Could Microsoft out-Apple Adobe?

Let’s examine a few trends and remember that Apple beat its competitors in the education market twenty years ago by having a rabid fan base along with compelling intuitive software.  Microsoft Live’s community had 60 million users last time I checked. Working within the existing Live framework will be critical for any Learning Management Systems (LMS) play that Microsoft chooses to do in the future.

The eLearning potential with Microsoft’s (NASD: MSFT) current portfolio of hardware and software, part of which is the XBox brand, is gaining momentum. I’ve been discussing current instructional design trends with instructional designers, consumer media analysts, military training officers, and gamers. We’ve reached current consensus:

There are a lot of benefits to using the XBox 360 as a training / eLearning platform, primarily because of the XBox Live community.

Having solid revenue generating Intellectual Property (IP) in both hardware and software gives a strong advantage to MSFT in this space. Windows Live Mesh is self descriptive; it meshes all the services together.

How Does Live Mesh Work?

From Ten things to know about Microsoft’s Live Mesh | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com

Live Mesh builds on the cloud storage, management, service and provisioning and computational fabric that other Microsoft Live services use. On top of that, Live Mesh uses the same identity, synchronized storage and connectivity services that Microsoft uses for other Live offerings.

The “platform” services (a k a the “developer stack”) include the new Mesh Framework, as well as both a cloud and a client software run-time Mesh Operating Environment (MOE).

Live Mesh “experiences” from Microsoft and third-party providers will build on top of these layers.

Windows Live Mesh will make use of Silverlight as Michael Cote explained in People Over Process » Market Context for Silverlight – A Brief Q&A:

Q: What is your overall feeling about Silverlight at this time?

A: At the moment, Silverlight feels like it’s going to be on a full-on contender with Flash and Flex in a short time. Silverlight 2.0 is supposed to bring in the more “hard core” GUI programming features that Flex has.

Perhaps Microsoft’s Mesh project will address the offline synch tick-list of AIR. Then, the battle will be over ubiquity, developer hearts and minds, and control of the web.

Through the PC Silverlight allows some scary-good functionality.

Think about having Instructional Design teams building applications that can reach outside and into the web page itself: From More about Silverlight – Microsoft’s Flex / Flash Competitor

Further to that, Silverlight applications can access and manipulate the browser DOM (meaning they can reach outside and into the webpage itself) so once the Silverlight runtime is more common expect to see many developers of web applications tap into Silverlight for both a performance increase and for better visual enhancements and user experience.

This is important. We are now looking at two-way communication with Silverlight.

Available Silverlight eLearning Tools

I’ve seen a growing demand in Google hits on my site for how to take Captivate content and put it into Silverlight. People are asking about how to take the output from this market dominating tool and repurpose it into Silverlight and this is only the beginning.

Imagine having software tutorials buildable by instructional design staff that can be quickly hashed into something usable for the XBox 360, through XBox Live, or through Windows Live Mesh…

La Jolla-based MadCap Software’s Mimic (Adobe Captivate and TechSmith Camtasia competitor) outputs in Silverlight format. I haven’t heard whether TechSmith or Adobe are intending to put this into their products within the next release cycle.

Where is eLearning in all of this?

There are some other very significant benefits aside from Silverlight; meshing all of these services together adds Windows Live Writer and Instant Messaging in as well.

One benefit is in reaching people through advertising as well as explaining the process: Simple Instructions Work Best and Sell Products

Finding your audience is something that every Marketing person desires to do. Explaining a process so that an audience gets the point is what every Technical Communicator desires to do.

With Microsoft’s Live platform they’ve integrated both of these within their Instant Messaging client.

Regarding Windows Live Writer from Web 2.0 – Windows Live Writer reviewed for blogging:

Yet another entry from MSFT into the Web 2.0 space such as with the Silverlight framework which allows two-way communication from a website, and oh yes… this is for free. That’s pretty disruptive.

Adding to the chaos is the mash of what has occurred within the current eLearning space. Market analysis of eLearning from 2008 Corporate Learning Factbook Values U.S. Training Market at $58.5B:

* E-learning has grown dramatically. The use of self-study e-learning now accounts for 20% of student hours, up from last year’s figure of 15%.

This growth is driven largely by an increase in online training among small organizations (100-999 employees), which are acquiring the skills and technology to make online training a reality.

Analysis: Adobe Media Player, my @%$

The shaky economy plays into this. Re-education of adults is becoming a critical factor in economic restructuring. If industry is closing down, concessions from the unions force retraining. Cost efficient training is a growth industry.

While Adobe (NASD: ADBE)is repositioning itself and firing divisions, Microsoft has an advantage into the eLearning market and can leverage their existing Rich Internet Applications. If MSFT can duplicate what Apple did in the 1980s and entrench themselves into education, it will mean long term success in a disrupted market which has $58.5 billion in potential.

This model could effectively work even with a poor economy and would build an OS-free eLearning model built on IP within hardware and software which could be used globally.

In my five part segment last year I examined how well the XBox 360 might be combined into eLearning and also Technical Communication in general over this new settop box / gaming system. Now even more aspects are becoming compelling and pushing the advantages of the Microsoft XBox 360.

“Xbox LIVE is the world’s fastest-growing online social network on TV,” said John Schappert, corporate vice president of Interactive Entertainment LIVE, Software and Services Business at Microsoft. “We doubled our membership the past two years, growing from 3 million to 6 million, and then from 6 million to 12 million.

The Old Is The New

Understand that the ‘New XBox’ is the old XBox 360 with updates. As a matter of course, I believe it’s a short step away from using Silverlight content if it’s not already doing so in this update.

Instead of revamping the hardware within the box, MSFT poured resources into programming updated content and…

…leveraged the hot trends in internet connectivity and technology.

Hot Tech Trend: New Interface Methods – Xbox Style

I’ve been researching new interface methods as a hot tech trend for 2008 and I’m not disappointed with the new XBox . New interface methods are demo’ed in the Xbox 360’s “In The Movies”. Here’s a quick clip:

Now I don’t need cable at all…!

Get this – NetFlix is in agreement to stream over 10,000 movies across the XBox 360. Very cool. I have a strong feeling that DivX has a lot to do with this revolution.

So for consumers that don’t like to pay the extra $100 for the DVR / HD package, how about a $40 antenna for local HD signal, Netflix as a Starz / Encore movie replacement, and downloading the series you like when they’re online or on DVD from NetFlix.

XBox 360: Leveraging Family Time

Karaoke takes on a new aspect with Lips – yet another social interactive game for your online and in real life (IRL) friends. The last time I was over at a friend’s house with teenage kids, we all sat around and played a trivia game which was really cool. I think it’s a great way to do the family entertainment thing, rather than the old Milton-Bradley boardgames which I still enjoy but the kids want to pass up.

Xbox 360 LIVE Party – Cheap Online Collaboration?

While there aren’t many people who aren’t on Skype, a great concept copied from Sony’s Playstation is leveraging social networking across platforms for gaming.

I’ve seem some super collaboration se.tups from HP that this could compete with on a super low cost and low-tech level. This has a potential for eLearning and Blended Learning that is way beyond the pale.

Microsoft’s XBox 360 Experience notes this about LIVE Party:

Entertainment without limits. With LIVE Party, bring your favorite games, TV shows, movies and pictures to life by sharing those experiences with friends, wherever they are around the world.

Now if I could only get my XBox fixed since it’s been down with that hardware problem since April and I’ve been too busy to call their support system back (they were down the day I called) I’ll be testing all this content.

Note: I held positions in 3M for some time, I can’t recall if I still have it in my stock portfolio.

From 3M Press Room

3M Revolutionizes Mobile Displays

Miniature Projection Technology Available Now

2008 International CES

ST. PAUL, Minn.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–3M is now providing consumer electronics manufacturers with a revolutionary advancement in the emerging field of miniature projection technology. 3M scientists developed a breakthrough ultra-compact, LED-illuminated projection engine designed for integration into virtually any personal electronic device. Roughly the size of a wireless earpiece and less than half an inch thick, the 3M mobile projection engine delivers brilliant VGA resolution images and is available today.

This would be perfectly paired with the Minority Report Interface or the Multipoint Interface that I blogged about last week since the killer app would be your laptop becoming an interactive whiteboard / 3D modeling multipoint interface.

What’s currently done with a hacked Wii remote will quickly jump forward.

Forget the Sony sixaxis or the Wii: Disruption within Gaming Controllers Predicted

This could also completely revolutionize gaming since a simple USB plugin could allow the same reflective tape motion capture (MOCAP) that works with a larger projection engine without the form factor issues.

Rekall, Rekall, Rekall: Blast from the past

Remember that old movie Total Recall, yet another Philip K. Dick short story I might add?

Where Sharon Stone’s character was playing tennis with her virtual reality tennis pro in her shared apartment with Arnie at the beginning of the movie?

Casual Gaming Revolution: Even Tetris could take on a whole new life with this type of interaction.

MOCAP Developer requirements are critical

Drivers to be written for existing game titles and all new motion capture potential to be realized by developers. Standardizing the motion capture would be smart. I’m sure there will be a rush towards an IP approach to the MOCAP not seen since the 1990s with the dotcoms and their technology booms. Coding in development games with sockets / hooks for this type of interface to be written later would be a very wise decision.

eLearning and Blended Learning Killer Applications

Any training or arts which would reinforce muscle memory (dance, for one, or karate, or Tai Chi) will logically follow.

Not to toot my own horn, but I’ve already been looking into this market for some time. I’m excited about what this could offer, particularly after attending the 2007 GDC last year.

By the way, hat tip to iconnectdots.com for the news about this.

Three things I’ll closely watch in 2008:

1. Multipoint User Interfaces
2. Workflow Collaboration
3. Software as a Service (SaaS)

New User Experience Challenge: Multipoint User Interfaces

In my previous Gaming to Boardroom post I mentioned the cost-busting hack of a new type of interface – the multipoint interactive user interface – was starting to gain momentum. This would make much better use of those large wall-mounted LCDs and projectors.

The disruptive technology hack was sourced to the Nintendo Wii remote, a cheap off the shelf component mass produced, a Bluetooth interface, and any PC.

With reflective tape on his fingers, Johnny Chung Lee from Carnegie Mellon’s Human Computer Interaction Institute easily reproduces Tom Cruise’s motions within the groundbreaking Minority Report, a Philip K. Dick short story adapted by Steven Spielberg in 2002.

As I researched further I found out that SpaWar and indeed other military centers have indeed been closely examining this type of interface for their command and control centers.

Here is a quote from one of PC Magazine’s sources confirming that same trend in User Experience (UX) driven hardware interfaces.

From EDS’ Next Big Thing Blog: Predictions for 2008:

This will be the year when we see real deliverables for new user interfaces, moving beyond the mouse. Just like the Wii used a new interface to take some old technology and make it new again, we’ll see similar advances on the PC interface. Gestures, voice, displays… it’s time.

If this is as simple to create as Johnny Lee’s project, we’ll be seeing this on the market in 2008. The key will be what applications will be written to support this new interface, and that may end up being UX’s long term challenge for months or years.

Workflow Collaboration

The author also adds some information about workflow. It’s interesting to me that this validates quite a bit of the same mobile and technical communication markets I’ve been researching for the past ten years.

From EDS’ Next Big Thing Blog: Predictions for 2008:

I’ve been mentioning workflow for a number of years and we’re beginning to see it move from the desktop into mobile devices and that will be common place by the end of 2008 as various COTS applications incorporate mobile interfaces. Collaboration on mobile devices will also take off as part of Enterprise 2.0 activities.

I doubt that we’ll see widespread use of electronic paper techniques in business even though there are some quite interesting capabilities out there now and those devices will drop significantly in price by the end of 2008.

SaaS-y Applications

And of course, here’s a bit about Software as a Service (SaaS) applications, one such I’ve reviewed with the MadCap Feedback Service.

From EDS’ Next Big Thing Blog: Predictions for 2008:

Broad acceptance of SaaS and web based applications will take place but probably not in ways that we may think. A wider range of businesses will use service based approaches to enable their activities and it will be as controversial as offshoring has been.

Summary:

So what will we end up doing with Workflow Collaboration, SaaS, and Multipoint User Interfaces in 2008? 

SaaS is a cheaper way to do business, and can easily amortize the high cost of server technology. Its adoption is just good business sense since it can be cut loose quickly if something better comes along.

Workflow Collaboration will disrupt the current status quo, if it hasn’t already, particularly in the global knowledge management space. This saves time and money, allowing smaller stateside corporations to gain the same benefits as traditional outsourced models.

I see Gaming technology jumping full fledged into the Multipoint Interface market along with some specialized applications for design. I also see this immediately involved in eLearning and more importantly, blended learning environments.

This technology is really in its infancy but with the LCD market so commoditized and screen real estate not being trapped in low resolution with HD content everywhere, it’s a necessary step in our human interaction with our systems.

This is pure disruptive technology at its finest. If you haven’t priced a multipoint interactive whiteboard lately, just trust me in that it’s not cheap. Dell has them on sale listed in Google.

But I’m seeing a definite market developing for this user interface, particularly in eLearning and Blended Learning not to mention all sorts of uses for my buddies over at SpaWar here in San Diego.

Multi-touch sensors as far they’ve been touted as a high-res, low cost, scalable method to interact with your system. Not to get too Bleeding Edge, but this is like having a six foot iPhone interface.

The possibilities are amazing, particularly for someone with carpal tunnel syndrome like me. Software design does have to keep up though.

Multipoint Interactive Whiteboard: Blended Learning’s Holy Grail

Check out what Johnny Chung Lee, a Carnegie Mellon HCI Researcher hacked together with a Bic pen, LED light, some custom software and the Nintendo Wii remote (Wiimote)

Minority Report Interface: Reality and Yesterday’s News

If you’re a Phillip K. Dick or Steven Spielberg fan, you might recall the Minority Report UI that Tom Cruise used (at top of article).

Johnny came up with a wicked method to do the same thing.

So the end result is that this is Bleeding Edge technology, and finding uses for it falls into the Applications Engineering field.

consumer electronics,xbox,xbox live,xbox marketplace,elearning,slingbox,distance learning

Introduction to Xbox Live Marketplace – The eLearning Potential

The Marketplace allows you to purchase points, basically their currency, and downloadable content is sold with these points. You can purchase them over the counter in places such as Target, you can give them to minors who don’t hold credit card accounts as prepaid gift cards.

With those points you can purchase on demand movies (in HD, by the way, allowing XBox to compete with hardware manufacturers like Sony and their Blu-Ray HD dvd), music, (the Zune is the iPod competitor from Microsoft), arcade style / casual games (the leading consumer of online casual games believe it or not are women over 35), and even TV shows without commercials.

Xbox Marketplace: Free Content

I went to see the movie I Am Legend this weekend with a friend. Since I have decided not to get the satellite TV package which is my only choice where I live here in Connectivity Hell (my new apartment), I found out about it through the XBox marketing within XBox Live.I downloaded the trailers, some online flash-based comics (going, holy cow, this looks great!) and went and bought my $10.50 ticket to see it this past Saturday.

OT about Will Smith’s new movie I Am Legend

Here’s the buzz on Legend from an MTV entertainment wrapup:

Faster than the White Witch, more powerful than the One Ring, able to leap King Kong in a single frame — Will Smith officially certified himself as Hollywood’s Superman this past weekend, leading “I Am Legend” to an astounding $76.5 million. The gargantuan haul eclipsed “The Chronicles of Narnia,” “Meet the Fockers,” “King Kong” and all three “Lord of the Rings” movies to become the biggest December opening in history.

I didn’t know this until today, obviously I’m not alone in thinking it’s a phenomenal picture. In looking into the DC comics tie-in (Flash animated downloadable content) I noticed that Jada Pinkett-Smith, his wife and accomplished actress in her own right, was listed as one of the top producers.

Go see it. It’s scary, touching, funny, has an edge and a lot of character.

Distance Learning – Strong Potential with XBox Marketplace

XBox Marketplace is clearly a model that can be used with distance learning and other online courses. Imagine users of the XBox being able to use the same GUI and interface they’ve grown up with to get tutored in basic college level courses, and these courses being a two-way connection where the content is, as Silke now calls it, conceptual simulation.

I think this is an example of another educational framework whose application will either become marketable or not. I’m betting it will, given time and the adoption phase is still moving.

As a parent, I totally dig the value XBox has put onto their product in limiting the profiles to certain hours per day or per week. If I had distance learning or other content on the Xbox, I could lock down the box until homework was done – even if it was homework in advanced Greek, Geometry, etc.

As a consumer, I chose to access my internet connection instead of pipelining mainstream media (commercials are things I hate) through the XBox, obtaining HD content without the added bundle nightmare of yet another set-top box and monthly cost.

You get the drift.

Gaming and eLearning within your home – XBox eLearning?

I finally started using the XBox Christmas 2006 and have an XBox Live account. I’ve done several reviews of games for another blog prior to starting mine, and from time to time I participate in focus groups and user studies which derive significant market data for the major players.

The research company TDG Research did a set-top box study a few years ago in early 2005 which I was able to participate in. Additionally, they also spoke to many technical community leaders such as Macromedia and Microsoft to develop their market research questions.

I was in the rare position of being able to be a fly on the wall and listen to some of these open discussions with the division managers and Michael Greeson, the chief analyst at TDG Research.

The Diffusion Group (where the TDG in TDG Research comes from) has this offering in their current stack of reports from their ‘Place Shifted Media’ study:

By 2012, TDG predicts that there will be 95 million active, configured place shifting servers in broadband households around the world. The most frequently used device for this function will be the PC (with 48 million PS servers) followed by game consoles (with nearly 23 million units), hybrid IP/digital TV set-top boxes (with 13.6 million units), and digital media adapters (with 8.7 million units).

The coolest part was hearing the big player’s operational level (Directors, VPs, strategy guys either those who set it or those who carry it out) talking about their focus for the future. The problems they were trying to solve included how to digitally transport your content.

Your games, your music, your movies. Your stuff on Xbox Live

One big question that stood out in my mind was in how a person replaces that media which is lost, stolen, or destroyed without repurchasing it?

XBox’s Marketplace has gone a far distance in providing this. If your download is corrupted, your profile has shown that you have purchased the file and you’re able to freely download another copy.

The Marketplace allows you to purchase points, basically their currency, and downloadable content is sold with these points. You can purchase them over the counter in places such as Target, you can give them to minors who don’t hold credit card accounts as prepaid gift cards.

gaming,elearning,xbox,xbox live,xbox marketplace,adobe captivate

Let’s look into the eLearning concept of Technical Communication in our XBox example. eLearning teams are more familiarly known as Instructional Design in some corporations.

eLearning and Gaming: made for each other

Game-like learning was one important pillar of the Game Developer’s Conference in March 2007. I attended the GDC this year, and learned that Gaming is always something to watch closely for new inspiration in eLearning. Integrating gameplay into learning simply makes it more attractive for your audience.

Dance Dance Revolution (multi-platform) has quickly become a standard in schools for physical education class and for use during free time.

For anyone remotely interested in eLearning, gaming concepts are hot and becoming mainstream. Education through gaming – that’s really become the crown jewel of interactive entertainment. It’s a value add when a successful brand of product (game) can be used to actually improve someone’s education and/or lifestyle.

eLearning and Gaming: Adobe Captivate

Captivate Product Marketing Manager Silke Fleischer has constantly advocated the ‘soft skills’ potential of her product. The roleplaying elements of soft skills constantly remind me of the old text-based adventures / MUDs or that groundbreaking text game Zork.

The main question in Instructional Design (ID) and any training syllabus is how fast can someone learn, how well will they retain what they learn and how much will it cost.

Captivate went a long way in giving people a quick method to create these ‘choose your own adventure’ types of soft skills training scenarios.

Building up training scenarios within a program like Captivate teaches your potential Customer Service rep audience those face to face skills that everyone needs to learn without the time intensive one on one instruction.

Make demos for the software tutorials – Captivate has some good competition with Camtasia and MadCap’s Mimic – and your GUI-based learning is covered. Soft skills are more in the eLearning realm, and some Learning Management Systems (LMS) address this but Captivate makes it easier, IMHO.

XBox Live: Achievements – LMS for Gamers?!?

In order to fully understand and grasp the potential of the soft skills training that Captivate offers and cross reference that with our latest thread, one has to understand the potential of the XBox Live profiles and the Achievements.

Economists always talk about incentives, and incentivizing something. XBox Live does this with the Achievements.

As an aside, the book Freakanomics is the quickest and most entertaining way I’ve found to learn basic economic principles by the way – I have it on ipod and in book form and have used it as a gift two years ago.

Back to the Xbox Halo 3 article:

Since Halo 3 launched, gamers have unlocked more than 30 million achievements. In its first week alone, Halo 3 drove a record number of Xbox LIVE Gold Memberships as hundreds of thousands of new members gathered online to collectively compete and complete the game.

The concept is simple: You play the games, you have fun. You play the games and achieve objectives, you get Achievements. But if you play the games well with others, you get Achievements worth more points than single play.

Why are the XBox Achievements so appealing?

I think the appeal is that it breaks down goals into smaller bits. There are lessons learned there for ID teams everywhere. Gaming is fine, goals need to be defined clearly and as simply as possible (single sentence works within the Achievement section), and team-based learning within the right framework can build stronger teams along with completion of the objective.

Bottom line: If you can incentivize learning past the traditional and obvious reasons of self improvement, people will work together in ad hoc teams and problem solve their ways out of just about anything.

Community Incentives: Achievements

Microsoft is incentivizing its gaming community to become a community. Play single player games all you like, you take those earned Achievement points with you when you (MSFT hopes) inevitably go online with Xbox Live Gold. Xbox Live Silver is something everyone gets – a way to get your updates online, check your friends out, etc. Basic service vs premium service.

Recently I watched four thirtysomethings and two fortysomethings work for an entire four hour stretch to finish objectives in a one hour mission get 40 Achievement points in GRAW2 – Ghost Recon Adv Warfare 2.

For those gamers out there, this was for the Ultimate Defender achievement, meaning you have to face impossible odds for exactly sixty minutes and defend an objective.

As a test study for the Achievement segment of this blog post, I tried to get the Ultimate Defender.

OT: I’ve got an entire help file written for a squad based game under my belt from five years ago, so the tactics were easy for me to grasp. Communicating those tactics… well, I left that to the other more ’seasoned’ players who had rank on me.

My objectives I communicated to those who wanted to listen were simple, one sentence in nature.

So the failure rate was pretty high; imagine having to coordinate up to sixteen diverse players aged twelve to fifty to do what the Army or Marines do every day – but without the discipline and tactics they have instilled with their core basic training.

Hence the study on who actually achieved it, and how they did it. The teamwork however… Hey, I was there right alongside them. With a lousy DSL connection and everything. Of course I have yet to break a thousand points but then again, I have a family and this blog and that construction project so I’ve been more than a little busy.

How do you incentivize users to work well together with virtually no common training?

This was for 40 points. One of the gamers had 21,000 points already. Two others were in the 11,000 range. But you get a cool little badge icon in your profile and bragging rights. I have to say, given the data available I’m guessing the 40 points were the icing on top of an already very rewarding game.

Basically the Achievements still work to incentivize retention and gameplay. Of course it should go without saying that the content of the games are still paramount; but with competition like the Wii and PS3 Xbox has its niche well defended.

The achievements also made operating within the system more fun than, say, shooting all your teammates less than five minutes before the end of the game. Player Killing – PK’ing in game terms. Clearly antisocial behavior can’t be rewarded. For a really funny example of PK’ing, SouthPark has an episode featuring World of Warcraft which… well, even if you don’t like SouthPark it explains it all far better than I could.

XBox has a way to handle potential PK’ers also. Feedback. Hmm. Sounds like just about everyone’s interested in Feedback which leaves me wondering if the Cluetrain has left the station at Adobe. Microsoft gets it…

adobe robohelp,madcap flare,xml,dita,madcap blaze,workflow collaboration,online collaboration,xbox,gaming,technical communication

In order to keep the train of thought, I’m repurposing some of my previous blog entry… Just to stay on track, we’re still focusing on the Documentation side of gaming and the Xbox example.

Check out this screenshot from the XBox 360’s Media Center (well, any Media Center has this) and notice that they break things down into four sections, Help | Forums | Tips | Hardware Center. There’s a lot of content within these sections… not all of it from a single source and not all of it from a single company.

Consumer Electronics Support Challenges to Technical Communication

Without XML or other similar technology designed for repurposing the content, this will be an update nightmare. Most important, with so much blending between hardware, software, users, tech support, engineering and marketing, keeping the channels of communication open between departments simply cannot be limited to email and screenshots.There has to be a transparent workflow or cycles take far too much time to be cost effective.

People, we’re talking about saving real money here. A workflow must be organized, efficient, and structured. That is the true pain that people are feeling within organizations, particularly Consumer Electronics.

All of that content must be updated or it becomes irrelevant. Then the support phone calls start coming in and everyone starts spending money to support their product.

What software plays well with gaming / Consumer Electronics Fusion?

The question I have is – what software provides the best method to integrate this content?

With the feedback server and the XML framework of Flare, I would have to say the advantage goes to MadCap Software beyond all the other competitors, including Adobe RoboHelp and Quadralay’s option.Blending Web 2.0 elements and reporting is critical within the consumer electronics world.

XML / DITA / Wrangling Content

Repurposing content and integrating a smooth workflow seems to be more of the focus of MadCap Software than simply a head-to-head comparison with RoboHelp.

In the specific gaming industry study I’m looking at now, the XML framework is critical to keeping content ‘wrangled’. I’m also hearing quite a bit about how Blaze, MadCap’s new product offering, is going to measure up.

From MadCap Software’s Blaze site:

XML Foundation. MadCap Blaze features a unique patent-pending visual XML editor, fully driven by schemas and cascading style sheets (CSS). However, no knowledge of XML is required in order to use Blaze.

Blaze has the potential as described by MadCap to become a market leader within the Consumer Electronics fusion space.

MadCap Software is integrating Disruptive Technology directly within it, and it will work with their existing products.

xbox,gaming,technical communication,consumer electronics,technical support

Continuing from the other article, let’s look at the Documentation side of Technical Communication.

What forms of Documentation?

First, let’s understand that we have time to absorb the role of docs in gaming. Having an understanding of the gaming world never hurts but it’s not yet critical in most tech writer’s immediate applications.

Documentation for gaming is still being written in traditional methods however it’s becoming supplanted by user-fed wiki sites across the net. 

Nutshell of the Gaming Wiki phenomenon:

Traditional published gaming guides must now compete with a free-based model, often times supplemented from their own content which is rehashed from the user reading the manual.

Looking forward at the blurring of lines between straight-text tech writing and rich media, it’s clear that help files are starting to take more forms and their importance within the Xbox framework and the Consumer Electronics framework and value in support reduction cannot be underestimated.

Yeah, ever had a hard time returning a software package? Now imagine your $400 to $800 entertainment set-top box (or in this example XBox 360) has problems you can’t resolve. How hot would you be? Who would you call? Who are your resources?

Check out this screenshot from the XBox 360’s Media Center (well, any Media Center has this) and notice that they break things down into four sections, Help | Forums | Tips | Hardware Center.

All of that content must be updated or it becomes irrelevant. Then the support phone calls start coming in and everyone starts spending money to support their product.

In the Consumer Electronics world, people tend to hate to spend money on products they’ve already sold. The less the better. If their channel partners offer a quick and easy solution to their support headaches, even just by integrating their navigation and cutting out the normal ‘google the error’ path things are made better.

Reducing Call Volume? Oh, that’s saving REAL money now.

Now break down the challenges that the Media Center team faces in keeping all of this content from different sources managed. Imagine what it would be like to be on this team, facing the deluge of information that they deal with.

What’s their techcomm workflow like?

A workflow must be organized, efficient, and structured. That is the true pain that people are feeling within organizations, particularly Consumer Electronics. Without XML or other similar technology designed for repurposing the content, this will be an update nightmare.

Most important, with so much blending between hardware, software, users, tech support, engineering and marketing, keeping the channels of communication open between departments simply cannot be limited to email and screenshots.

This is important to understand: Halo 3 has outsold Star Wars. And Spiderman 3. And any other movie in history.

It is the single week record holder for any form of entertainment, period.

Not to mention, doing its part in improving Microsoft’s gaming platform sales:

Sales of the Xbox 360 console saw a sharp increase, more than doubling compared to the weekly average before the launch of Halo 3.

Even the Army uses the XBox handheld controller for their house-clearing robot. So it’s safe to say that XBox has penetrated many diverse markets. I’ve got some raw data from Microsoft about their game market penetration, but I’m talking about across complete Consumer Electronic channels more than the game aspect.

From InformationWeek:

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT)’s Halo 3 racked up $170 million in sales on its first day of availability, making it the hottest-selling title in video game history.

From XBox / Microsoft: Biggest Entertainment Launch in History

To date, over 20 million copies of the games in the Halo trilogy have been sold worldwide. The record week one sales comes on the heels of the previously announced $170 million in sales in the U.S. within the first 24 hours of the game’s release, which marked not just the biggest videogame launch, but the biggest entertainment launch in history.

The Xbox 360 title beat previous U.S. sales records set by blockbuster openings for entertainment events like the release of Spider-Man 3 and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

How many people play XBox?

According to their figures, Microsoft says that 11 million Xbox 360 consoles have been sold. So, for a game retailing at $60 the math is pretty simple that just about everyone owning an XBox 360 bought a copy of Halo 3.

How many people are in this core group? from Microsoft – http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/14595/Xbox-360-and-Xbox-Live-Facts-and-Stats/

Faster than expected, Xbox LIVE has eclipsed the 7 million member milestone and is on track to reach 10 million members by the end of June 2008. In fact, in the last year we’ve added a new Xbox LIVE member every 8 seconds.

Where does the TechComm come in?

eLearning and Documentation. You know it, love it and live it. I’ll explain how they converge.

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I’ve been getting stuff done this weekend and now I’m moving this week. So there’s not a lot of blogging time for me and as soon as I post this, I’m packing up the main system for transport.

Silverlight Released Today By Microsoft

I’m interested in the competition this gives the Flash Player and it makes good sense about why Adobe sped up their release.

I’m interested in the direction online learning / eLearning, since most standard education setups use Microsoft products already and the IE Browser wars have been played out, with their ’security setting’ blasting most entrenched Flash projects created with anything earlier than Flash 7.

Note: Don’t think that I believe that Microsoft will not have their own security issues with Silverlight, it’s just that it’s easier for them to put the fix in.

Why Should HAT Authors Know About Silverlight?

I think this is compelling for Technical Communication for several reasons. Overall, the eLearning and Technical Communcation space is going to get richer content through better streaming technologies in the near future.

Silverlight and Flash are those top contending technologies which will have broad, 95% and up penetration of the market. Silverlight is very integrated within the MSFT-included Windows Media Player, not to mention they’re partnering (somewhat) with Linux.

I work with programming teams who do some amazing and proprietary things with Flash, and I’m expecting great things from them because Silverlight is supposed to be more improved than Flash and easier for them to transition into, particularly the Visual Studio users.

Silverlight In Their Own Words

Here’s one of the Silverlight team talking about the experience:

Working on two different product releases – Silverlight 1.0 and 1.1 – simultaneously is a very unique experience not easily summarized in a blog post. The kind of stuff this team has done in a matter of months is nothing short of amazing. We joke internally about how someday books will be written about these episodes; and needless to say, about the giants upon whose shoulders people like me stood.

Another Silverlight developer’s blog says it all:

that sound?  yeah, my jaw dropping.  me likey.  oh, and wicked cool halo3 hd video

Here are some excerpts from today’s new Silverlight product press release. Of specific note is the better quality and the ‘tight integration’ speak. You’re going to hear a lot of that ‘tight integration’ speech from user-focused product development teams, because the trend is to have multiple functioning software products working together.

REDMOND, Wash. — Sept. 4, 2007 — Microsoft Corp. today released to the Web (RTW) Silverlight™ 1.0, a cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in for delivering richer user experiences on the Web. In addition, Microsoft will work with Novell Inc. to deliver Silverlight support for Linux, called Moonlight, and based on the project started on mono-project.com.

Silverlight significantly reduces development and deployment costs and provides enhanced Web audio and video streaming and playback using industry-leading Windows Media® Technologies.

Microsoft unveiled new Silverlight customer experiences on “Entertainment Tonight,” HSN and World Wrestling Entertainment, and also launched the Silverlight Partner Initiative, a program designed to foster collaboration among solution providers, content delivery networks, tools vendors and design agencies.

“Silverlight is a popular new way to build and deliver cross-browser, cross-platform experiences on the Web,” said Miguel de Icaza, vice president of Developer Platforms and leader of the Mono project at Novell. “Novell is excited to work with Microsoft to extend Silverlight beyond Windows® and Macintosh to Linux with Moonlight, so Linux users everywhere can enhance their rich media and interactive experiences on the Web.”

The tight integration between Visual Studio® and Expression Studio allows developers and designers to easily share projects, designs and code to create stunning, high-quality applications faster and in a more cost-effective manner.

In addition to the release of Silverlight 1.0, Microsoft released Expression Encoder 1.0 (formerly Expression Media Encoder), a tool that makes it simple for professionals to encode, enhance and publish rich media content to Silverlight. The intuitive interface allows users to rapidly encode a wide array of file-based media content formats into a Silverlight experience. Expression Encoder also eases production of live events using sought-after features such as multisource switching and publishing of content to services including Silverlight Streaming by Windows Live™.

When it comes to refining a Knowledge Management workflow, I’ve been researching into collaboration tool adoption. I tend to look towards the internet for what the free market economy brings up.

There’s a sweet spot between the user familiarity of an email and the openness and collaboration capabilities of a wiki; I tend to use a DevBlog instead. DevBlogs, or development-based blogging, has an adoption rate of about 60% of my client base and allow remote collaboration and concept review.

Hence the DevBlog concept, and my adoption of the WordPress standard for Blogging. Most people can use the web-based Comments area because they have already adopted the technology by viewing or interacting on other people’s blogs.

I believe this is because of the subject structure, and most importantly, the ability to collate the information by relativism; nesting a family of knowledge within Workflow Collaboration such as this post falls into, allows me to communicate effectively with each part of my team since everyone knows where the related posts are.

Knowledge management could use wikis as a dream tool, however repurposing the content tends to be cumbersome. I expect that the Web 2.0 focus of MadCap Software’s Flare v3.0 addresses this issue nicely.

So the question comes down to whether there a better free tool – in this case a wiki – that can provide what the corporation needs to collaborate and collate information effectively?

Corporate Wikis – Ready For Prime Time?

I’m torn on the issue of wiki usage within a company. Rivalry remains the top killer of corporate thought, IMHO.

I think it depends a lot on the type of corporate structure; to be blunt about it a hostile work environment rewards innovative and individual thought destructively and can jeopardize someone’s position. Having a wiki, which tracks good ideas openly, may endanger those free-thinking people without them even realizing it.

If the company is based on collaboration from the get-go, wikis would be enormously effective. Learning / Training departments who use a departmental approach might be able to gain incredibly from the ability to change information as it is gathered from the instructors in the field, however email may work just as well.

Flare, with the Feedback Server, allows two-way interaction which is recommended for use within the secure firewall, in the form of a ‘beta’ site during product development.

[Flare 3.0 and the Feedback Server have] Web 2.0 community capabilities, allowing readers to add their own comments and provide feedback on your documentation… …providing the ability to allow readers to rank the quality of the topics and content using a simple star system. — MadCap Software

The ‘beta’ site then has the help file with open comments allowed by the Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) and the Product Managers (PMs) can determine what content they want included in their deliverable for the product release. Related topics are managed using ‘See Also’ or A-links which update relatively to the content placement. Add to that the simple methods of including and excluding content based on the Conditional Tags (Build Tags for RoboHelp users) and you’re laughing.

The final product is either a self-hosted help file, or a web-based help file that has had many more eyes on it and has had more input through comments by the SMEs than was earlier available with just a hardshelled help file and email.

All in all, I think wikis are a technology to track, but for most knowledge management and software help authoring, I would recommend spending the up-front money on the Flare/Feedback combination. That way the content can be provided in Word, XML, HTML, or PDFs and assembled by a professional Technical Communicator.

Wikis in Game Development

One exception to this would be within the world of Game Development. Having a multiple author environment is critical for ‘blue-sky’ thinking in game development, and refining the game concepts down into brainstorming requires documentation. Because the concepts have to flow freely, the initial phase is very important not to stifle. Creativity which is then recorded is critical.

When it comes to the narrower and more defined area of taking those ideas and placing them into the requirements documentation, having something in an XML framework makes life easier also.

Wikis in Pinstripes – Wikipedias In Corporations

Here’s a great article I’ve discovered about wikis in business, found on the Harvard Business School ‘Working Knowledge’ site. My experience with Harvard MBAs has not left me impressed but this is a very well reading article, with a great question and answer session at the end. Quoted from http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5605.html :

Harvard Business School professor Andy McAfee has his doubts that a corporate encyclopedia would have much value. But the underlying wiki technology—basically an electronic document and repository where participants can throw out ideas, comment on the work of others, and share documents—has more promise.

HBS Cases: How Wikipedia Works (or Doesn’t) — HBS Working Knowledge

What Wikipedia has shown is that self-selection is critical. Peer review is critical. So there is a challenge for firms that are used to managing employees and allocating the resources in a very top-down kind of way. Now we have a technology that enables self-selection, transparency, openness—how does a manager or management deal with the technology? Do they implement it in a way that’s true to the spirit, or is it top-down? And, again, there are some very successful examples and some not so successful examples.

Some people wonder about collaboration and how effective this form of communication is – are wikis just a fad, or are they the focus on the future?

The new generation of students, the MySpace and Facebook generation, will be hitting the HBS campus soon; they are already here to some degree. They are so used to collaboration and sharing in a distributed fashion, for instance, going to a friend’s page and leaving a note. They have these asynchronous ways of coordinating and collaborating.

Q: If you were to counsel companies that need more cross-collaboration and need to break down silos, what technologies would you recommend?

What I usually tell companies is, “Look, if you want to activate this Web 2.0-style energy inside your company, management is going to make all the difference. And if you manage it the old-fashioned way, or if you don’t manage it and you just have the if-we-build-it-they-will-come philosophy, you’re probably going to be disappointed.”

You need to be actively involved—I’m going to fall back on buzzwords—in coaching to get desired behaviors and leading by example, and not shooting people when they step a little bit out of line. The organization is going to be watching what happens, and you’re going to send very, very strong signals one way or another that are going to be picked up very quickly.

Corporate Wiki Success Depends On Leadership

Even with the right tools, successful corporate communication comes down inevitably to quality leadership.

All in all, I think wikis are a technology to track, but for most knowledge management and software help authoring, I still would recommend spending the up-front money on the Flare/Feedback combination.

That way the content can be provided in Word, and assembled by a professional Technical Communicator, and with a limited ability to speak too much out of turn, it should keep anyone from sticking their foot in their mouth in print in front of the Executive team.

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