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Hi everyone,
This is a fantastic concept with lots of potential for helping make meetings/presentations useful. There's a post for this on elance: http://su.pr/2eHa5G .
Anyone interested in bidding on this?
Leor
Imagine the teacher being able to ask a question and instantly having their pad light up with green buttons. To ask a class to sketch an idea and post it - only to have a big screen light up with 20 - 30 thumbnails of sketches and the whole class can instantly see the results. Measuring the reaction speed to queries to see who is keeping up and who is falling behind in real time. Imagine the teacher getting 20 red buttons when they turn the class lesson into a boring exercise. The possibilities are endless for modern day teaching.
I've seen this tried so many times in so many college classrooms. Usually the teacher requires the class to buy some sort of "clicker" device (which costs $15 rather than $500) and the students can then respond to questions etc. Problems become immediately apparent when dealing with the lengthy setup time and getting everyone connected to the system, usually wasting an entire lecture purely on this. Teachers aren't IT admins and consumer devices like the ipad are flashy and fun but why replicate the function of a $15 device when it has already proved to be at most slightly beneficial as a tool. As a computer engineer, I love good technology, but good technology cannot replace good teaching. And a tool like this wouldn't be effective without good teachers using it right as opposed to a classroom plaything which allows the whole class to vote the teacher off the island. (Not to mention the massive cost of forcing whole college campuses to pay an apple tax to participate in a discussion).
Allow each meeting participant to input their effective hourly rate. That way, a cost ticker can be incrementing in the corner of each person's display. The unstated question would be: is this meeting really worth its cost?
All this talk of the talking pad and the ultimate presentation system is really cool. I wanted to put my head in the ring with the basic outline of how it could be related to the music and broadcasting sectors.
First the app could create the ultimate broadcasting platform with both audio and visual presentation so that radio and TV merge into one system and all mobile. This could also lend itself to the perfect platform for a band or artist to showcase their talents and present themselves to fans, to promoters, to labels (if they are still in existence by then). Te he point it that the devise becomes any extension of who the artist or band is in terms of creating an experience, at a show every member of the audience could receive the band or artists app and be fully engaged on-going with them.
This would be game changing for bands and artists and enable them to reach their goals and dreams.
There has been some talk about raising money and how much to charge. There has also been talk about making it an open source project or donating to charity.
I think these two views are at odds with each other. This makes me ask what are we here for?
Are we here to protect our investment of time and money?
Or here to be Linchpins and give the gift of our art?
Personally I see this as a chance to be remarkable and to do something meaningful.
All I have to say is:
if we are able to create a killer app that Seth Godin blogs about I'm pretty sure we won't have worry about our investment not paying off.
Yep. That's the spirit.
Check out: A Gentle Introduction to Ted Nelson's ZigZag Structure.
Starts with the front page, moves to table of contents, jumps into a section, shows the content of it, moves to a picture or video, etc. Imagine a generic App created to build something likes this, same abilities to control the presentation but different content.
Imagine a restaurant situation where the waitress is trying to explain the different food and wine selections to a person. She has a lot of options to talk about and starts with something and based on the customer answers or nods she modifies her suggestions. The Talking Pad, in my point of view, is like a restaurant menu and wine list, where all the options are always present but what you choose and the order you choose it, depends on the real time conversation. The solution will be to make the navigation, between the forest and the trees, simple, fast and intuitive.
I think this is a great use case for the Talking Pad. If we can create something that can be used for this and presentations then I think we got it!
I really like this idea for a number of applications. The coolest part is the ability to intuitively control the presentation through multitouch… and while having a standalone application for the iPad seems a little daunting, the ability to import slides from Powerpoint or Keynote would simplify that. Since non-portable OSes are integrating multitouch as well, I can see the iPad being a convenient presentation device, but licensing the technology back to run on a multitouch enabled laptop would be potentially lucrative.
Can you even imagine how cool it would be to teach a high school algebra class with what amounts to a portable chalkboard in your hand? No more facing away from the class! You can carry it with you and demonstrate a problem "on the board" while sitting next to the student in the back row that asked the question. You can archive every class and post it online in its entirety or edit it with additional links to connect to past or future class discussions.
For presentations, this really frees the presenter to be a lot more flexible. No more accidentally misplacing a slide and having to halt everything as you click forward and back… assuming the index is reasonably well constructed. You can be more off-the-cuff without sacrificing the ability to look well prepared since you can load up a reserve of material to illustrate a point, but the non-linear nature means that you don't have to use it. Now, instead of each presentation being a recital, it can be the equivalent of a performance by a bar band. When people start shouting for Louie Louie, you're ready with the chords and lyrics even if you had planned on a set of Styx and Foreigner tunes.
Heck, one can imagine the eventual ability to use such a comfortable and intuitive interface to edit video in the same way that djs can mix live music.
Tom Mink Said "Can you even imagine how cool it would be to teach a high school algebra class with what amounts to a portable chalkboard in your hand? No more facing away from the class! You can carry it with you and demonstrate a problem "on the board" while sitting next to the student in the back row that asked the question. You can archive every class and post it online in its entirety or edit it with additional links to connect to past or future class discussions."
Erm, yes, because I already do. I use a tablet PC and export to pdf. And the students have actual A4 sized whiteboards (laminated card with drywipe pens or you can buy stiffer boards from educational suppliers) and I can check that they all are getting the answers correct very quickly. We use 'u' shaped classroom layouts.
I'm imagining what a class set of iPads could do with some kind of web based whiteboarding software. But I'd also like to get group work going with instant web reference material available!
Its a good idea. However, has a potential to overwhelm the user if the presentation becomes more than handful of slides. Think number of permutations and paths.
Couple of ways this could be resolved…
1. Predefined user paths (e.g., page 1 then page 3 etc) with ability to jump to a random page and then come back to the path
2. Multiple such paths per presentation
I think an easy solution would be to create this non-linear path model for Apple's keynote and MS Powerpoint. An easier solution to develop I believe.
I think thats why the number of slides should be limited. If you have 9 slides in a grid and the slide you are looking at is in the middle then you navigate to any of the other 8. You add more slides and the challenge of navigation gets a lot harder.
It's doing it for only sticky notes, but this website had an interesting UI that I thought of when I read Seth's post.
http://spreadnotes.me/hello
Isn't this quite a lot like HyperCard?
How about we build a modern-day version of HyperCard, that is, almost exactly as discussed earlier, but with the great "openness" that made HyperCard so popular and versatile back in the day. In other words, a presentation tool that works just as well assisted (that is, navigated by the author of the presentation) as unassisted (that is, by a user that has never seen the presentation before).
As already discussed, it would be possible to plop objects such as pictures, video clips, WebViews (with a specified web page loaded inside of it) onto slides, and create links to other slides (and webpages to open in Safari, possibly). Charts and so on would be nice, but may not be necessary for the 1.0. The always-ready notepad would also be a nice addition. If the iPad ends up shipping with some kind of Dashboard (as the rumors say), calculator and notepad widgets will likely be shipping with the iPad, which would make it redundant to spend time implementing.
Information can be found at http://www.thebrain.com/ , it has a free version, it can be set to presentation mode, can create web versions, runs on Mac Linux, Windows. With a web page knowledge you can do almost anything.
sssam asks "How many downloads would you forecast, and at what price?"
I think that is the wrong question.
I say, that to make this app profitable, you need to give it away. A free app. (or better, ask for $9.99 with all proceeds to Unicef to help the kids in Haiti.)
How do you make your money, then? Offer SaaS (software as a service) that expands on the functionality of the app, such as stand-alone presentations that you can upload to TalkingPad website and share with your peers, customers, whomever. Or to allow embeds of your TalkingPad presentations, or many other services. You could charge $45 a year for that service, and get recurring revenue (instead of a one off revenue stream from the sale of the app.) A server on a cluster in the cloud costs very little to run, so no infrastructure costs upfront.
200,000, 500,000 downloads of a free app, 5-10% conversion on the added services - recurring revenue. Do the math.
It is doable, we just need to ask the right kind of better questions….
I think it depends on what the goals of the project are.
A Saas based application really requires a company to back it.
An iPad app doesn't need the same infrastructure. There are plenty of small app developer teams.
I guess the question is do we want to produce an app or start a company?
On a side note I do like the idea of giving to charity.
The model I think would work is a free App (or paid with proceeds going to charity), and a SaaS company that can provide the value-added services that can be monetized.
I have not seen any developers raising their hands to take on pro-bono development, so in the interest of moving this forward, I would like to consider the possibility of raising say $150K-$250K from angel investors to pay for the development of the App, and set up SaaS company to market it and provide the value added services. Something along these lines.
What do you think?
I am a little unsure about setting up a company around this.
1. None of us have worked together: Thats not to say we trust each other but given that we don't really know each other forming a company might be a little rushed. Its a little like getting married on the first date.
2. We don't know if there is a market for this: Its very hard to tell if anyone would actually buy this app or not. I'm all for making a basic app and seeing if anyone buys it. If there is demand then it might be a good idea to set up a company.
Baby steps.
I don't quite understand Seth's idea of accessing 8 different slides through the 8 directions. It seems like it would be confusing to try to organize that kind of checkerboard style swipe navigation.
I understand the thumbnail view. I can see great usefulness in looking at a checkerboard then selecting one slide from it, then going back to the checkerboard to select your next slide, but going from full screen to full screen in 8 possible directions seems like it would be very confusing for the person giving the presentation, even if you had title/thumbnail labels in each corner showing you what was on the next slide.
My take is more like this: Remember what the photos app looks like on the iPad? A scrollable list of thumbnails. Reverse-pinch to expand to full screen, do it slowly to get a sneak peek at the slide before you open it (and before it gets displayed on the external monitor). Pinch to go back to the checkerboard view.
I know there has to be some kind of nav directly from slide to slide, but the 8 point thing is confusing me. Can anyone explain how this would work without begin confusing to the user?
I can see the 8 direction navigation working ok. I don't think it would be the main way to navigate the pages of course, but would provide a "6th sense" if you will (and to be slightly dramatic about it!). Also, there's the hyperlinking between pages as well to aid navigation, as Seth mentioned. As for the pinch idea, I've considered that as well and think it would work well to show checkerboard and zoom in a slide.
Hello sssam
My take on this
Presentation mode: a 'contact sheet' of thumbnails of slides on the iPad screen possibly organised in a flow or mind map so draggable, or just a fixed array. I gesture on a slide, and it takes over the whole screen. I may or may not have linked another screen to the currently displayed screen, the link being triggered by a gesture near one of the cardinal hot spots. I'm thinking the second slide could be supplementary detail (thus hidden on the 'contact sheet') or another of the main slides. In authoring mode I can choose what slides to link where. We have a mind mappy style collection of information and if someone wants more detail about a point, I can click on a slide link to give it. Forces me to anticipate 'second level' questions when I'm authoring the presentation.
Editing mode: I personally would like a mode-less arrangement here, so the 'contact sheet' and 'slide zoom' is still used in the same mode as presenting, but there is a special gesture or hotspot that lets you edit slides - that is where the notepad & writing on the slides comes in. Then additional slides can be linked to any of the 8 corners (or not) as required. I'm thinking of wiki style linking here. Perhaps the linking gesture could bring up a list of existing slides or allow an arrow to be dragged to another slide. Linking to something that does not exist could be how you create a new slide, so no dead links ever.
Is this making sense? I am a teacher and so I'm looking at students having this kind of device with always on web connections, so their 'notebooks' can record my overview of a topic honed through years of presenting the essentials (my reason for being there) and they can make their own links to more detailed stuff on the Web or out of the books they have on their device so their information mirrors their needs.
Here is how I think the navigation would work.
Lets say you have a grid of 9 pages. When you look at an individual page it fills the space in the middle of the grid. If the page you are looking at is always in the middle you can get to any of the other 8 pages in the presentation.
I think the other pages might need to be rotated and numbered so that you can keep track of where you are in the scheme of things.
I'm going to post some pics in the UI section to demonstrate this. I hope that helps clear it up.
I will be most interested in your comps of a possible interface. I've been thinking all along of some kind of hypertext authoring where the links between the slides were deliberate, not simply based on proximity in a matrix. Like prezi with its arrows.
Building on the idea of importing slides instead of using the app to build them…
The media browser model would work well… but instead of using the UI Kit built-in media browser, what if we had a login online, where you could upload powerpoint files, photos, videos, anything, from your computer… then a login in the iPad app that could serve up your uploaded files for inserting into the app? That way you could import files into your app that the media browser doesn't support.
Like I said in previous posts, I'm an app developer. My partner and I would be willing to build this app if someone wants to fund it. It will cost around $25-$30 if we just use the UI elements with no real graphic design, and another $10-$15k to do it up pretty with graphic touches everywhere.
If anyone is interested in taking on funding, we can talk about partnering on this.
SSSAM said "As long as you don't have to create all the charting, graphing, detailed text manipulation tools, etc. of powerpoint, the app dev could focus on the more important stuff."
I take your point. Perhaps bitmap 'slides' with a link editor and import functions for common slideware as you suggest and a way of associating media files.
I actually see this more along the lines of using the Media Browser (if you use a Mac, you know what I am talking about).
From there you can select photos or videos for the slides. Other type of slides, (URLs via webkit, empty slides for writing, etc) can be done on the app itself.
The TalkingPad interface, needs to be one that allows the reorg of slides. The navigation is done through the eight directions (N, S, E, W, NE, NE, SE, SW).
Are we still working on this?
I'm an iPhone dev, and the thought of building something this big makes my stomach (and wallet) hurt. This could easily cost $50-$100k to produce.
However, if this didn't have to have it's own version of powerpoint built in, it would be a lot more feasible.
In other words, a lot of the cost would go into duplicating the slide creation tools in powerpoint and keynote. What if there was an "import powerpoint/keynote" option? You would build your slides in powerpoint/keynote, then import them into this for presentation. There could also be simple slide creation tools, so you could import and duplicate a basic template, then the talkingpad app could insert basic text and such.
As long as you don't have to create all the charting, graphing, detailed text manipulation tools, etc. of powerpoint, the app dev could focus on the more important stuff.
Workflow:
1. Launch new project
2. Import slide presentation that you created in powerpoint/keynote, which includes a blank slide for template purposes in talkingpad.
3. Rearrange slides in new nav system.
4. Add links, movies, etc.
5. Add WebUI based webpage "slides." (Basically just a browser page within the presentation, with address loaded up.)
Etc., etc., etc….
That way this program doesn't have to do everything that the highly advanced powerpoint programs do, it's just a shell that takes pre-made presentations and is much better at PRESENTING.
SO… I guess Seth could say that powerpoint and keynote have always focused on the CREATING of presentations, and this app would focus on the PRESENTING of presentations.
To raise $100K is not an issue. The issue is, if we really want to do this or not. I do. Do you?
I'm not as concerned with raising the money as with making sure the investment is a good one. Let's look at pricing for a second:
Apple is pricing Keynote at $10. Most other business apps are in the $5-$10 range. However, with this being a valuable presentation tool for businesses, and not just businessperson's toy, and also with the iPad being a larger device, I think you could push the price up a bit. I'm thinking the $30 range could work. If you go much higher than that, people will balk and/or you're asking to be undercut by a competitor.
For a $100K investment that is as risky as an iPad app (which they are… very risky), I would be looking for at least $300-$500k realistic possible return. Earning $21 for each sale (Apple takes $9 on a $30 sale) means we need 5k downloads just to break even, and 15k to bring in $200k profit.
That means 15,000 people would need to purchase this app just to really make it a real winning venture.
But if we keep that price down in the $20-$30k range, life is a lot easier. It becomes something we can put together in 2 months, and if it doesn't sell all that well we haven't lost too much time or cash.
You see this as a "business app". But I see this as universal app.
For students, teachers, sales people, coaches, marketers, tech people, designers — for anyone that has a need to communicate an idea and engage the listener. And that is all of us.
Linear is dead.
I agree on the universal use. How many downloads would you forecast, and at what price?
Why do you think this is going to cost that much to produce?
How much time do you think is required?
Also I don't think it needs to be anywhere near the level of power point or keynote. It can be very basic and still very powerful. Look at prezi.com. Its not the options or features that makes it interesting.
What if this app was a lot smaller to start with and grew over time?
My initial research shows that it will cost around $150K to develop. Timeframe, ~3-4mo.
The presenter can press record at the beginning of the presentation, which will record the screen and incoming audio through the built-in mic. When the presentation is over, the presenter can email the whole thing to attendees, absentees, his boss, whoever. Also useful for reviewing presentations to improve your sales skills.
Have a notepad that can be brought up with one touch. This can be written or drawn on. swipe up to flip to a new page, just like a physical pad. Swipe down to bring back previous pages, which save automatically.
Eastgate Systems publish Tinderbox (Mac OS only) that I have used to make and give non-linear presentations in the past with authoring during sessions. Tinderbox does a LOT more than that by the way. I'm using Linux now so no recent experience. There is a downloadable preview.
I use a personal wiki on some web space now for note taking in meetings &c (modwiki, really old school :-).
I've always liked the archive page in Tumblr as a jumping off point…
I am working at a VERY large custom home that has a large art collection, and bronze pieces. It would great for our visitors and guests to have an app that would display one or more photos of the piece, and a history/background on the artwork… so as they tour the home they could educate themselves on the pieces.
Ideally it would be nice to have several photos of the piece (drill down) or hand motion for more photos - Split screen of one side photo(s) and other side easy-to-read type…. all up-to-date from a website.
Also ability to mark FAVS, or RANK - that I could print out a "take-home" booklet on these (for further art appreciation).
Version 2 (iPad-MAX) would use mini/local GPS tagging to page to the next page as the guests walked thru the house.
Photo interface should work perhaps from Lightroom export-to-web.
Additional features would be links/updates to local events that are current - current weather, best sunset time today, market index, etc.
Audio could be provided by THE ACTUAL ARTIST - - - way kool - - -
Summary report based on RATINGS could have links to the artist or galleries where their work is available - output to DVD or better yet an USB drive (custom engraved) - or emailed to guests email account (with links) - maybe sponsored by local Galleries…
The size of the screen makes this app really useful - easily kept up to date with corrections/additions/links/valuations…
I'm not techie, but can provide user interface feedback and ideas -
- Scott
prezi does what you say but unfortunately it runs on flash.
so it will be impossible on the iPad.
the non flash deal on the iPad is a real bummer.
none the less you will like prezi and same functionality in an app would be sweet as you suggest.
cheers,
I love Prezi but I think its a different type of non linear presentation. I feel like Prezi is more structured than this would be. Prezi works best when you setup a presentation/navagation path. This could be about slides and non linear navigation.
Besides there is already a prezi.com why would you want to copy something that exists? :)
I don't know if anyone has ever used Prezi.com, but basically, you can create non-linear presentations with text, pictures, video that are downloadable and playable through a flash player.
You can also create a path that would allow you to present 'linearly', but you can also view the whole mind-map at one time and click to wherever you want.
It doesn't have the total functionality Seth describes, but it may be a starting point.
— Jossi
Jossi, and why don't to create a foundation like the Mozilla Foundation (Firefox) or the Wikimedia Foundation (Wikipedia)?
It could make money just as you said: "You could charge $45 a year for that service… 200,000, 500,000 downloads of a free app, 5-10% conversion on the added services - recurring revenue."
And for fundraising, the first 1.000 people who donate $100 could get premium accounts forever.
Yes, that is a possibility, but creating a 503(c) foundation may take too much time. I want this shipped sooner. I am now in contact with a couple of angel investors that may get this funded.
But I like the idea of "the 1.000 people who donate $100 could get premium accounts forever." Creating scarcity may work here.
Anyway, if it's an open source project it will spread and lots of people will contribute and donate that "$100 for premium space forever" ;). I love the model of Wordpress.com
By the way, an open source project doesn't mean not to make money. As you said:
"Offer SaaS (software as a service) that expands on the functionality of the app, such as stand-alone presentations that you can upload to TalkingPad website and share with your peers, customers, whomever. Or to allow embeds of your TalkingPad presentations, or many other services. You could charge $45 a year for that service, and get recurring revenue (instead of a one off revenue stream from the sale of the app.) A server on a cluster in the cloud costs very little to run, so no infrastructure costs upfront."