Z This tool is very useful to learn how your page is being interpreted by your device.

http://demo.ta-da.mobi/index.php?more_details

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Web World 2009-06-29T20:18:29+00:00
Specs are a-Changin’ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/specs_are_a_changin/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/specs_are_a_changin/#When:14:55:35Z With the weight of “Billions” in potential low-hanging ad revenue and a lack of specs to communicate where to sped it and why the bottom line with web video these days is that something’s gotta give.

David August has a few ideas on the topic I found interesting…

from - http://www.viciousconcepts.com/details/2009/02/iab-seeks-web-video-ad-standards.php

“Companion ads bundled with video ads mean lost audience.”

He’s got a good point and a handful of others too like…

“Whether legal or otherwise, people will find a way to view what they want on the device on which they want to view it.”

Personally, I think companion ads should be an add-on to a media buy, not part of the core purchase - and definitely not required by agencies.  I also think that in order to make sure ads are viewed it needs to be easy to get to the content with even less obtrusive ad inventory than before.  Otherwise users WILL find a way to get right around it.

And above all - video ad specs should be open source compatible regardless of the player, i.e. be integrated with leading Open Source ad server OpenX to start.  There are plenty of developers world wide that would do the integration and documentation work, we just need video player companies to warm up to the idea even if it means they need to alter their business model away from sharing ad revenues.

In my opinion that’s the only way to ensure fairness and spur innovation in this obviously insanely lucrative niche of web video - especially as it grows wings with mobile.

Related:
1.) IAB’s Digital Video Ad Serving Template (VAST- http://www.iab.net/vast

2.) Free Open Source Standards Based Video Ad Delivery (BETA) Project - http://code.google.com/p/openx-iab-vast/

 

 

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Web World 2009-06-22T14:55:35+00:00
Widgets Galore http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/widgets_galore/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/widgets_galore/#When:15:28:31Z I just widgetized motoChristo by integrating Twitter and LinkedIn widgets.  Facebook’s is up next but for now I will say that I am not very impressed with either.

My main gripes thus far are…

A.) the display is not at all customizable for LinkedIn and barely customizable for Twitter (only a choose a web-safe color theme).  For instance I’d love to change the shape of the Twitter widget to be a long rectangle instead of a bulky square.

B.) neither API’s allow you to pull certain sets of content instead of their guessed version of the data I want.  For instance, what I really want from LinkedIn is to be able to display my personal LinkedIn “Recommendations” (recommendations from others about me) on my site.

Oh well, at the rate these things are moving, I wouldn’t be surprised if I could get what I want within the year.  In the mean time I’ll keep looking and hopefully FaceBook or some enterprising widget-aggregator will provide the flexibility I want.

You can check them out in action in motoChristo’s about section.

LinkedIn’s Widget API
Twitter’s Widget API

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motoChristo News 2009-05-03T15:28:31+00:00
Semantic or DIE! http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/semantic_or_die/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/semantic_or_die/#When:13:05:43Z What is Semantic HTML and why is it so $#&@! important to Web Developers? 

Although I have my own opinions (describe the content, not the presentation), I love to hear hear what other developers think - especially those spouting with such zeal that you wouldn’t be surprised to see tattooed HTML tags covering their chest as they rip off their T-Shirt in outrage against non-standard mark up!

For instance take Jason Kottke’s answer…

As much as possible, the tags surrounding the content of a document should describe what that content is and/or what it’s for - mofo!

This is from a thorough (and passionate!) presentation from New Zealand that I found especially insightful.

I am posting it here for our reference…
http://www.ermanz.govt.nz/news-events/archives/presentations/semantichtml.html

Points of interest…
1. “Which tag should we use when?” It depends.
2. Semantics are determined by the user, and the user is not always human. 
3. There isn’t a perfect HTML tag for everything and heck - sometimes the tag you think would be right might not be the best tag for a given situation.

Key take away…
Think about what the content is and why you want it to look a certain way.

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motoChristo News, Web World 2009-04-21T13:05:43+00:00
Gone Fishin http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/gone_fishin/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/gone_fishin/#When:06:01:10Z Wooo-hoooooooooo!  Headed to the Cayman Islands on the spur of the moment.

Carolina hooked it up yesterday and we leave at 5am tomorrow.  Did I mention, that Carolina ROCKS!  I’m so lucky to have such a wonderful girlfriend, but that’s a whole other blog post for a whole other website). 

Anyway, I still can’t believe it but turns out she landed a 5 days / 4 nights deal on the beach at the marriott beach resort for $800 for total.  Well… she was also kind enough to include her Marriott points toward the deal as well (thank you C!).

Sooo, Long post short - I hope to be reachable by phone or email, we’ll see but either way I’ll be back at the shop on Wednesday am.

In the mean time, check out the photos page I’ve been working on and note that I’ll either be fishing snorkeling, sunning, or chilling for the next few days south of the border.

And also note that you can see all about it back here in that photos page of mine.

Until Wednesday - C ya!

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motoChristo News 2009-04-03T06:01:10+00:00
Newsweek Widget http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/newsweek_widget/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/newsweek_widget/#When:14:57:28Z Check out this cool Newsweek widget I ran across.

I really like the ad interaction with Rolex and how the advertiser is such an intricate part of the design and functionality.

Very cool, especially for an off-site inventory widget giving the users and the advertisers a bang for their respective buck.

Props.

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Web World 2009-04-02T14:57:28+00:00
Got wine? http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/got_wine/ http://www.motochristo.com/index.php/weblog/comments/got_wine/#When:22:04:17Z I’ve always enjoyed fine wine, but online?  MyWinesDirect.com uncorks the model in a big way.

I started a front end developer / designer project with them today.  Looks like I’ll be doing about 80/20 Design vs. Coding.

Job seems so far to be leading the front end development efforts in Photoshop, XHTML, CSS supported by a team of hand picked marketing whiz kids for a few weeks while the current lead travels.

Including producing content for partners like RachelRay.com, QVC, and the NHL.

I like. 

More to come soon, I hope.

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motoChristo News 2009-03-24T22:04:17+00:00