This year we moved away from our craptastic flip cams. Those’re great if you’re watching a dog run around in a backyard, but suck for capturing a conference session. Poor video, and poor audio. This year we captured just the screen and used each presenters laptop mic, which pics up incredibly good audio. The added benefit of directly capturing the presenters screens was that our session videos are 720p. That means you can see the code, read the slides and actually get something out of them.

That said, we did raise the price the videos. Not a lot, they’re now $5/ea. Part of why we charged so little was the low production value of the videos. You could rarely see the screen clearly, and the audio was often sub par at best. That’s not the case now. We were able to capture 30 sessions out of just under 50. Some sessions got recorded without audio, others the presenter simply didn’t want to record, and some the recording software failed. But 30 ain’t bad. We created a bundle at the top of the listing, which will save you $50 bucks, vs. buying each session on it’s own.

As always, feel free to share with coworkers, and such, but don’t be a dick and make the videos available for download, the income we get from session videos helps cover the hosting of them, as well as the software and equipment we use to make them.

So head over to the session videos page and enjoy.

And enjoy this one on us. Michael Labriola – The Why of Performance.

If you were in Denver last week or were watching twitter, we announced during the Wednesday State of the Union General Session, that 360|Flex was dead. Ok not dead, but no longer active. Let’s say retired.

We announced 360|Stack as the successor to 360|Flex.

I realized that I shoulda had a blog post ready to post after that keynote for maximum effect, but oh well.

So what does this all mean? Well unlike everyone else we didn’t want to try and squeeze a new mission into an old name. You know like changing what the letters in an acronym stand for. That’s not how we roll, and we didn’t think it right to try and shoe horn new ideas into an old package. Plus 360|Flex is special and making it fit a new ‘thing’ seemed to diminish that specialness.

360|Flex fuckin’ rocks. Even our years where we lost money, we had a blast and loved the community. Flex has a long road ahead of it and we plan to be a part of it, but there’s more to our community than Flex. Lots more.

I mentioned this in the general session. What makes 360|Flex so awesome was never Flex. It was the community. The fact that we were all doing Flex work, just made it easier :)

Funny anecdote, Jonathan Knapp  was hanging out with me this past monday where I cowork in Denver, and said he hasn’t done Flex in a few years, but hasn’t missed a 360|Flex ever because while the technology we focused on wasn’t directly in his wheelhouse anymore, the community and the vibe were like none other and that energized him. That really reinforced to me that we chose correctly. 360|Flex has had an awesome run! Started in 2007, this year was the 10th 360|Flex. Ten conferences is a good run. Like George Costanza says, “end on a high note”

Except we’re not just ending on a high note, we’re starting on one!!

360|Stack will be what 360|Flex always was. An event focused on the cool people making cool shit. Maybe they’re making it in Flex, maybe it’s something in the HTML5 stack, maybe it’s a native app. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is the Cool Shit.

A lot people asked during the conference what 360|Stack was about. The answer then was easy, the line up of awesome talked we collected for 360|Flex 2012, would very much mirror the type of talks we’d have at 360|Stack. No foo-foo road map sales talks. No “try my framework it’s better than the rest” talks that never show code and love bullet points.

No no no. It’ll be code on screen, technical talks so deep you walk out of the session, with a bit a headache and tons of creative energy to go use what you just learned!

That’s what 360|Flex was all about, and that’s what 360|Stack will be all about too. Just you wait and see! You thought we rocked as a Flex conference? just wait…

The keynotes begin at 9:30, so make sure to tune in.

Even before Flex moved to the Apache Foundation, folks have been building awesome things to support the dev community. I predict now that Flex is finally and truly open source, that third party ecosystem will explode. It’s one thing to support a commercial product, always afraid your product will be baked into the latest release or broken by API changes. Now the third party can actually help improve Flex by getting involved in the project itself. Win win.

Just check out this incredible list of companies actively participating in the awesomeness of Flex.
Speaking of community, two days ago I was able to help host a joint User Group meeting with two of Denver’s Adobe focused User Groups. Mike Chambers and Lee Brimelow came out to talk about Flash and Gaming as well as the future of Flash. It was a great meeting. If you’re not a member of your local User Group. You should be. Not only are they great ways to meet other developers in your area, but they’re a great(er) way to stay in the loop in what’s going on with Adobe.

This site maintains a list of User Groups. Check it out. Get involved!

I mean you’ll get some goodies :) We’ve got stickers, and our sponsors will no doubt bring goodies. Of course our sponsors tend to think outside the box, so be prepared for some cool stuff.

But what I really mean is you’re gonna leave with business cards in hand, of people you actually want to talk to again (Sorry sales guys and recruiters). People you’ll work on an Open Source Project with, or write a book with, or simply take a job or contract andwork with. You’ll also leave with more notes than you’ve taken in years. We see people every year scribbling and typing furiously during sessions to capture all the awesome information being shared.

And of course if you’re participating in our Arduino Hands on course, you’ll leave with a spark fun inventors kit.

You might also leave with a hang over, but that’s just the cost of being at 360|Flex sometimes :)

Don’t miss out, if you take Flex seriously, you need to be in Denver in two weeks. It’s an investment in your future that we hear time and again, pays off by lunch on day one.

See you there. Register now, it’s not too late!

This will be a good opportunity to speak directly with Adobe, ask questions, and discuss recent changes around the Flash Player.

The Future of Flash – Mike Chambers

In this session, Mike will lead a discussion around recent changes and announcements around the Flash Platform. He will then spend some time laying out the roadmap for the Flash Player, and discuss the direction in which the player will evolve, including the general focus of the player and the ActionScript language and AVM (ActionScript Virtual Machine). In addition to discussing the Flash roadmap, we will be showing off the latest Flash and Adobe AIR content, give some sneak peeks on upcoming releases, and setting aside plenty of time for open discussions and Q&A.

Adobe Gaming Technology – Lee Brimlow

In this session Gaming Evangelist Lee Brimelow will reveal the latest technologies being worked on by Adobe for game developers. They will show how these technologies allow developers to create casual 2D games in addition to AAA 3D games. Current best practices will also be discussed.

Details:

April 3rd. (RSVP Here)

6:30 – 7:00 – Pizza, beer, soda. Enjoy!

7:00 – 9:00 – Mike and Lee.

See you there!

This class, by Android Developer David Smith, will focus on getting your Android app running smooth, and lookin’ pretty. The full outline is here.

This is an 8 hour class, with limited seating. Dave will be walking thru several advanced topics intended to take your Android development to a new level, leaving behind basic UI approaches that aren’t efficient and definitely aren’t pretty :)

This class is in Downtown Denver. Bagels/Coffee and lunch will be provided. It is BYOL (Bring Your Own Laptop).

For those local to Denver, this will be a great way to prep for 360|Flex 2012′s mobile sessions.

Check out some of the highlights.

Graphics and Resources

But I thought I’d take a moment to highlight the mobile content we’ve got in store for everyone.

Sunday before the conference kicks into overdrive, Brent Arnold is doing an all day, hands-on session called “Cross-platform mobile development with Flash Builder and AIR”. This class is only $100 and seating is limited. You’ll get hands-on training from a pro, in a setting where you won’t here “Just follow along until I can help you” We’re keeping seating limited to make sure it’s an awesome experience. Register Here.

Monday starts out with “Jeffry Houser – Building a Game in Flex is Stupid”. Jeff built a game in Flex for Android and iOS, and will be sharing the ups and downs that went along with it.

Monday also has “Chris Griffith – Choosing the Right Mobile Development Platform” Chris has built the official conference app for the last few years. Focusing on iOS, then adding Android support, and even working on mobile web.

Monday closes with “General Session: HTML5 Applications with Sencha” by none other than 360|Flex alum Ted Patrick, now with Sencha. Ted will be talking about migrating your Flex skills to Sencha and building robust applications (mobile and otherwise) in Sencha Touch.

After Tuesdays General Session, Daniel Wanja is presenting “Building iPad apps with Flex.” Daniel has built several apps in Flex for the iOS platform, iPads specifically for major brands, and will detail his experiences.

After lunch on Tuesday Andy Trice from Adobe will be presenting “Multi-device Deployment Best Practices” touching on the do’s and don’ts of building your app or game for multiple devices. Every device is unique these days.

Nate Beck presents “Going Mobile” after that, talking about his experiences going from desktop Flex/Flash to mobile.

The last part of Tuesday is packed with mobile. With a BlackBerry PlayBook Platform Overview, and Darin Weakley & Roman Hardgrave presenting “Offline Maps – Use MapQuest’s Mobile Flex API and See Where You Are Without a Connection” and ending the day with a General Session by Kevin Whinnery of Appcelerator, talking about their platform. Appcelerator has had a gang buster year, and their platform is very mature.

Wednesday after the General Session – Closing remarks from yours truly, Kevin Korngut presents “Optimizing Mobile Applications – So Easy a Designer Could Do It” Designing for mobile presents it’s own unique challenges, and isn’t just “Making is smaller”

Ryan Campbell presents ”Developing Applications with the PlayBook AIR SDK 2.0.” Since it’s debut the Blackberry playbook has been a major supporter of the Flash Runtime, and has made major improvements in it’s subsequent releases. Ryan has been working with Blackberry on Apps for the playbook.

As Wednesday comes to a close, Jon Campos presents a General Session titled “Advanced Mobile Q&A.” He’s taking questions in advance of the session in order to answer them live. He’ll also be taking questions from the audience. If you’d like to ask a question, leave a comment in his blog post or post it to him on twitter.

See you in Denver next month! Get your ticket now!

So what is 360|Flex 2012?

• It’s 4 hands-on sessions. Two free, two paid. Each worth the price of the conference in and of themselves.
• It’s 14 technical sessions on web stack technologies (HTML, JS, etc)
• It’s 7 sessions on design and business
• It’s 13 sessions dedicated to mobile
• It’s 8 sessions from Adobe Evangelists and Engineers
• It’s 10 General sessions. Everyone in one room, learning awesome things.
• Of course it is also 16 or so sessions around the Flex/Flash stack cuz, you know it’s in our name after all :)

What else is 360|Flex 2012?

• It’s great chances to meet other coders and designers. We all have a lot of “twitter friends” this is the chance to make them real life friends.
• It’s a great way and time to reconnect with people you haven’t seen since… oh the last 360|Flex :)
• It’s fun parties on and off-site sponsored by incredible companies in our space.
• It’s a chance to meet and talk to Adobe folks 1 on 1 (Pro Tip: getting them drunk = more secrets revealed. Just sayin’)
• It’s a chance to meet companies and interact with them on a personal level, not a salesy “buy our crap” level
• It’s a great place to find full time and contract employment, that happens a lot.

Then what isn’t it? Which is every bit as important as what it is.

• It’s not the same old speakers from every other conference in the space giving the same talk they gave at another event.
• It’s not a huge expo floor with Tchotchkes and other crap, and endless demos and sales people
•  It’s not people talking about “what’s possible” it’s people talking about what they’ve done.
• It’s not endless sessions on “Roadmaps”

Time’s running out. Sitting on the fence isn’t a good place to be. Grab your ticket now, and be with the best of the best in the Flex/Web/Mobile space. Register now!