how Apple fanboys get their high

At Monsoon, we may never be able to rap like the pantless knights but, we still like to think of ourselves as hardcore apple fanboys.  We own 3 generations of every Apple product, camp overnight for new product launches and celebrate popcorn-hour each time Steve Jobs gives his keynote.

With every piece of digital loveliness made by Apple,  being a part of this brand and culture fits right into our techno-chic lifestyle and gives us endless gratification.  But the ultimate high for us is to see our work on Apple products.  We’ve been developing applications for the iPhone for quite some time but we recently had the opportunity to work on an app with another one of our favorite partners, South By Southwest.  SXSW brings together some of the world’s most creative artists, speakers and entrepreneurs and my business partner Sandeep has previously had the opportunity to captivate audiences with interactive panels on Outsourcing.

There is no other conference that fosters creative growth and networking opportunities the way South by does.  Which is why we’re so excited to announce SXSW® Play, the official media discovery app for the SXSW 2010 Music, Film, and Interactive conferences.  The app features a wealth of rich media from musicians, films, and interactive panels that will be featured at the festival in Austin, TX from March 12-21.  With this app at your fingertips, you’ll never be bored in line again!

Features of the application:

• Discover - A fun and exciting way to navigate SXSW’s 2010 lineup using the iPhone’s built in accelerometer.
• Media - Listen to mp3s of featured musicians, watch trailers and clips from films, and get full length podcasts of interactive panels, all on your iPhone.
• Browse - Navigate the Film, Interactive and Music mp3s and videos by category.
• Favorites - Build a list of bands, films and Interactive panels you don’t want to forget.  Find when and where they’re playing and check them out at the festival, or just experience them on your iPhone.
• Constantly Growing - As SXSW continues to present the world’s best line-up at their Music, Film and Interactive festivals, the app will grow too, including immediate posting of the Interactive panel podcasts during the event.

You can download the free application from the Appstore and find out if you’re an Apple fanboy here.

punjabi ballers at the NBA

Monsoon partnered with the NBA and HP to create a touch app that allows you to customize an avatar and create your NBA alter ego.  As huge basketball fans (tragically, Warriors fans), we are really excited to announce this application. Let’s face it: this is the closest a group of Indian guys will ever get to the NBA!

The app can be seen during jam session week at HP’s digital playground from Thursday through Sunday (Feb 11- Feb 14) at the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Texas. Here’s a sneak preview and we’ll share more pictures and videos next week.

Click the image to see a video demo.  If you’re attending the allstar game, drop me a line and let me know what you think.

Monsoon brings Climate Change Testimonies to the heart of Copenhagen

“Experts say this global warming is serious, and they are predicting now that by the year 2050, we will be out of party ice.” —David Letterman

Jokes about climate change may not always garner lasting belly aches, but let’s face it, they tend to be more captivating then scatter diagrams and pie charts. So when the UN decided to collaborate with Monsoon for COP, we wanted to build an application that would be fun and interactive; something even Al Gore would appreciate.

We wanted to leverage the power of touch technology to ensure negotiators and leaders participating in Copenhagen heard voices of those affected by the impacts of global warming.  We worked with the UN to create the Climate Wall, an experience that allowed conference attendees to spin a virtual globe and watch real-life stories about climate change.

Sights and sounds from around the globe bear witness to how the changing climate is changing lives.   One of these stories takes us on a virtual journey to the Prey Koki forest, located in a quiet corner of eastern Cambodia. The forest has lost most of its cover to desertification and while planting trees, Buddhist monk So Kon shares the impacts of climate change . “Here in Cambodia our climate is changing. It’s getting hotter and the rainfall is irregular. But we believe that these trees can bring rain and help the farmers with their crops and daily life,” says Kon.

In an era where buzzwords like Corporate Social Responsibility  and CO2 emissions make climate change feel like a distant paradigm, Monsoon’s virtual globe application brings stories from real people like Kon to your fingertips.

The concept was a success and featured on the home of Seal the deal and the UN.   We simply feel blessed that we had the opportunity to make a small contribution in raising awareness about climate change.

See more pictures and view the full application here.

let the touch-tweeting begin

I admit it; I wasn’t among the first on the twitter blog wagon. I put if off, for no good reason really; just like everyone else I haven’t quite perfected the art of bending the space-time continuum to my advantage. Then in the summer of 2008, I bought myself an iPhone and dove thumb-first into twitter.

Fast-forward to today, and I can’t help but want to touchscreen-activate everything and tweet every one of my “lightbulb moments” (eat your heart out Deepak Chopra!).  Yup, my name is John Doe and there is a tech-junkie in me.  Thankfully geek-chic is in, and with Monsoon Company’s latest product launch, my tech-junkie and I are walking the metaphorical red carpet together. Body by touch, brains by tweet.

We are proud to premier the very first Touch Twitter app for Windows7.

Get a taste…scratch that…get a touch here.



The first release of the app brings with it many of the twitter essentials: quick access to tweets via a full feed, the ability to search, post an update, and lots of following/followed views.  Let the touch-tweeting begin!

We’ll be releasing an update to the app with a lot more touch-friendly features shortly.  The ability to share photos, drag Twitterati (or whomever else you choose to follow) into groups, and save searches and trends, to name just a few.

The app is getting media coverage in almost every major tech outlet and blog.  See what Laptop mag and PC World had to say.

To learn more about Monsoon Company’s recent touchscreen projects, follow the links below:

Top 100 colleges app for US News
Notes Application for HP
iPhone app for South by Southwest

my talk on social networking at the Craigslist foundation

Your kid’s future at your fingertips

Monsoon Company collaborated with US News and HP to create a touch-centric Adobe AIR application for America’s Top 100 Colleges. The application provides a fun, interactive way to discover the best National Universities and Liberal Arts Colleges.

Being a boutique consultancy that is focused on touch software, we are always excited to see how touch is evolving in education and e-learning amongst other verticals!

Get the US News app here.

Productivity Myth# 1 “A short email is faster than a phone call”

I’m overwhelmed by the number of debates that focus on how many times you check email.  Personal Productivity Guru’s can’t get enough of it!

After a long day at work and replying to a gazillion emails, I can’t help but wonder how many times does Obama check email?  Would my virtual assistant or admin actually be able to “own” my email?

After years of self-conflict with these questions and a lot of trial and error, I speak with confidence when I say that I’ve found a strategy that works, at least for me.  Sorry Tim Ferris, I just can’t be the bad-ass-book-writing-multiple-language-learning-breakdancing-chinese-kickboxing-ninja that you are by avoiding calls and emails.  Sorry bro, but that s***t just doesn’t work in real life.

What works for me is the “5 minute knock ‘em out” rule (who ever came up with the 15 second or the 1 minute rule, slap em silly and move on.  It never works!).  If you can handle a task by email in 5 minutes….I mean handle it completely without the need for continual debates, do it.  About 30% of my emails fall into this category.  For the remainder, just do what works best for you and stop listening to productivity guru’s that are begging for bragging rights on buzzwords!  Check your email 3 times or 5 times or 10 times a day.  Just try not to be an iPhone whore.

If you get a hunch that a conversation is going to take more than 2 emails, setup a 15 minute call and just handle it.

When you’re at the gym, leave your phone/pda behind and if it gets too tough to use the dial-based-iPod, disable your internet.  Do what ever it takes to discipline yourself to focus on working out and not worrying about sales or marketing or execution.

Ditto when you eat - enjoy a meal. Even God wants you to do this!

It’s been less than 2 weeks since I’ve incorporated this strategy and I’m already starting to save 30-60 minutes a day.  That’s close to 100 hours for the rest of this year - unreal!

Personal Productivity - Note to self

Q: You haven’t called me in ages.
A: I can’t call you because I just don’t have time during the week

Q: Babe, can you come eat dinner already?  I’m warming it up a second time
A: I have a bunch of s**t on my plate; can’t eat right now

Q: You started out with a fire and I was following your blog.  Now I see you write once a month. You’ve lost the other 5 of us…
A: I can’t blog guys…that’s the last thing on my mind!

Q: Why don’t you get help? 
A: I have gotten help but I think I need more…I’m so busy, I don’t even have time to look for help

Q: So you guys planning any vacations?
A: Right after our honeymoon
Q: Haven’t you been married a couple of years
A: Yep, just been crazy busy - maybe this year

Q:You look tense
A: I am
Q: Are you unhappy
A: No, not at all actually, I’m very happy
Q: Then whatup brother?
A: nm much man, I’m just busy!

are just some of my rants that friends and family get to hear.  The last 4-5 years of my life have been madness.  I’ve had a lot of fun - work has been successful and thriving but deep down inside, I’ve lost balance.

Recently on a business trip to Singapore, I had an epiphany.  I was able to get more done in fewer hours and still felt I found the time to intermittently update my twitter status and enjoy meals without my left hand trying to type.  How did I do it?

From the 4 hour work week to the abundance of books and personal productivity software, I’ve realized that nothing has or can help me in getting disciplined.  I’ve made a commitment to myself and this post is nothing more than a note to self that for the remainder of this year, and hopefully beyond I’ll try to master the art of balance, understand and share what personal productivity really means.

There’s probably nothing here you don’t already know, but as a first task to discipline myself, I’m committing myself to echo 10 quick things I will be incorporating in my life over the next few months.  This is no thought-leadership….merely a self proclaimed exercise on how I’m about to change my life….blog, read, love, enjoy, vacation, work and continue to achieve success.  So check back frequently as I write more about how these changes are helping me make an impact in my life and in the lives of others I seem to have grown distant from.

Is impulse shopping dead? That’s what Alice said!

Today I had a chance to play with Alice (Who the heck is Alice?…my wife asks).

For those of you who don’t know her, meet Alice - she is the answer to those grueling trips to your supermarket!

Its been about 38 months since my last trip to Costco - I figured out in my first year of membership that we don’t need a bottle (package rather) of ranch that lasts a full year.  Pizza places go out of business in that kinda time! What about TP? With that much toilet paper, how can we ever find room to store our kids? (once we have em).  Somehow between juggling my business and personal life, and therapy, I’ve elegantly delegated my wife’s moral obligation to be taking care of what we need for the house :-)  The problem - she (a seasoned impulse shopper) brings home stuff we don’t ever need.  My dog now has a collar in every color and probably as many treat brands as Tinkerbell!

Truth be told, the long lines make her nervous too and she usually goes to the supermarket next door. Occasionally though, I get a “babe, it’s a girlie***iblankedoutontherestofwhatyousaid***thingy today and could you make that trip to get us some toothpaste” phone call……I mean sacrificing a morning run across the golden gate for what, some paste?  No more! Say no to those infrequent, yet exhaustive trips!

I heard about Alice.com (in beta) on Twitter today.  I’ve eagerly signed up and have setup deliveries for all the toilet paper and paste we’ll ever need!  Of course guys, be savvy - Alice will send you reminders and you can save preferences but do your due diligence.  Even though they offer free shipping, unless you’re willing to wait 2 days without TP and resort to gross alternatives, be selective about your preferences and let Alice do all the work for you.

Amazon has a similar service but I don’t think they ever got it right. Alice.com has found a niche and it strictly focuses on that.  Their funding is limited but given the idea, combined with exposure to the millions who read my personal blog (I’d like to think that), I think Alice is poised for success.