1. Inspiring your team is important. Keeping up-to-date and informed on our various projects challenges and successes throughout the year encourages us to exceed our goals and find new ways in which we can improve.
2. Routinely track your carbon usage – you can see how we have been doing in the chart below. We’re happy that Prezi’s footprint hasn’t kept pace with other aspects of the company’s rapid growth (see here) yet we know there’s more we can do in 2012! Our estimated figures show a moderate increase from last year’s 150 tons to this year’s 215 tons, with the majority impact coming from business trips.
3. We still strongly believe that the projects we work on should match the following criteria: a) the ability to easily contact the people who are running the project, b) the project should jointly create social change and economic development in addition to CO2 offsetting.
4. Based on our criteria we decided to continue to support this stove project. It’s a project we’re devoted to as it works toward long-lasting change: a) families who get a stove can benefit from dramatically improved health, b) local entrepreneurs and the families receiving the stoves are fully involved in implementing the project, and c) each stove can last for about 10 years and each stove can save about 2-3 tons of CO2 / year.
5. To put a figure on this in terms of carbon offsetting, the math is as follows: 215/(2.5*10)= about 8-9 stoves = $2,200 USD

Based on many discussions with our edu users we’ve been working to create a community site where teachers and students can talk, share and learn how to use Prezi in education, from the smallest grade school classroom to the biggest Harvard and Stanford auditoriums. We are now pleased to introduce Prezi U, a dedicated community site for all things Prezi in education.

Visit Prezi U for access to diverse content on using Prezi in education for all levels– from Kindergarten to University and beyond.
Prezi U is a hub for your prezis, ideas and experiences. A channel to submit your own content and receive feedback, engagement and new skills from other Prezi U members.

On Prezi U you can:
1. Submit your own educational prezis to the dynamically growing edu library, which covers diverse topics and subject areas categorized by schools and curriculum.
2. Engage with others in the forums, or search for answers to your questions about Prezi in education.
3. Submit articles about your experiences using Prezi in education.

Visit Prezi U today.  We look forward to meeting you in our new community, and we can’t wait to see what you create!

Thanks to all who entered, and again, congratulations to our three winners. View more Prezi jobs.

So, at Prezi, we enjoy challenging preconceived notions, and we try to do this on every level in our company– even with the people we choose as investors.  Two years ago, when we closed our Series A, it was TED Conferences’ first investment in a company, and for Sunstone Capital it was their first investment in a Hungarian company.

Today, we are excited to announce Accel Partners has joined Prezi today as a third investor. It’s obvious that these guys know a thing or two about growing businesses, and we feel very proud to have them on board.

I can’t think of a more exciting time to lead Prezi. Computer visualization capabilities continue to grow exponentially, gesture and touch interfaces are becoming mainstream, and the Internet is integrated into our lives in increasingly clever ways. As engineers and designers of an idea sharing tool, we’ve never had so much freedom to shape the future as profoundly as today.

For me Prezi has fundamentally changed the way I work. In the morning I’m often in our San Francisco office co-creating a Prezi with other people across the world, then I head out for another meeting using my iPad to discuss that very Prezi with local colleagues. I am also more likely to strike a conversation and less likely to just sit in meetings based on one-way monologues. These are just our first steps in reinventing idea sharing, but with a new Prezi being created every second, we feel we’re on the right track.

So what’s next? Prezi is spreading globally and there are more and more devices where we think it can be useful. I’d like to make Prezi accessible to anyone with an idea that’s longer then a status update and shorter than a book.

Why zooming? Zooming helps you to explain both the big picture and the small details easily. It allows you to choose freely between the ideas that you’d like to explore. We believe that some of our old metaphors used for illustrating ideas–like slides– may have long a history, but that this does not mean that they are the best way of developing and explaining ideas. Ideas are best when they break boundaries and let you express a part of yourself. The only limit on your ideas should be your imagination. We should all boldly zoom where no one has zoomed before.

The second annual Prezi Night in Tokyo took place on Saturday, Dec 3, hosted by an awesome Japanese Prezi user community.

The fun event was a chance for Japanese users to meet each other and share experiences using Prezi. There were even Prezi quizzies and Prezi Karaoke. Check out more photos here and here.

The organizers allowed Prezi CEO Peter Arvai to show off his Japanese skills in his message to the community:

We look forward to Prezi Night Tokyo III – let us know if you’re interested in hosting your own!

After two days, teams presented their incredible projects:

• Prezi Kinect Hack: Control your prezi using body gestures
• Prezi Wars: Use Prezi Meeting to play a third-person shooter with your friends
• WebGL Prezi: The results are in, our developers tackled creating a rough version of Prezi in WebGL!
• Prezi Usage Map: A zoomable map of prezi creations, visits, and tweets about Prezi
• Whiteboard to Prezi application: Automatically create a prezi from a photo you’ve taken
• Hipchat bot: Type in a command in hipchat, our HP bot will let the office know what’s up; break something in Prezi, sirens and lights!
• Democratic Voting in Prezi: Make life’s toughest decisions using Prezi voting
• Prezi Logo from Post-its: See the Prezi logo, made “pixel by pixel” from Post-it notes

After a colorful summer, we decided that it is about time that prezis gota facelift. So our designers have been carefully picking an entirely new set of 30 colors, 15 fonts and 10 themes that we believe can make your prezis look more awesome than ever.

In addition, you can now color your text directly from the text editor menu.

Now it’s your turn! Create your own theme and have it featured on Prezi’s upcoming theme sharing page. Choose one prezi from the list below, make a copy, design a theme, and make it reusable. The title should include the “#theme” hashtag! Submissions will not be accepted after November 13th.

http://prezi.com/gayqepzt7tst/prezi-theme-contest-1/
http://prezi.com/e3azyuiinn6z/prezi-theme-contest-2/
http://prezi.com/_aw-pwctfbcc/prezi-theme-contest-3/

Starting November 14th, people can vote on your theme for two weeks. The 10 most loved prezi themes will be featured on our theme sharing page on December 1st, and we will also give away exclusive Prezi T-shirts to those who made it to the “wall” of fame.

Click here to check the rules.

The grand-prize winner of the Prezi “Zoom Back to School Contest” is: Mr. Adam Griffin, and his prezi “Making Difficult Choices”.

Mr. Griffin is using prezi not only to educate his students academically, but also to teach them to make good choices and solve moral dilemmas.  He will receive a new iPad 2 with Prezi Viewer for use in his classroom.

Thank you to everyone who participated.  We are blown away by the creative ways you use prezi to educate and inform, and look forward to seeing more of your Prezi creations soon.

Many thanks again- and happy zooming in your classroom!

We reached out to top Prezi Viewer users, to ask how the Prezi iPad app helps their work. Middle school teachers Ben Robinson and Mark Davis, and PR communications expert Gonzalo Adriasola agreed: Using Prezi Viewer completely changes their work routines, and opens up new horizons in their careers. Upon our request, they kindly shared their experiences with everyone:

What do you use your iPad for?

Gonzalo Adriasola (Internal and external communications expert at PR agency Hill and Knowlton): In meetings with my team or clients.

Ben Robinson (Middle school World History teacher in Great Valley, Pennsylvania):
In the classroom we use apps like Google Earth to explore places like Egypt and the Great Pyramids. They use Prezi Viewer to review prezis that I have made and get a better understanding of the topics covered in class.

Mark Davis (high school science teacher at Westview High School in Avondale, AZ):
I use my iPad for nearly everything: email, Facebook, twitter, rss feeds, blogging, Skype, reading, and light word processing. As an educator, I use my iPad as a tablet to control my school laptop and SmartBoard, take roll, type and post assessments on the fly, and communicate with students through the class Edmodo website and text messaging services.

How did you get to know Prezi Viewer?

Gonzalo Adriasola: I love Prezi, so once I got my iPad I was looking for the app.

Ben Robinson: I have had ten iPads in my class room since January 2011, and knew that being able to show my prezis to my students on the iPads would have big benefits. For example, they can view the prezi at their own speed and move back and forth on the path freely until they are ready to move on. So basically, I would check the app store frequently hoping it would appear, and it did.

Mark Davis: I just started using it and testing its features to see what it could do. I looked at each of my Prezis on the Viewer to learn what its capabilities were and came up with ideas for how I could used it in the classroom.

How does Prezi Viewer help in your work?

Gonzalo Adriasola: It’s very useful to bring my ideas to every meeting.

Ben Robinson: Prezi Viewer allows my students to view the Prezis I have created at their own speed.  Students can zoom into different parts, and explore more freely.  The prezis are far clearer than on my smartboard, and allow students to see pictures in much more detail. The Prezi Viewer allows students to sit in small groups and explore. This helps foster discussion and deeper understanding. They also can use Prezis that I have made to help them stay organized. I have created virtual notebooks for my students that helps them keep their papers in order.

Mark Davis: It allows me to show my Prezi presentations on each student’s iPad. I simply installed the Viewer on each iPad and synced it to a classroom account through which my students can access the presentations.

What would you suggest for other users?

Gonzalo Adriasola: To always innovate. Prezi is a field of opportunities…We can all play there.

Ben Robinson: If you are a teacher and not using Prezi, what are you waiting for? I think Prezi is far superior to PowerPoint and so do the student I teach. I feel that Prezi allows me to be far more creative in my presentations and the students can see more connections between the ideas I am teaching. I never feel as though I’m leaving a concept behind when moving to a new one. We are able to move seamlessly from one concept to the next.

Mark Davis: I would suggest experimenting as much as possible with Prezi and the Prezi Viewer to learn what they can do, whether you’re in business or education. The options for creating presentations are at the right mix for creativity and engagement, without going overboard with every bell and whistle imaginable. It actually makes for a very eye-catching presentation that takes less time to produce than using the popular slideshow makers; anything that saves time, yet is a quality product or service, is a must for hardworking teachers.

We are pleased to announce that Prezi has received the second prize “Rising Star” in the Deloitte Technology Fast 50.

This prestigious annual award honors the fastest growing technology companies in Central Europe.  ”Rising Star” companies must have been in business a minimum of 3 years and a maximum of 5.

Prezi was named the second fastest growing company in Central Europe, with only Polish Biotech firm Selvita demonstrating a faster rate of growth.

We are thrilled to represent Budapest as the only Hungarian company to be awarded!

Prezi CEO Peter Arvai accepted the award.

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