Where are you from?
I'm currently working and living in Sydney Australia

Where did you grow up?
First five years of my life in Kota Kinabalu Malaysia. Then moved to Melbourne where I spent most of my formative years.

What are your pastimes and interests?
Coding, Interactive 3D (games etc), cycling, Dance party lighting (programming and concepts as well), writing music, science fiction, anime/manga, Computers in all their glory 8-) Fact is I'm a geek, I have trouble being away from knobs and keys.

What's your favorite saying or cliché?
Oh dear, if you've ever run 'fortune' on Linux, you will know there are many excellent sayings to be picked from. But my favorite would have to be either:
1. 'Magic Happens' - Sticker often found on most Kombi Vans in Byron Bay
2. 'She'll be right' - Good old Australian fatalistic optimism; Yes it's an oxymoron, but so is the saying in most contexts.

What's your favorite movie?
Ouch.. That's tough.. I'll just list ones that come to mind City of lost children, Highlander, Ghost in the shell, The Princess Bride.. I give up, I could fill pages with equal favorites.

What's your favorite cocktail?
Flaming Lamborghini

When did you first get involved with flash?
2 Years ago.

What is your view of the current use of flash?
I personally cant stand 'Brochure ware'. I think Flash is about Applications, Games and True Entertainment (interactive wherever possible). Sure it makes pretty 'static' sites, but that doesn't interest me.

The killer flash sites for me:
Games such as those by Jobe - www.ultimatearcade.com
And www.coin-op-city.com
www.icebox.com and short film sites like that.
www.yenz.com Old but excellent interactive site.

Who do you feel is advancing the use of flash the most?
Those I just mentioned. Brendan Hall for his input into the community and for moderating the flashcoders mailing list. Figleaf software for the same. Flashkit.com , Motionculture.org and were-here for the same reasons. The collective of free/open source developers helping us produce better and cleaner work - such as the developers of Ming, LGX, swift-generator et al.

Who has been your greatest inspiration?
My friends, always.. The people closest to you help you grow the most.

Where do you see the future of flash?
It may not have a long term future. Right now Flash is probably the most consistent web-client development systems around. In the future, Flash will need to cover some important issues with its backend integration - if it does then it will be treated as a reliable low bandwidth thin client for the internet. However the rift between high/low bandwidth users is going to see the market diverge. A solution that easily caters to both markets will be heavily sought after. In my opinion of course 8-)

What advice would you give to budding flashers?
There's an old saying, lost in the annals of time, it goes something like 'RTFM' - in all seriousness, read the manual, and do the lessons. Then run off to all the wicked tutorial sites. Get creative. Give yourself time. Do not try to build the empire in a day.

Join communities.

My favorite realisations were found in community lists and chats.

What can FK01 attendees expect from you?
I have spent so much time trying to write clean, self-documenting, fast and re-usable code, that I think the attendees can expect me to know most of the pitfalls there are when trying to accomplish this.

They can also be sure that I will make myself available to them for any questions, debates, rant and raves they care to get involved in 8-)

Any closing words?
Please, be as original as you can be.

If you would like further information on speaking opportunities please contact: Mark Fennell(webmaster@flashkit.com). We have conferences planned in LA, Sydney, and Europe and Asia as well, so let us know your interest!