Tag Archives: ios

digital media

#BBM: My article on BBM from Blackberry World (May 2013)

Back in May of this year I had the opportunity to travel to Orlando for BlackBerry’s Live conference. I wrote a number of articles from my trip on itbusiness.ca. You can read them here, over there, and also here.

Recently, BBM, Blackberry’s popular messaging service, became available for Android and iOS devices. Since then, over 10 million new people have downloaded the app.

BBM Channels
BBM Channels

I also wrote about BBM and BBM Channels in May. For those curious where Blackberry is going with BBM, Channels and monetization. It is well worth the read (if I do say so myself.) You can read that article over here.

digital media

#FollowFriday: Robleh Jama from Tiny Hearts

It has been a pleasure getting to know Robleh over the past couple of years.  Most recently, I have had the opportunity to sit at the feet of this humble giant to learn how he has launched 3 consecutive successful mobile products.

Who is Robleh Jama? He is the founder & CEO of Tiny Hearts which is an award-winning software studio focused on creating beautiful, playful and useful apps.

What has he built?

  1. Pocket Zoo – a virtual zoo with live animal cams. Pocket Zoo went on to become a #1 Education app and a Top 50 Overall app.
  2. InstaMatch – The Instagram Game.  A popular memory game that has been featured on TechCrunch, TUAW, Swiss Miss, Coolhunting.com and by Apple as a What’s Hot & Staff Favourite app.
  3. Most recently released Wake, a beautiful and intuitive alarm for iPhone. Currently a top utility app on the App Store.

I had the opportunity to capture an interview with Robleh on camera. It’s a very insightful conversation. I hope you enjoy watching and listening:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnXbbTrF_o8&w=560&h=315]

digital media, social media, twitter

Does Vine have it’s first Vine-Superstar?

I say yes. And his name is Adam Goldberg.

Many of you might know Adam from movies such as Saving Private Ryan and A Beautiful Mind.  Adam also happens to be an accomplished musician, designer and director.

And now, he’s using Vine as a creative outlet and to showcase his creative talents. (If you’re curious about Vine check out the blog post I wrote on my company website.)

Which is a good thing. He’s not making videos of cookies being eaten or cats playing with dogs. Not that I have anything against dogs. It’s those darn cats I can’t stand…

And Adam will not be alone for much longer. The Vine platform and format is simple to use. For anyone.

All you need is 6 seconds. A 6 second movie. About anything you want. Think about it. How many people wish they could create a viral video on YouTube? Many. But it’s not really the viral video people are interested in making unless they use the platform for business – “Hey Karim, can you make me a viral video?”

People are interested in the creativity of these videos. However, the masses have been stopped as a result of a continuous raising of the bar. With Vine, the barrier to entry is fixed. And it’s low. Only 6 seconds. Imagine what you can come up with in 6 seconds. Now all you have to do is grab your smartphone* and away you go.

What will you create in 6 seconds?

* = currently Vine is only on the iOS platform.