Day 2 of Intel AppUp Elements 2010 included topics to help developers make money with apps, promote apps to increase success, and understand the continuously evolving apps ecosystem. Attendees also had access to Blackbelt level developers and Adobe AIR developers.
Let’s take a closer look.
Rock Out with Your Blocks Out
The Stretch Your Mind track was aptly named. Sessions ranged from panels on netbook consumer behavior to security to in depth development platform reviews for Adobe AIR and MeeGo SDK. The power behind all of this mind stretching activity? Yes. TWINKIES.
RWW spoke with several developers and captured what they are taking away from the sessions. The variation in attendance of sessions also provided a quick data point on what is the hot topic for all developers and what might be more niche.
For example, a great many discussions started with the words “porting from iPhone to” and “moving from Objective-C to C++”. Another common refrain from developers was the hope that Intel will create a social element for the consumer interface of AppUp.
On the topic of application review, Intel indicated it would be outsourcing the vetting of applications to an external third party company. Essentially, Intel is expecting the flow of diversity to preclude having the right mix and numbers of Intel full time staff in place for that scenario. This third party approach also means Intel is trying to avoid prior examples of queue concerns with other app marketplaces.
During discussions of where AppUp might be available to consumers, Intel was cautious in naming names of high profile projects outside of Intel. Namely, while the Cisco Cius was used in most of the screenshots and there were numerous references to Google TV, Intel did not comment specifically on the availability of AppUp for these platforms.
Engage!
At a developer oriented conference you’ll come across coding, shop talk, and all manner of geek speak. Intel AppUp did not lack in that area. What was more telling and indicative of the desire for more than just the code is the overflowing rooms that didn’t bring up code once.
One example of a glimpse into the other side of app developer communities was the “Getting Consumers Engaged with Your Apps”. As one attendee said “you have a limited amount of time in a day” to engage. The panel for was composed of Frank Gruber of Tech Cocktail, Xavier Lanier of notebooks.com, Daniel Odio of Pointabout Inc, and John Bergquist of Soma Games and The Code Monkeys.
Each panelist had a different take on what really matters and how best to approach the goal of getting consumers to care about your app. Suggestions tended to tip and tricks such as making videos and applying mechanical turk for SEO value to using Facebook and Linkedin to search out key influencers.
Departing from the tips and tricks flow, Frank Gruber hammered on why “hustle” matters when you are building up your apps. Gruber’s point was the emphasis on staying as real time as possible to move quickly so that you immediately discover what works and more importantly — what does not work if you try any of these tips and tricks. This should be familiar to anyone that has applied iterative approaches to code development and here Gruber challenged app developers to apply this outside of only the coding side of app development. Later Gruber summarized this as giving your app a “heartbeat” so that consumers know you are a real person or a vibrant app developer that is interested in being engaged.
Post Diet Mt. Dew Quotes
In speaking with Taylor Brown and Jesse Mecham of YouNeedABudget.com, an Adobe AIR shop, the following phrases were shared:
“I am glad to see how much Intel is behind this. This is a genuinely large initiative. We want to be in front of more eyeballs and Intel is committed to enabling that for app developers.”
“The tangible dates shared for availability by the retailers were a pleasant surprise. This is about the hardware and retail side coming together finally. It’s bigger than we thought.”
In keeping with the multi-platform theme, Rovio is bullish on the things heard at the AppUp event. In speaking with Ville Heijari he shared the following:
“Expect the world of Angry Birds to get much much larger”
On the international front, developers with audiences in Japan, China and Europe such as Uwe Maurer of Ambient Design LTD based in New Zealand shared the following:
“AppUp will make it easier for us to reach new customers on emerging netbooks with pen, touch, and multi-touch capabilities for our natural media paint software, ArtRage 3 Studio“
Coder Challenge: 7 Kinds of Awesome
There were 7 teams on the Coder Challenge. Easy DICOM Viewer, MTAR, M-Power, VR Aquarium, Little Fingers, Trillion Ball and Gazelle.
Winners received $2000 each and a brand new netbook!
Keynote from Peter Biddle: We Can Do Better Than This
Peter Biddle opened the conference and said that all the secrets would be revealed during the final keynote. Biddle did not disappoint.
After a short Pong story (you had to be there!) and observations on the how “We can do better than this” theme he launched into the vision of AppUp and how it will fundamentally alter the scale and expectations of the apps marketplace mode. Biddle went on to outline how and why AppUp is going to address 5 key points.
- Platform Sexiness
- API Volume
- Money and Recognition
- Low Friction Deployment
- Validation? Boring!
In short, Intel AppUp aspires to give your app a face, a community, a path and a venue to be discovered and consumed easily. If you are a musician this might sound familiar to you. You’ve heard “rock star” developer before but the notion of being in a sea of developers in an even larger sea of apps might start to draw the parallel between app developers and musicians.
Unfindable, unsearchable, and unreachable are the things AppUp intends to knock down. Finding the signal in the noise is where Biddle hit stride in the talk. By relating the feedback he assembled from each session he listened to and then consolidating that feedback for the keynote, he got heads nodding. The building of partners through tools and processes is what makes the curators a real and viable aspect of the vision. Take any Top 10 X blog posts and you’ll begin to see what driving back to apps could mean if that blog is using AppUp open systems.
Biddle asked “How we did” of the crowd and all hands went up on the awesome scale. Considering that this was the first Intel AppUp Elements event the Oprah moment for 2011 is that all 2010 attendees get free comp badge for Intel AppUp Elements 2011!
Update: Day 2 is still going and we will provide updates in semi-real time!
Disclosure: Intel is a sponsor of ReadWriteWeb.
