Laurent Bridenne's web log about multimedia strategy, design, usability, technologies and much more... Multimedia

it's been a long time since my last update...

busy working on really cool stuff with multimedia. Take a look at the Blackbox Interactive Tour

The biggest thing here at Sun is that we had to rev down to Flash 7.12 since there is no Solaris support for the Adobe Flash Player. No capability to enable alpha channel, so we had to cheat with the video element. Such a disappointment.

Another cool thing, anyone can add our videos to their blogs. Check out the "Embed" feature on the videos in Sun's Multimedia Center. Pretty cool stuff.

More changes coming... too busy to update this blog because we're so hard at work...

As a work-from-home employee (Open Work), I can work at odd hours to get things done with global partners and co-workers. Accessline can find me anywhere, edgemail makes me connected to my inbox from anything/anywhere, but something is still missing... the human touch.

I sometimes feel out of touch with collegues that work in close proximity to each other. Out of sight, out of mind. For con call meetings, people are more engaged with whoever's in the room than the audio polycom unit sitting on a table like a dead octopus. SunLabs is going to make it easier for me...Porta Person!!

I could get work done in a tiny room 24/7 with a phone and a computer, but it can get lonely. Thank goodness for my puppy. When I pop over the hill once a week, I do "face-time". I meet and engage folks I've been working with "virtually" and use whatever ounce I have of social skills... which isn't much.

Still, it's nice to break the monotony of phone and email...
eventhough I don't get much work done when I'm on campus than if I stayed at home...

You can't have it all

"The world of entertainment and news gathering is rapidly changing as the network blurs the line between audience and entertainer, viewer and newscaster, fan and producer. With Internet technology -- music and movies, broadcast news and blogs, entertainers and audiences -- can all converge and mix online."

That definitely relates to my everyday job... setting up virtual communities, adding videos to YouTube, podcasts on iTunes and taking in comments/feedback from the comunity to improve ourselves.

The Network is the computer... and computers have changed. Anyone can do their own podcasts, edit their own videos in a flash. Online worlds like Second Life, communities like Craigslist... online forums, instant messaging... the internet, the network has changed. Much more personalized, much more interactive and much more instantaneous...

I get my news from the web. Not my TV. I get the scoop for my football team from their web site (podcasts, videos, press releases), and get the inside information on "Lost" from online forums. I look at funny videos on YouTube... some not that funny unfortunately.

We're all contributors to the network in some way, shape or form.

It's not the first time the government makes a mistake with taxpayers money... Well, they'll know soon enough...

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/061122/sun_contract.html

... all I'm saying is they should get a few blackboxes and tie them into the Sun Grid...

http://sun.feedroom.com/?fr_story=FEEDROOM163422

... enough about my yapping... let's go back to work ;)

Black Friday came and went... every year, web sites are faster and more available. No more servers getting overloaded with web requests.

I was looking at HDTVs. I don't need one. I want one ;) Being in the multimedia industry, coming from a TV/Film industry, I get drawn to that.

But there's a whole lot of hassles in the way... first is DirecTV... got to upgrade my receivers, antennas which means I have to run cable from the ceiling to the roof, walking across planks with a flash light and that itchy insulation stuff... a big pain... then comes the higher monthly costs...

All of that before buying a TV... Prices went down a lot. I almost got one but then I remembered that the TV won't fit in the entertainment center...

Funny thing is that I did exactly the same thing last year. When will I learn??

Then I thought what our customers have to deal when wanting to make a purchase from Sun. They're not buying a software or hardware, but an entire solution. They don't have to go to three different vendors (TV, satellite provider, furniture store) but one, and Sun thinks of all the different implications for migrations or updates.

I wish circuit city or best buy would do the same... maybe next year

Imagine the best OS... non-proprietary, cheap, highly secured, reliable, fast, self-healing, works across all hardware types (multiple manufacturers and devices) and most of all, easy to use. Wouldn't that be great?

This OS would be the backbone of every IT organization... from libraries to defense departments, running on cell phones, gaming devices, medical devices to high-end storage and application servers.

Now... What comes to your mind? Mac OS? Vista? Probably, since it's most of what we use in our everyday life. Solaris? Probably not. We hear that it's expensive and proprietary.

Solaris is SOOO expensive that it's available for free. No kidding.
Solaris is SOOO proprietary that it's open-sourced and has a developer community.

Yeah, but it only runs on our very expensive servers right? NO.

Get a free server, get a free OS and experience it with your own eyes. THEN, you can have a full picture of what Solaris brings to the table. Don't listen to the hype. Don't even listen to me... just try it and make your own mind.

All I ask is that you share your comments/feedback about it on why it is not the OS you'd want to run your online banking and governments on.

From bridging the Digital Divide in third-world contries, creating developer communities (Open Solaris, Java Open Source), delivering eco-friendly, ultra-efficient servers that take less space, less power (and a PG&E rebate), Sun Grid, Blackbox, Solaris 10 with awesome features like ZFS and D-trace... you name it. It's been a year, and it's all a blur... a good blur.

This evening, I took a look back. I don't get to do that too often since I'm always rushing to launch another product, announcement or something big that needs to happen yesterday.

I have seen a big change in what we do. We're smarter in how we spend money. We build cool new ways of doing business and save companies money. We innovate, but we also enable others to innovate.

We're not solely building high-end servers for the dot-com era anymore... don't know why the press still harps on it. I see that EVERY SINGLE press release. They don't see what we've done over the past year. That's upsetting... but it drives me to create compelling multimedia programs and change this perception.

Alright everyone...

Tune-in HERE at 9:15am PT for a BIG Sun announcement.

We're taking another step into the "participation age". Been working all weekend on posting multimedia for this announcement, but didn't see any mention of it on Reuters for some reason...

tell your developer friends!!!

Hey, why not? The niners are looking to have their new stadium built right across from the Sun buildings next to Great America where I used to work (before working flex via OpenWork).
After all, the Oakland A's are looking to have a high-tech Cisco Stadium in Fremont. So why shouldn't we have a "Sun Pavilion", powered by Sun? (aside from $$ for naming rights of course) ;-)

A couple of years back, I was recording a demo for a cool new tool... "Project Looking Glass". This stuff was awesome. I couldn't wait to get my hands on it on my laptop.

I really thought Sun was back on the map with such a killer app, all developed on Java. This was light years away from the typical desktop UI. I really thought this was going to get included in the next revision of the Java Desktop System. There was a real buzz about it.

Later on, I attended a webcast for the next Apple OS which resembled Looking Glass. And then I saw Longhorn (vista). Then I started to wonder what ever happened to this project. So... what happened to it? Seems like somebody took it to the next level in creating a "Minority Report"-like app. Check it out here. I still want to see it/use it on whichever platform I'd like. It's that cool.

Sun may not have cashed-in on this golden opportunity, but at least, we shared our code and knowledge to sparck innovation.

Everybody in the world seems to use Microsoft Office (Excell, Word, etc.) and so was I, back at Netscape. I truly didn't know what the hoopla was all about with StarOffice, so I tried it. As with any new software, it took me awhile to figure out where some features were located. At the end of the day, I was thinking to myself... What's the big deal?

Well, one day I found out. I was writting a document while having many programs open (Mozilla, Photoshop, etc.). I spent a good 2 hours working on this and I was almost done. When all of the sudden... BAM!... "the application encountered an error" and, to my mistakes (running windows and not saving my document) my hours of hard worked went down the drain. Or so I thought...

I was used to that... It happened to me a lot [more often] with Word or any Windows software. So after I calmed down, I re-opened StarOffice to start all over again while everything was fresh in my mind. As I opened the app, it asked me if I wanted to recover the document. And within a few seconds, what I thought was lost forever in Windows' after-life, was right here in front of me. The next thing I did was click SAVE ;-) ** my current version of Office never did that**

I WAS SHOCKED! How cool is that?!

So from there on, I was sold. Been using it ever since. I can create documents in StarOffice and save them as Microsoft Office docs for our vendors. I can open up Microsoft Office docs from our vendors, work on them and save them, all in StarOffice. There's also a one-click publish to acrobat PDF which is another great feature.

But the greatest thing is when I did a StarOffice demo and they told me the price difference between StarOffice and Microsoft Office... I was floored. We're the best kept secret. If you've ever lost hours of work in Microsoft Office, you've GOT to download and try StarOffice...

By now, you've probably seen Jonathan's blog about corporate communications. Either that, or the article about Sun's internal YouTube contest on CNET. Needless to say, the power of internet, coupled with a strong need for companies to communicate up-to-the-minute information is driving rapid change in the industry.

Companies [like Sun] would rather spend money on R&D than advertizing [and rightly so]. This opened the door for blogging, online videos and other cheap, yet effective, community/sharing communication tools.

We are surrounded by what I call "forced marketing": From telemarketers calling you at home, spamming your inbox, invading your radio station or TV... it's everywhere and we're tuning it out. We reach a point where if we see marketing fluff, we tune it out. We need the info from the source, untainted, no spin. Discussing instead of broadcasting.

I think we're on the right track...

November 17th is coming... I'm probably not going to get my hands on a PS3... I was reading up on the latest and greatest and found out that Java will be included in the PS3. How cool is that?!? I wonder if I'd get a discount ;-)

Java IS everywhere.

And hey! Isn't that the guy from "Lost"??

Now, the next cool thing is the Playstation Network. To tell you the truth, I haven't even plugged-in my PS2 online... too many cords to deal with. But the potential for interacting with gamers all over the world in movie-realitic 3D environments is awesome. I can't wait. It would definitely beat the Second Life. See below... and yes, we're also involved in that as well.

All in all, the PS3 is supposed to be a super-computer for the entertainment center. I want it to be my Tivo, digital music library, gaming, blue-ray player... but most of all, I want to see a big Sun logo when using the features... because we should get the awareness that without Sun (Java), devices like the PS3 would not be that cool.

Open Work (also known as the ability to work anywhere) is a beautiful thing. Doesn't suit all job types, but for my line of work, where everything I do is compressing, hosting files and managing the development of multimedia applications... it is great. Vendors on the East Coast, publishing group on the west coast and a cutting edge global delivery infrastructure. No problem.

Another good thing is that you can use a solaris, linux, windows or mac systems for this. Open Work is for everyone.

My work extension gets forwarded to my cell, wi-fi is everywhere and becoming more affordable than ever for residential use.  I also use timbuktu and logmein to connect to my machine at work where I get super-blazing fast download/uploads (fiber link anyone?) and most of my publishing tools (squeeze, flash, camtasia, FTP, dreamweaver, etc.) That's really all I need! well, ok... maybe a land-line. Cell phone reception isn't the greatest in some places still. Maybe I'll switch to voIP and get this over with once and for all.

The only thing required for making this succeed is strong work ethic. People still tend to think that "telecommutting" is pretty much slacking off at home... it's actually quite the opposite for me. It is highly concentrated, uninterrupted work where you can get a lot done. It also means working outside the regular "business hours". A 40 hour work week is more like a 50+ these days for most of the people I know. But the greatest thing is at the end of a work day, to shut down the laptop, turn off the cell phone and <BAM!>, you're home.

No wonder Sun was recognized among best workplaces for Commuters. Saves me time, gaz, insurance, stress. For Sun, it saves them real-estate, utilities (phone, electricity, water) and everything else to keep the campus running. It also saves the environment and our dependance on foreign oil. It's a win-win-win situation for the employee, the employer and the environment. I'm wondering why other companies haven't caught on yet. Doesn't anyone know this exists?

Ok... this is not what you think, but it drove you to read this.

"Corporate transparency" would be more appropriate, but less eye catching. That's what I do. I'm catching eye balls by designing/enabling communities at Sun to visually communicate information about Sun and its products.

The problem is "how". For a long time, it was press releases. Then came video and we had executive and marketing managers sitting in front of a camera and give their marketing pitch. Then came blogs... unpolished, true naked conversations (for the most part). And now, comes YouTube, where anyone and everyone can create and publish their videos online.

Should we use YouTube to post marketing pitches? Absolutely not. Should we use it as an informational gateway to direct developers, current and potential clients onto Sun.com to learn more about a product? ... or even better, download and try one of our products for FREE? You bet.

The best thing about YouTube is that we (Sun) don't have to spend precious money to create these videos. No 12-man professional video crew costing us an arm and a leg. Just need a camcorder and a technical expert. Our technical folks always have something to say about cool product features that would make someone's life easier.

So stay tuned folks... I'll try this out. Since YouTube can accept comments, I hope
that all of you will send me feedback... what you want to see (or not want to see).

YouTube username is SunMicrosystemsInc

Although, the best way to get videos, podcasts and vodcasts is at http://sun.feedroom.com