Adobe MAX Keynote Day 1

Adobe MAX this year had over 5,000 attendees. Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen spoke first. He focuses on what Adobe is calling the Flash Platform which now includes Thermo and Flex Builder. Thermo has now been branded as Flash Catalyst, which a preview build available to all MAX attendees. Everyone is also receiving a preview of the next version of Flex Builder, called "Gumbo." He then profiles an AIR project for Project (Red) that is a subscription-based content provider of music. The product is called (Red)Wire and is supposed to launch later this year.

Next up was Kevin Lynch. Kevin focuses on three trends: client and cloud computing; social computing; and devices and desktop computing. Kevin focuses on how the faster adoption of Flash player releases allows them to speed up the innovation process, allowing them to release every year. Flash player 10 includes real time processing of audio and Kevin shows off a very cool audio mixer built in Flash. He also shows off some of thePixelBender and 3D enhancements in Flash player 10 including live transformation of 3D with video. Finally he shows off the new text engine. Heannouced a 64 bit Linux release of Flash Player which he says was released today. Kevin then invites Bud Albers, the CTO of Disney Interactive to discuss what they are doing with Flash.

Kevin announces the MLB.com has chosen Flash for streaming video (which, he doesn't mention, means they dropped Silverlight). He discusses AIR and announces the release of AIR 1.5 for Windows and Mac (Linux coming soon). The new release includes Webkit with SquirrelFish as well as encrypted local databases. Kevin then invites Micheal Zimbalist from the New York Times Company to talk about a newsreader built in AIR. Considering I read the NY Tmes every day, this is quite interesting, allowing you to read the news on and offline, pulling the latest stories if you are online. He emphasizes how the articles layout dynamically with wrapping columns of text. The ads within the paper look like print but are interactive like the web, including embedded Flash Video.

Kevin returns and shows off a new mobile device which will be running AIR and shows off the NY Times newsreader running on that device. Kevin then introduces MariaShriver and Ann Lewnes, SVP of Corporate Marketing at Adobe. Ann does an interview/conversation with Maria about a project for California Museum.

Kevin runs through a new application called Tour de Flex, which is an AIR application which appears to be livedocs on steroids with Twitter integration, example applications and sample code. Kevin then introduces a Salesforce.com executive to speak. Unfortunately, I am running low on battery, so at this point I need to turn to the old skool approach of pen to paper.

Kevin moves on to discuss the social computing trend by introducing Nigel Pegg, a senior engineering manager, to speak about Cocomo. Cocomo is a service/product for building real-time social applications in Flex. For example, Nigel talked real-time across an AIR application with videostreaming. He was also able to collaborate on the application on screen by "co-navigating" (this was not screen sharing and no data from the application was passed across the web). Adobe manages the infrastructure for the collaboration utilities. As of today, theCocomo platform service is available on labs as a beta.

Kevin returns to discuss Adobe Wave for displaying desktop notifications. Using Wave, your web applications can easily pass desktop notifications to the client. It sounded like this might also be on labs but it wasn't clear.

Finally, Kevin talks about the devices and desktop trend, focusing on how devices now far outnumber computers for accessing the Internet. Kevin says that there will be one billion flash-enabled phones by 2009. This leads to a discussion on the "Open Screen Project." Adobe is building the full Flash Player 10 for higher end mobile phones. He shows off a Nokia Symbian -based phone, a windows mobile device running Flash within Opera (Kevin seems surprised when this works for the demo), another device running Windows Mobile and Opera to play YouTube. Finally, he shows an iPhone, but doesn't demo it because apparently it still doesn't have Apple's blessing. Lastly, he shows an Android device running video using Flash Player 10. Kevin introduces Andy Rubin of Google, who is one of the creators of Android, for a brief but uninformative discussion.

Kevin demos a Flash Lite Nokia phone to show how it works today, which isn't terribly intuitive. Adobe is releasing an application to package Flash-based applications and distribute them to phones. This is also available today (I assume on Labs but that wasn't clear). You will also be able to install Flash on your phone over the air. The applications now run like native applications on the phone with access via the phone's start menu. Lastly, Kevin shows off a "device of the future" that is multi-screen aware and is ale to connect to screens around it allowing for sharing and collaboration between users and multiple devices.