OVD INC.

Back in 1996, when Macromedia first released Flash, everyone in the web community was in awe by its ability to render motion smoothly. Compared to its predecessor the clunky ‘animated gif’, which dominated web design at that time. Since then, Flash technology has advanced so quickly with industry, partnership and community adoption, it has now become the standard tool for rich experiences.

These rich experiences are not without their faults; many of which stem from infrastructure and software partnerships. Even with 92-99% penetration rate (depending on region), some older browsers still experience issues with Flash content. Secondly, slow connection speeds, and processors are other factors which has hurt Flash’s ability to be fully effective. However, these obstacles are less and less prevalent with huge improvements in infrastructure and their associated costs, as well as Adobe’s willingness to open up plug-ins to software partners.

Flash has really grown up since then, and with the release of CS4, we are seeing the next gen of things to come. Augmented Reality (AR) has been in the public market over a year, and has already experienced tremendous uptake. Although still in infancy, developers and designers are becoming more and more creative in developing unique applications. At this stage, ‘Entertainment’ dominate AR usage, with very few useful apps (ie. FEDEX shipment estimator). AR is reminiscent of Flash’s entry into the marketplace as an online animation tool without much substance but lots of cool factor.

AR has huge potential to become the next standard for experiencing web content in entirely new and exciting ways.