Flash Forward – Boston 2007
This is my third Flash Forward Event.  The first was the original 2001 Flash Forward on Nob hill in the Masonic Temple where Adobe and Macromedia both gave away full software bundles.  At the time the two companies were separate and not so friendly with each other.  I will never forget the Macromedia reps trading Adobe Bundles for another copy of the Macromedia Bundle and then throwing the software to the ground and stomping on it.  Adobe saw what was going on and decided they would do the same.  I ended up walking away with three full versions of the Macromedia Suite.  I think it was Dreamweaver 3 and the rest of the bundle.  Sinbad was still funny at the time and made jokes about how stinky developers where.  And Josh ______ from praystation was a rock star.

The second event was 2006.  musicRAIN was a finalist in the FlashForward film festival.  Lynda and Stewart decided that they would part ways.  Josh Buhler and I went to lunch with Danny Dura and Christian Cantrell.  And Flash was coming of age.

And now Flash and Flex are not only accepted but respected as the platform for developing Rich Internet Applications.  What was once only a dream is now a standard practice.  The tables have turned and instead of HTML just embedding Flash within itself Flash is the container for HTML.  The gap is being bridged between the desktop app and the website.  This is probably the most important Flash Forward that I have attended because of what I am working on currently.  I hope to gain a lot form this conference and be able to use it to further the progress of the amazing application that we are currently building.

Please email me and let me know you are at Flash Forward Boston also and please say Hi.  I would love to go to lunch and hear what you are working on and how Flash/Flex has made a difference in your world.

Over the next three days I will be giving a summary of my experience at Flash Forward Boston 2007