TriviaTok: OpenTok meets Twilio Client

| By | ,

TriviaTok is a game show app designed and built by TokBox superintern, Ezra Velazquez.

How It Works:

Game is about to begin!

When the host clicks “Next Player”, a user in the audience is randomly selected and goes on screen to video chat with the host.  The rest of the audience gets to watch.  “Next Question” kicks off the game. The player can pick the right (or wrong) answer – or get help:

  • PHONE lets you call a friend (Twilio Client)
  • CROWD lets you tweet for help (Twitter API)
  • 50/50 eliminates two wrong answers (Ezra’s skillz)
Read More

Live Face Recognition with OpenTok and Face.com

| By | , , ,

Next weekend is our second HAPI Hack Weekend at our office in San Francisco and we’re excited to have a bunch of interesting APIs there to hack with. One API that I’m particularly excited about is Face.com, which gives developers a set of methods for easy face recognition.

I created a simple app to introduce the basics of using OpenTok with Face.com:

Read More

July OpenTok App Round-up

| By | , ,

It’s hard to tell when it’s summer in San Francisco, but here at TokBox you know it’s summer when everyone’s a-video chatting. This July, lots of new OpenTok developers decided to dip their toes in the warm, inviting pool of group video chat. (not sure why…) Here are some of our favorite examples:

Group/Social Video Chat
Friend Cameo: Voice, video calling and video mail on Facebook
SocialHangouts:  G+ Hangouts meets FB Video Calling with multi-user video chat
Tanglr.TV:  Group co-viewing of online live events
EpicMafia: Online Mafia game – with video to look ’em in the eyes

Read More

Win a chance to demo at TechCrunch Disrupt in SF!

| By | , , ,

Want to prove you’ve built the coolest OpenTok application? Think you have what it takes to demo to the most influential people in Silicon Valley?

Here’s a chance for you to prove it here in person in San Francisco! Just build the most compelling OpenTok app and you’ll win a place in  Startup Alley at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco this September. To make the prize even sweeter, we’ll pay up to $2000 in travel expenses!

As a Startup Alley participant, you’re eligible for audience voting to participate in TechCrunch’s premiere startup competition, Startup Battlefield. If you win the “Audience Choice” award, you will earn a slot to present your product on stage during Startup Battlefield in front of an all-star panel consisting of the biggest innovators, angels, VCs and influencers in the Tech community on Wednesday, September 14th, 2011.  Winner must meet Startup Alley criteria; for more details, please visit this page.

Read More

S.P.A.R.K Chicago – Only the strong survive

| By | ,

If Startup Weekend is entrepreneurship on training wheels, then we sure could use an event that’s one step more advanced. Once you understand the dynamics of choosing a team, the compromises involved in pivoting, and the pitfalls of not validating customers, there should be a place to dig deeper into your startup idea – execute, period. I’m glad to say this weekend I found that next step.

S.P.A.R.K Chicago kicked off last Friday like any other Startup Weekend, except these entrepreneurs were hungry. They knew that not only would they be judged on launching a startup in 54 hours, but the top three teams would move forward for another three days to find one ultimate winner. The stakes were high because the competition was steeper and the prizes were money. But what I saw motivating these teams was that coming out on top of this unique event would be something memorable (okay fine, the prizes valued at over $100k were part of it too).

Allow me to introduce you to some of the teams.

Read More

Using OpenTok apps on Mac OS X Lion 10.7

| By | , , ,

Following the release of OS X Lion on Wednesday, Adobe Flash Player has had a series of compatibility issues with Apple’s new OS. The big problem for fans of OpenTok apps? You’re unable to click “allow” or “deny” on the Adobe Flash pop-up that appears before you join a video call.

Until the official Adobe & Apple fix is released, there are a few steps you’ll need to follow to make OpenTok powered apps work:

1) Open System Preferences
2) Open Flash Player from “Other”
3) Click on Camera and Mic
4) Click on Camera and Mic Settings by site…
5) Set static.opentok.com to allow

Read More

You Fly, We Buy: Launch at Startup Riot Seattle

| By | , , ,

Here at TokBox we love seeing you, our OpenTok developer community, build awesome applications. To help make your OpenTok app a success, TokBox is sponsoring travel to Startup Riot Seattle for two deserving OpenTok app developers.

Apply now!

So what exactly is Startup Riot? Startup Riot is an all-day event which highlights 25 startups through three minute, four slide presentations given by the startups. The startups subsequently answer questions from a judging panel for three minutes.

Read More

Adding metadata on connections

| By | , , ,

You can now attach metadata for each client that connects to a session. For example, you can add information about the connecting user. When a client connects to the session, all existing clients connected to the session can access the metadata for the new connection.

You add this metadata by passing it into the generate_token() method of the OpenTok server-side library. The metadata is then securely embedded in the token string. Here’s an example, using the OpenTok PHP library:

Read More

My Favorite Things

| By | ,

This week I’ve been travelling the east coast, hittin’ up various events. I’ve learned about a bunch of new stuff I didn’t know about, so I thought I would share some of…

JON’S FAVORITE THINGS!!!

This is the reaction I expect out of all of you:

Okay, my favorite things are:

Read More

Why your company should do an internal hackathon

| By | , ,

Originally posted at blog.mumm.me

Hackathons are awesome.

At TokBox we put our normal schedule aside for a couple days to run our first internal hackathon. The rules were simple: pitch an idea, form teams, build something, then demo it 30 hours later. The winning team would get a prize.

My team didn’t win (though we were proudly among the first losers), but it was a really positive experience. Here’s why I think every company should try doing an internal hackathon:

Read More