Academic Presenter VS ZapTheater

ZapTheater makes it easy to create slideshows that autoplay on the Internet. Just upload images and MP3 then add a dash of creativity. The built-in tools make it easy to animate images and captions and to create banter between images.

ZapTheater presentations rival video in generating viewer engagement, you can create compelling scenes that you dream up instead of just recording events. ZapTheater shows can also include videos, so you can have your cake and eat it too. Vice versa, you can easily copy your ZapTheater presentations to a video and upload to your favorite video site.

For video to load, browsers carve out a self contained "sandbox" on your screen. Hence video cannot access built in browser functions like CSS, JavsScript and URLs. ZapTheater, on the other hand, uses the browsers built-in CSS and JavaScript tools to render your presentation locally on the client computer. Each slide has the full power of the Internet at its disposal, you can even query remote databases and use results to influence the show that is currently playing (or collect viewer data, etc).

There are only two dynamic presentation formats that can autoplay on the Internet, video vs ZapTheater. Video is an "alien" plugin that does not integrate with browser functionality. ZapTheater uses native browser functionality to render each presentation. Since each slide is a HTML document, the full power of the Internet is at your fingetips.

Questions and Answers

As answered by people managing Academic Presenter and ZapTheater.

What makes your product unique?

ZapTheater's answer:

Because ZapTheater presentations autoplay on the internet, they are often perceived as video. While video cuts a tunnel into your screen, ZapTheater uses HTML, CSS and JavaScript to manipulate text and images to generate dynamic presentations. For those occasions where video is appropriate, ZapTheater presentations can include video too. While ZapTheater uses a slideshow concept, each "slide" is a html document that can merge with the next "slide" seamlessly - the viewer is not aware that there was a transition. Because each slide is a HTML document, the full power of the internet is at your fingertips. Slides can query your SQL database to: - recognize specific viewers from code that you embed in the calling url - update your database from user input - branch to other ZapTheater presentations (eg. provide details) and then return to your primary presentation - pause to play videos (videos can also be set to play inline) There are 3 different ways to include video for 3 different purposes - in short, each slide has the full power of the internet at it's disposal because it is an html document

Why should a person choose your product over its competitors?

ZapTheater's answer:

Video is our main competitor - It's easy to make changes to a slide, add and remove slides, insert/remove sideshows and videos - ZapTheater can include videos, videos cannot include ZapTheater presentations - You can create presentations with ZapTheater then record to video Regarding presentation software competitors: - ZapTheater puts the full power of the internet at your disposal - ZapTheater presentations can autoplay on the Internet - For presentations made by presenters, ZapTheater manual mode provides the full power of the Internet in each slide that you show

How would you describe your primary audience?

ZapTheater's answer:

Powerpoint users, businesses who update their sales force, business to customer presentations, family albums

What's the story behind your product?

ZapTheater's answer:

In 2000, HTML 4 came out, the first support for images and html files. Those were the days of AOL and dial up internet connections. I had a T1 connection for my business, 1500 mbps transfer rate. The only browsers were Netscape, Safari and Internet Explorer. In 2005 I wrote a slideshow program in Pascal that was, I believe, the first dynamic presentation program on the internet. The Westminster Police dept gave me a fun story to tell. Over the years I converted it to other languages like Python and PHP. I still have the PHP source code and plan to recreate the original version when time permits.

I did not have time to screw around with it so some time around 2015 I recorded it as a video, you can watch at https://coptoons.com. (or youtube coptoons.com Frank Loughry). Note that I was able to add new slides at the end to document the Westminster Police reaction. That is a great ZapTheater feature, you can update the presentation after events develop.

Which are the primary technologies used for building your product?

ZapTheater's answer:

HTML, CSS, JavaScript

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Academic Presenter and ZapTheater, you can also consider the following products

Prezi - Welcome to Prezi, the presentation software that uses motion, zoom, and spatial relationships to bring your ideas to life and make you a great presenter.

impress.js - impress.js is a presentation framework based on the power of CSS3 transforms and transitions in...

Apple Keynote - Apple Keynote or just Keynote is an advanced level presentation software application created as a part of the iWork productivity suite by Apple Inc.

Microsoft PowerPoint - Microsoft PowerPoint empowers you to create clean slideshow presentations and intricate pitch decks and gives you a powerful presentation maker to tell your story.

Zoho ShowTime - A web and mobile app focused on making better presenters out of speakers.

SlideDog - A multimedia presentation player for windows. Enables you to seamlessly switch between presentation files such as PowerPoint, PDF, Movies, Web-pages, Prezi and more

Compare Academic Presenter VS ZapTheater and see what are their differences