Sure, HTML5 is important and all — but let’s face it, most of us are more concerned with the end result. And one of the more impressive things we saw at this morning’s keynote was Sports Illustrated’s HTML5-based web version of its magazine. Let’s talk more about that after the break, and what it may well mean in the Android mobile space.
Way back in the day — and we’re only talking five or six or seven years or so — the web version of a print product was a matter of just sending the text and maybe a photo or three to a web site. Static, boring and, really, it hasn’t changed that much today, outside of some video or Flash animation.
Sports Illustrated long has been a leader in outstanding photography and writing. And in the HTML5-based demonstration by Sports Illustrated this morning, it can continue to be so on the Web.
Think of the most futuristic way you can imaging reading a newspaper or magazine online. Text that looks like magazine text. Photos that remain as crisp and clear as they were in four-color 300dpi on glossy paper. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the direction we’re headed, thanks to HTML5, WebM and VP8.
Don’t worry so much about those acronyms. Worry about what they’re going to do for you. Video seamlessly embedded alongside text. Large — LARGE! — photos with the same look and feel as the magazine.
Now imagine all this on a high-resolution Android tablet (and, yes, available on others, too.) Maybe a precursor of things to come this week. Or if not, definitely a glimpse at what we may see in the coming year or so.