TechTableTalk: "It's Not Over Your Head"

When an email arrived from the theater dance and performance studies program announcing a lecture “about “Doing Dance Criticism,” I decided to go.

I thought the lecture would be a healthy experiment.  With a half hour before the program was to begin, I landed a parking spot and walked through UC Berkeley's Sather Gate and located Room 315 in Wheeler Hall, which was already filled with people.  There I found the famous quartet of dance criticism composed of:

Sarah Kaufman, dance critic for The Washington Post, won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.

Wendy Lesser, editor of The Threepenny Review, regularly writes about dance, music, and opera. She is the author of eight books, including The Amateur: An Independent Life in Letters and Nothing Remains the Same: Rereading and Remembering.

John Rockwell, former dance critic, music critic, and editor of The New York Times Arts and Leisure section, is the board chairman of the National Arts Journalism Program.

Lewis Segal, formerly the staff dance critic for the Los Angeles Times, is a freelance arts writer based in Hollywood and Barcelona.

Sarah Kaufman referred to her experience checking in at the airport and asked,  “Why do people recoil from physical contact and prefer a quick, but questionable technology,” contrasting the pat-down to the x-ray scan, perhaps thinking of the theme of her next dance article. Wendy Lesser responded to Kaufman’s question and offered, “The scan is faster.” As a recipient of two hip replacements, which requires Lesser to undergo pat downs all over the world, she said that the scan procedure means that people can keep a closer eye on their computers rolling down the security assembly line.

But what about dance criticism? There were a variety of thoughts ranging from the notion that dance on stage, or to what the panel referred to as “concert dance” represents an accumulation of inputs from everyone who touches a performance.  The age-old question posed by the poet, W.B. Yeats, “How can we tell the dancer from the dance?” was described in the same way that the poet did—we really can’t. Another panelist said that the ability to write well in evocative terms, crafting language to describe the physical experience of dance, was a big plus.  The last speaker held by his motto, “We don’t make the scene; the scene makes us.”

One of the critics let the cat out of the bag and voiced a concern for the future of dance criticism. As newspapers shrink and arts publications die, Rockwell acknowledged that bloggers on the Internet have challenged the relevance of dance criticism.  He said, “We’re in transition to a new business model that may eventually allow some people to earn a living.” He also hinted that the Internet may evolve into a pay-as-you-go model.

Segal also acknowledged changing business models, recognizing that new TV sets now offer access to the Internet. As a result, he said, the “difference between cable and websites will become blurred” and offer dance websites a viable future.

However,  the critics did not mention the impact of TV programs like “So You Think You Can Dance,” or “Dancing With the Stars,” in bringing dance to new public audiences, until that question was posed from the floor. Then everyone pitched in about articles they’d written on the subject.  Some offered that the programs were “vulgar,” others were more positive in recognizing that dance-savvy judges offered the public an opportunity to become “dance literate.”  Another critic wondered why the public needed to know about what steps composed the “Paso Robles,” for example, when they could simply discern “the movement,” which sounded like a Marie Antoinette “let them eat cake” attitude if there ever was one.

My take-aways? I learned that the world of dance, like every other place, is being seriously impacted by technology. I also felt that these four dance critics may be falling behind the public as You-Tube, the Internet, and TV programs legitimize forms such as B-Boy and Hip-Hop and bring dance to a new audience. Do these audiences have an interest in a  criticism that can expand beyond the world of concert dance? 

Maybe the panelists are dancing to their own music...

Give up? Cleantech Open (right, you saw the picture) is a five-year old organization that “finds, funds, and fosters entrepreneurs with big ideas,” according to Executive Director, Rex Northen who spoke at the October 8 California Regional Cleantech Open hosted by Chevron in San Ramon, California.  At the end of the day, six new companies each walked away with awards of $18,000.

Many fledging companies have been assigned mentors and are given business plan assistance. Cleantech wants to help commercialize clean technologies. Corporate sponsors also are part of the backbone with expertise and support from companies such as Autodesk, Chevron, Kauffman Foundation, Google, PG&E, Reed Smith. San Diego Gas and Electric, and Wells Fargo, and others.

Andrew Hargadon, Professor and Soderquist Chair in Entrepreneurship at the Graduate School of Management at the University of California at Davis gave the keynote. Hargadon focused on assembling a network around an idea. Citing Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, neither of whom actually invented anything, Soderquist advised to “Find the path to deliver to as many people as you can as fast as you can. And if it takes several centuries that’s not scale—it’s change.”  

In the judging panels and during the “innovation exchange,” many venture capital firms were on hand, Both Nancy Floyd, Nth Power, and Nancy Pfund, DBL Investors, acknowledged that environmental companies are at the “tipping point.” Don Riley of Chevron Technology Ventures extended an open invitation for entrepreneurs “to contact me.”

I served as a scribe on the Energy Efficiency Judging Panel and heard about a slew of technologies, everything from a specialized pump and software algorithm to collect the natural gas spill-off from oil rigs, a new resin insulation for the high-speed transmission of electricity, and a social networking utility to allow people to track their carbon footprint.

Congratulations to the six regional California winners and semifinalists. Here’s how they stacked up:

The six finalists participate in the national judging on November 15^th and 16^th. National awards are held on November 17^th at the 2010 National Awards and Expo, at Parkside Hall A, 271 South Market Street, San Jose.  

SARTA   (Sacramento Area Regional Technology Alliance) sponsors a leadership series to give local entrepreneurs and students of emerging technologies an understanding of how green business works.

The desired outcome is to speak with state energy agencies and venture capitalists about solving real problems and saving people money with new energy efficient products.

The topic of the Leadership Series Clean Tech Track, held at Drexel University on September 2 was, “How to Influence and Impact Clean Tech Regulatory and Legislative Policy.” Drexel offers eleven doctoral and master's programs, including in all things entrepreneurially green.

The September 2 discussion included instructors
 Michael Faust, CEO and President of the Northern California World Trade Center; Will Gonzalez, Owner, Gonzalez Public Affairs; Jan E. Schori, Of Council, Downey Brand, 
and Jan Smutny-Jones, Executive Director, Independent Energy Producers Association (IEP).

Places on the Internet to start getting informed include high-priced and free publications. Possible sources with a mixture of both are: 

• Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) 
• Western Climate Initiative 
• California Manufacturers & Technology Association   
• California Solar Industries Association  
• Bloomberg New Energy Finance 
• Business Council for Sustainable Energy 
• California Environmental Protection Agency
• Climate Action Reserve  
• John Geesman’s blog   
• Efficiency First 
• NoOn23

Don’t forget about using Google Alerts with specific keywords and TweetFeeds to get information about the energy movers and shakers of the moment.

“Get in Early, Tell Your Story, Keep it Simple”

High on the list of questions was how to go about identifying the leaders in any community once there’s a real product in hand. The advice was to:

• Know the local Chamber of Commerce
• Informally introduce yourself to local elected officials
• Describe your product in non-technical terms in a way that addresses the WIFM (what’s in it for me?)
• Query both groups about whom they consider local community leaders
• Contact those people and talk to them

The district director of any federal or state legislator can be of tremendous assistance in identifying local leaders and subject matter experts, advised Michael Faust.

Policy Highlights

There were many other tidbits including the fact that Southern California is probably more fertile ground right now for green products since they are dependent on coal to meet a large percentage of their energy needs.  Talk with Southern California Edison and the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power if you have a solution to that particular problem.

With the coming of electric vehicles, there will be tremendous drain on “the grid” which has a whole other crop of officials grinding their teeth. Bundling home audits with grid pricing, suggested Jan Schori, may be one innovative way to package a solution in this area.

Lastly, the speakers recommended to thoughtfully attend conferences with a game plan.

Don’t feel badly if you can’t contribute money to a politician’s fund because in the long run, it won’t do that much good, said lobbyist Will Gonzalez.

And finally, even if AB32 gets clobbered with a yes vote on 23, there’s enough legislation in place to keep energy regulations going. On the other hand, said Schori, a yes vote will send a message to venture capitalists that California is turning away from its commitment to clean energy, which will not be a good.

I wanted to end this discussion on a high note. Be sure to check out the upcoming SARTA Clean Tech Showcase, Tuesday, October 26 at Sacramento State, the region's largest event highlighting the clean tech sector's innovators, investors, educators and companies. And contact Lenore Weiss if you need a great writer to communicate a strong message that will get your customer’s attention.

Surely you’ve heard about the May partnership announced between Toyota and Tesla to start building electric cars at the recently closed NUMMI (New United Motor Manufacturing Inc.) plant in Fremont, California. For the past 25 years General Motors and Toyota had worked to manufacture cars together, seeing it as an opportunity to learn about each other’s production methods.  The plant was closed earlier this year by Toyota as a cost-cutting measure; now it is being resurrected in the name of electric car development.

And who is Tesla? The only manufacturer of EVs in the United States at prices that none of us can afford.  But that may change with Toyota acquiring a $50-million stake in Tesla and the two companies poised to rumble on the assembly lines together…but don’t look now…the Tesla-Toyota partnership may have competition.

At a Commonwealth Club meeting in San Francisco this month, speakers representing different spectrums of EV car development including a representative from General Motors, discussed the possibility of these electrically powered cars becoming the future vehicle of choice.   

Tony Posawatz, Vehicle Line Director of General Motors’ New Chevy Volt and also Co-Chairman of the Electric Drive Transportation Association, announced that he had driven a Volt to the meeting, and offered that the car will be in retail development by the end of this year “with GM being the first to mass market electrically driven vehicles in the U.S. and around the world.” Currently, the Volt has a 40-mile range with an extending gas generator that produces enough energy to power the car along further on a single tank.  Posawatz spoke of that initial range being upped from 40 to 100 miles and that the Volt is not “a single play for GM.”

Look around the corner. Motorcycles also are being slated for electric development. Jit Bhattacharya, CEO of Mission Motors whose new Mission One Motorcycle (funded with help from Silicon Valley venture capitalists) claims to be the fastest production electric motorcycle in the world, said that the company is looking to “improve range, performance, and cost.” Current EV technology is based on lithium-ion batteries, commonly housed these days in laptops, PDAs, cellphones, and the Toyota Prius.

Mission Motors is exploring a partnership he said with China, which is using electric bikes and scooters to help address the issue of smog. This was an environmental problem that was highlighted during the Beijing Olympic 2008 games.  Apart from all other considerations, “The electric motorcycle is just more fun to ride.”

More fun, but what about practical, what about the massive infrastructure and development that needs to support the transition to EV? What about the growing demands on the power grid? Mark Duvall, Director of Electric Transportation at the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), an independent, nonprofit center for public interest energy and environmental research which receives most of its funding from member electric power companies, said “The industry has a responsibility to serve with a job to just deal with it.” He cited how power companies have stepped up to increase service as newer technologies like computers and plasma TVs draw more juice from the grid. 

Technology is improving here also with the development of what many refer to as the “smart grid” giving buildings, most immediately those owned by the government, the ability to monitor light and heat usage by wiring systems together and controlling them from a central software panel. Ultimately, we will be able to monitor energy usage in our homes.  All of this will require massive amounts of capital investment. The Feds have already kick-started the process, he said, with a 130 million dollar investment, but suggested that power usage may get more expensive with different pricing tiers, encouraging consumers to power up EVs during off-peak hours. There's even talk about being able to sell power from a EV car battery back to the power grid, much the way people today with installed solar sell electricity to local power companies.

Yeah, and what about plugging in those vehicles?  How is that going to happen? Richard Lowenthal, a former Mayor of Cupertino, California, and founder and CEO of Coulomb Technologies, Inc., acknowledged as a leader in electric vehicle charging station infrastructure worldwide, anticipates that this will happen differently depending on different situations. 

For example, in an urban area like San Francisco where the majority of people do not live in single-family houses, drivers may plug-in vehicles while they are shopping. “Most stations probably will not charge because businesses want people to shop in their areas.” He anticipates charging stations becoming “a normal piece of parking lot furniture." He also said that the home permitting system is changing to allow for these stations. “It’s just like installing an appliance.  It’s not a big deal,” although Lowenthal did acknowledge that older homes will have to do “a lot more work.”

More immediately, the future of EVs “will be blended,” said Posawatz, with an exploration of lithium-ion batteries augmented by biofuels and flex fuels. The EV “is not only for enthusiasts and early adopters. This is a car every one will love.”

Who knows? The American automobile industry, supported by power companies and infrastructure development, may have some life in it yet.

Sure I wanted to see the last four contestants engage in their duet duels on national TV. But we’re talking HTML5, the next generation in hypertext markup language that the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) international standards organization has been hard in work in developing. Plus, it was a total geek-out held at Microsoft’s San Francisco offices on the heels of the Web 2.0 conference at Moscone Center  and sponsored by three local user groups: PHP, Java, and HTML5. 

I stood my place in line waiting to grab a slice of pizza, and a cup of broccoli salad. (Mixed with currents and red onions, the stuff was tasty!) Many around me consorted with their cell phones while I grabbed a seat and gazed up at dual screens on either side of the room with the speaker podium placed <align=”center”>. Sponsors introduced themselves (Google, Guidewire, JetBrains, Kaazing, Marakana, Medallia, Oracle, O’Reilly, and Teksystems), and then it was on with the show.

So what is HTML5? Very roughly it’s a markup language for the Web that originally made its debut around 1990 and has been progressively upgraded since then to allow for the use of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and the implementation of AJAX with Javascripting to create in the eyes of the beholder, a more information-rich Web.

The lessons learned using HTML these past 20 years are being incorporated into tags and objects that may have previously existed as JavaScript work-arounds to satisfy growing user expectations, an approach one speaker called “paving the cow paths.” Browser support isn’t totally there, but Chrome, Opera, and Microsoft’s Internet 9.0, are all mapping the divide.  

The first speaker was Brad Neuberg from Google’s documentation team. Neuberg painted a wide HTML5 swath, demonstrating how the new standards matter to consumers and developers. This includes a new specification called “workers,” which allows developers to run code that won’t block the browser, meaning that it will remain responsive while it’s parsing lots of information. With the growing use of maps, there’s a geolocation object that will pass browser latitude and longitude coordinates to a browser for map display, handy for social networking sites. There are semantic tags to break content into more discrete sections, including the printed page’s “sidebars,” all allowing for better search engine indexing.There also are new link relations to define icons (think mood icons) and pingbacks. SVG (scalable vector graphics) will be available via new CSS selectors to offer the automatic definition of column number, text stroke, opacity, rounded corners, gradients, and controls to play audio and video (think YouTube on steroids and beyond). 

Microsoft’s Giorgio Sardo, took the stage, explaining how Explorer 9.0 is using the memory stored in GPUs (Graphic Processing Units), and in the double-core of “double-core” computer processors to allow for the display and resolution of HTML5 elements, pushing browser technology to a new level.

The last speaker was Peter Lubbers from Kaazing and co-author of Pro HTML5 Programming (Apress 2010). He dove into a subject that was near and dear to the hearts of many developers who have been using household web development techniques such as “AJAX” and “Comet” to simulate real-time information on the Web. The truth of the matter is that information can only flow in “half-duplex,” or in one direction, which is the reason, Lubbers explained, that the recent “Times Square bomber” (Faisal Shahzad) was not immediately intercepted on his way out of the country because the “no-fly” list cannot be updated in real time. HTML5 brings a full-duplex solution to the table and it’s called “web sockets.”   

As all this settles, browser support will be spotty, but certain HTML5 elements are available in Chrome, Opera, and Explorer 8. You can inject a certain amount of browser HTML5 muscle into Internet Explorer by adding a meta tag, Google’s Chrome Frame.

Got to go.  Need to turn on the results show for American Idol.  

Bill McKibben looks like an aging basketball player, tall and lanky, when in actuality he is a Methodist Sunday school teacher in Vermont who has spent a great deal of time according to his own account, “in a basement coloring.”  But looks don't tell the whole story.

Bill McKibben also is an educator, environmentalist and author of more than 10 books on climate change. He helped to organize the most widespread day of political activity on the planet when according to CNN on October 24, 2009, 5,200 separate events were held in 181 countries including beneath the ocean at the Great Barrier Reef.

Speaking April 23 at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley to publicize his latest book, “eaarth,” McGibben wore a t-shirt with the numbers “350,” a commitment to limiting the amount of C0₂ in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, which according to scientists is compatible with life on the planet.  The number currently hovers at 390.

McGibben built the climate change case from ground-up evidence and discussed how there is now 25 percent less ice in the world including the glaciers of Greenland and the Andes. Scientists are now panicked, he said, with “every visible system beyond the top of its boundaries. Last summer typhoons marched over Asia with 9 ½ feet of rain,” he said. With five percent more moisture in the atmosphere, there’s also more evaporation and more drought.

“Even things that are too big to change are changing,” he said, “causing problems for organisms at the bottom of the food chain. Global warming and fossil fuel emissions are creating more acidic oceans. Some at the top of the food chain like cruise liners are being denied anchorage in places like the Maltese Islands, a country that is shifting its dollars from the tourist industry to moving the island's population before it floods due to global warming.

Instead of continuing to build starter castles for entry-level monarchs and listening to people like Alan Greenspan, “the tiny tired wizard behind the curtain,” McKibben said “our civilization stands at collapse.” While acknowledging the growth in the number of organic farms within the last 50 years, he also noted that assuming a six or seven degree temperature increase, many of those farms will not be successful. Nor will changing to energy efficient light bulbs impact the affect of global warming. 

McKibben counsels that our entire civilization needs to transition from fossil fuels and learn new habits for a new planet. “Gas, coal and oil is the single most profitable enterprise in the history of the world,” which is why the world looks the way it does, he said.

“The only moral response is to do everything we possibly can to change the odds and that requires our full participation,” which brings us back to the idea of  “350” a measurement that was proposed by James Hansen and his team at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City. Hansen was one of the earliest scientists to raise broad awareness of global warming.  Today he advocates a rising price on carbon emissions with fees collected to promote other energy sources, a proposal that doesn’t sound totally unlike levying taxes on cigarette smoking with money going toward prevention.

Earlier this year at the Copenhagen Climate Change Accord, 117 of the poorest and most vulnerable countries who directly understand the affects of global warming, agreed to reduce carbon emissions by 2020.  But the United States still has not planted its feet firmly on that terra firma.

McKibben and others involved in organizing a global 350 movement, want to continue turning down the fossil fuel heat. They announced that this coming October 10, (10/10/10) will mark a “global work party” toward reducing carbon emissions.  Go to www.350.org to sign up or to create a work party in your local area.

Also keep your eyes peeled for discussion in the coming weeks about a bill that is being introduced as a “New U.S. Senate Climate, Jobs, and Energy Bill by Senators John Kerry, (D-Mass.) Joseph Lieberman (I-Connecticut), and Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) “It’s a giveaway gift to the industries that created the problem,” said McKibben. Find out more by reading the bill that will be published in coming weeks on Senator Kerry’s website.

Leroux was a former head of International sales development for Adobe. She understood when Steven Jobs, Apple CEO, proclaimed at the MacWorld Conference & Expo 2007 that the iPhone, was “a revolutionary product that would change everything,” with a user interface design that combined Apple’s popular iPod music device with phone and Internet browsing capability.

Fast forward three years later, when Jobs in trademark jeans and black t-shirt speaking at Expo 2010, positioned Apple as the “number one mobile device company in the world,” and announced another new offering from the magic software kingdom, the iPad.

This time many technology pundits didn’t exactly get the Big Fuss. (Look! It's a laptop, it’s a mobile phone, no, it’s an iPad!”) Giving a similar demo as the one he gave three years earlier, Jobs showed photos, movies, great album cover arts, but then so what? Many walked away saying that marketplace would be the iPad's final arbiter of success.

Those whose business is to remain in the operating system know, whined about the inability to use and develop interactive Flash applications on the iPad, many developers pointing figures and accusing each other of just wanting to watch Flash porn on the Internet. Apple said that Flash just hogged too much OS memory, picked up its cookies and walked away.

Some developers like Jonathan Hollin on binarybonsai said, “I am genuinely at a loss as to just what all the fuss is about… an overhyped oversized iphone.” 

Marine Leroux, the developer mentioned at the beginning of this entry, sees Apple's device as a new content delivery platform.  She has developed successful applications for the iPhone under the auspices of her company Bamboudesign.com. Leroux is also the founder of the iPhone Network Lounge in San Francisco, and a recent speaker at the Photoshop Developers Group talking about iPhone application development.

Carlos Icaza, co-founder and CEO of ansca whose software, SDK Corona, allows developers to create iPhone and iPad applications more quickly rather than using the device's native language,   is on the board of directors of Bamboudesign. Backed up by compiled code, Leroux is passionate about iPad development possibilities.

“There’s an enormous opportunity here to make content a more engaging, compelling experience,” she said as we shared a cheese platter in downtown San Francisco. “This is a more powerful, portable device that includes iWork, which is Apple’s version of Microsoft Office applications: Pages (Word), Numbers (Excel), and Keynote (PowerPoint).

Leroux is all for using the additional space of the iPad to create richer applications and said so in the New York Times following the iPad announcement. “When you’ve got more space, why not make the most of it?” Why simply port applications designed for the iPhone and iPod to a different device, she opined, when you can use the new platform to do something better?

 Leroux thinks that the larger iPad canvas with a great Internet browsing experience offers a chance to integrate more functionality onto fewer screens and to deepen the user experience. An example is embedding “GPS and other mobile technologies in one place.” 

She feels the real opportunity is for educational developers and publishers, particularly as the newspaper industry struggles to reinvent itself. With the iPad’s larger and superior display and 10 hours of battery life, Leroux sees the possibility of creating a “more intimate relationship between the user and an application.”

So as developers cozy up to the iPad, this new Swiss Army Knife of the mobile technology world, Leroux knows that as platforms come and go, there always will be game developers.

But she feels that the iPad will allow new content developers to reach a wider audience, including children.”This can be a Sesame Street for new learners, all learners.”

Find details of the next iPhone Network Lounge.

Lenore Weiss
http://techtabletalk.posterous.com/

All the pizza was gone by the time I managed to get to first Photoshop User Group meeting of the year at Adobe’s voluminous cafeteria located at 601 Townsend Street. It took awhile for me to drive across the Bay Bridge, a drizzly wet Thursday evening stalled with both FastTrack and cash customers behind the metering lights, my first attempt at driving across the Bay Bridge since a cable had snapped last Labor Day weekend with ensuing accidents over the bridge’s now infamous new structural “S-curve.” But tonight I was good. My GPS device was honed in on my target, I arrived in time to find a chair and hear surrounding chatter (“We stayed in Lisbon for three days. It was cold and rainy and there were a lot of cobblestones.”)  I waited for the lights to go down, when two t-shirted men from Aquent, a talent agency, which had been responsible for providing the now empty boxes of pizza, gave a current job forecast and encouraged one and all to stop by after the meeting.  Before they exited stage right, they offered a few job pointers which included: developing a good resume, calling your old employers “to be sure you’ll get a good referral,” networking with people at user groups and staying current and relevant. They closed with “Mobile is big. So are visual front-end developers and everything Flash.” Now it was Marine’s turn. She didn’t waste time getting started despite her wrestling match with a clip-on microphone. I’d met Marine last year at the iPhone Network Lounge, but since that time, Bamboudesign has been in the news, including the New York Times and Information Week as a leading new iPhone and a new iPad developer. Marine waltzed the congregation through the development of an iPhone application using Photoshop, a nice cocktail app giving users an idea how to mix up Martinis. What else would it be called but iMartini? She started off with her own set of pointers that sounded a lot like old school journalism’s “who, what, when and where”--know the objective of your application; who are its users; identify key task, use scenarios, and then finally, sketch out your screens that will be later morphed into Design Templates. It’s all about fundamentals and being organized.  A former employee of Macromedia in a former life, Marine gave the dimensions of iPhone applications that are available in Apple’s UI Guidelines and SDK. In portrait view, they translate to 320 px by 480 px with definitions for the bottom menu bar of 44px that are roughly equivalent to the size of a male’s fingertip, she quipped.  There are more definitions, but check the SDK. Sans serif fonts, like Helvetica is the one to choose, although Arial also will make the grade. Text should be in the vicinity of 17 to 22 px with other definitions for labels and list view. Forget to underline, that is don’t! Other specifications include using the image file type = PNG since these vector images have a better alpha channel with greater color depth; moreover, 72 dpi is totally acceptable for graphic resolution size. Now for a lego starter kit of free pre-fab iPhone graphics, Marine suggested two good sources and here are the URLies:

www.teehanlax.com/blog/category/iphone

http://blog.twg.ca/2009/09/free-iphone-toolbar-icons/

The rest of Marine’s talk would’ve made Benjamin Franklin proud.  It was all about being organized, efficient, and frugal.  She explained how to create a file structure of assets that included basic screens, templates, and screens that were unique to the application with PNG/PSD folders for buttons, images, labels, and whatever else you have hanging around. Layer and name everything in Photoshop, she advised, and, “Plan to have the status bar above the title because it’s more convenient for users.”Develop your PSD screens, PNG graphics (and don’t forget about developing your post-pressed buttons), screen flows, and specify your interaction.  The last two steps, she explained, are largely for developers who get handed off the information.  “Don’t let your developers guess,” she advised. “They’re very smart people, but not your typical user.  Give them the full recipe so they can make the cake exactly the way you want it.” Tips from the audience included using Photoshop to create highlighted (action) buttons.  Just “batch ‘em.”  Also craigslist is a good place to find roaming developers.  As for me, pass the Martini…

Here's the link to Marine's presentation: http://www.bamboudesign.com/preso/photoshop/iphoneappdesign_Photoshop_PDF.pdf

To contact Marine: marine@bamboudesign.com

Lenore Weiss
http://techtabletalk.posterous.com/