I have been looking for new methods of adding punch to my posts and reviews on this website. The CES2008 story just below uses a YouTube Video. That sort of launched the interest in finding some other rich media that could be used. Here are the results of that search: FlashPaper and Zoho Show. Each has its advantages and shortcomings.
FlashPaper is built from Adobe Flash so it has two virtues right away. First, FlashPaper can be viewed either on the desktop or online; second, FlashPaper can contain images, movies , sound and animations. In short it is rich media intensive. The second plus for FlashPaper is that it is one of the best contaners for rich media because a)it compresses these resources more efficiently than any other plugin; b)it is almost universally available on Windows, Mac, and Linux PCs (desktop, laptop or kiosk); and c)its used by a wide range of developers for Web and desktop applications.
But the most compelling advantage to me of FlashPaper is the fact that it is so easily created. Any program that can print can redirect its printed output to a FlashPaper file. Its that simple. So that Microsoft Word paperor InDesign document, PowerPoint Presentation, or ErWin Database Design diagram – any output that is printed can be produced in FlashPaper.
Now there are trade-offs here. if you want to edit the FlashPaper you have to go back to the original source document edit there and then re-output to FlashPaper. Also the size of the files tend to be large if there is a lot of graphics – the show to the left is 181KB in size. Nonetheless, the ease of production/redirection of FlashPaper output makes it an attractive vehicle on this Web blog.
Zoho Show
Zoho Show 2 is a online system for creating presentations. It is like having PowerPoint or some other presentation program while work in a browser. Zoho have a wide range of 20+ tools already available(see the show below) including Zoho Write, Zoho Chat and Zoho Presentations. A common feature among these largely free tools is their versioning and collaboration features. You can determine who can see your work and who can edit/comment on them. With the Zoho Chat capability, you can review work together and chat about updates/edits among a group of users. Very nice.
Take a look at the shared Zoho Show at the left. It looks a lot like a YouTube or Quicktime video, but what it has is a PowerPoint presntation on the inside. I imported the bulk of the presentation into Zoho Show from my desktop Powerpoint Presentation. Then online I edited the final presentation.
The advantage is that the online presentation is now available to me at anytime for revisions. As well I could work co-operatively and edit with other users online if needed. And though the session was creaky at times (it is beta software), the results have been very pleasing. However, the downside is that a)this is only Presentation material, b)the size of the file is big enough to cause a notable pause before loading, and c)I am dependent on Zoho to maintain the service for free into the future. Still, I am impressed enough such that I will now be looking for opportunities for using Zoho Show presentations on this Web blog and thePhotoFinishes.com site in general.