A Look at TCOM Through Digital Media: November 2011

After following the CEOs of Microsoft, Apple, and Adobe as well as following the companies themselves through Twitter and various blogs on their websites, several things can be learned from each of them. Many of their tweets and posts coincide with releases of new products, features, or benefits. These often come in the form of personal reviews/notes, comments on the product, polls asking about customer ratings, and their own experience using them. However, their are occasional posts regarding the state of the job market from their point of view, thoughts on where the industry is headed, and sometimes random ramblings. Though sorting through these different posts, readings, tweets, etc can be very much a hassle I have found that they tend to be insightful and very thought provoking, especially coming form the leaders and professionals in the industry.

Following the leaders and professionals alongside the company posts and twitter accounts proved to be a valuable method to use for side-by-side comparison. I obviously wanted to make sure that neither of the two were contradicting each other (if that chance arrived). I'll say now that I never once saw an instance or that though I didn't expect to find such things. Regardless of that first thought, it was interesting to see news of upcoming products or services from the company accounts and also see them talked about by the leaders and professionals as well. This allowed me to research new and upcoming technologies from the companies and also receive insight from the leaders of the companies on the products.

For instance, Xbox (owned by Microsoft) had post after post about the upcoming Kinect upgrade and the new innovations revolving around that upgrade. Adobe had much to say about upgrades being made to the CS5.5 Suite and the upcoming launch of the CS6 Suite. Apples continuous hinting of the iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, and the various talks of the success of the iPad were interesting as well. With each of these posts from the various companies came talks from the CEOs (and other professionals, as these accounts would often link to other Press Releases and comments made by others) about the products and I found these to be the most interesting tweets/posts/blogs during the course of researching for this essay. However, the most useful information in regards to this essay's topic, centered around the few posts and tweets regarding the industries future as seen by the professionals.

Thus, I believe that there are a few things to be learned from following industry professionals through social media. First, we can gain insight into a particular leaders thoughts on a product or service. I believe this to be of utmost importance because it lets us know how they actually feel about a product. Now granted, they probably won't have anything negative to say about their own products given that they are most likely obligated to say things in their own interest, but regardless of this reading their comments through nearly real-time updates is fascinating and helpful for both the company and the customer. I compare this to this country nearly fifty years ago and the relationship it had with its elected president. Most Americans felt that they didn't have a close relationship with the President and that he was unknown to them aside from what they had read or researched themselves. This gives a sense of mystery and while suspense is great, you definitely don't want to feel that from a leader of your country.

So in the same way that social media, television, and the advance of emerging media has helped America feel close to its leader, social media helps customers feel close to company leaders. Yet this doesn't just apply to customers either. Looking at this from my own perspective, as a student hoping to eventually gain a footing in this very industry, working with the products from these companies, I gain much from merely following the professionals through social media. I gain a sense of knowing them better. I gain insight on the job market, market trends, advancements in technologies, and what to expect when I get into the field. This allows me to research these things further, because if the industry leaders have something to say about it, I can bet a significant amount of money that it will be important to know within the industry. So in a sense, following these professionals through social media is like planning directions for my research.

These blogs and twitter accounts give me the ability to efficiently research topics that are hot within the industry at that very moment, as opposed to going in blindly and maybe researching something that won't do me any good in the long run. Knowing about products, market trends, future plans for a company, etc are all things that I can gather from following these professionals and they basically act as the gateways to that knowledge. Its a map right there on my computer or phone. I think this is what anyone within any industry stands the most to gain from following their professionals through social media. It doesn't matter if the industry is computer science, telecommunications, art, or dietetics; arming yourself with current knowledge that is basically given to you by leaders in your industry, is the best thing you could do to become a professional yourself within you career.

Working in this training module was very challenging and yet very rewarding. I had not previously had Flash building experience nor any experience with the Flash Catalyst line of Adobe programs. However, a lot of interactive media uses Flash and flash based tools and files so I knew that this would be a good module to look into. Immediately I noted the extensiveness of this module despite being labeled 'Training Essentials'. As I continued through the module I came to find out that building even simple flash tools and files takes extensive time. Yet, each of the examples that was worked on in this module showed me what a good flash tool consists of, how to go about getting the interactive tool to do even the most basic of functions while looking sleek and elegant.

I found that working on the Olive Farm Interactive Tour tool was very fun and exciting. I was able to create drop down menus, scroll bars with selectable items, and design the flash-based game that went along with the interactive tool. These were the core features of this module, as well as scripting/coding the various events that took place within the interactive tool. However, the module also introduced flash timelines and event timelines to plan out how the interactive tool and game appear and depending on player outcomes, what happens next. I fount this particular part to be the most challenging and thus confusing at first. Yet the instructor and the video was very helpful in walking me through all of this.
I would also like to note that the module assisted me by showing how to import SWF files into Dreamweaver and thus use flash catalyst in conjunction with the web design program. The module also helped in showing me how to use the SWF Flash catalyst files with other HTML editing programs and tools so that they can be used on other sites not created with Dreamweaver.

Overall, I found this module to be very helpful. I believe I was much more interested in this module and program than i was with the Illustrator program. However, both are very useful tools and I hope to find the time to take other training modules with these two programs.

A Look at TCOM Through Digital Media

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Industry Leaders Essay

Second Lynda Training Module Outline/Review: Flash Catalyst

Second Lynda Training Module: Adobe Flash Catalyst