Steven Tew

Stefan Richter has once again put his ever impressive Flash skills to good use, this time creating an online, multi-user, drawing pad called The Scratchpad.

“The Scratchpad draws a shape according to your mouse movements” says Stefan “and when you let go [of the mouse button] it sends that object to the Flash Com server. The server then tells everyone about it.”

Not only does The Scratchpad show multiple-users what is being drawn, it also allows multiple-users to draw in the same workspace at the same time.

So I had a go. I drew a window, and quickly somebody else started to draw the view outside. Then a third, fourth, fifth and sixth person each started drawing an assortment of soft furnishings until we had conjured up an embarrassingly accurate primary school rendition of my bedroom.

The Scratchpad timer reached zero and the pad cleared itself ready for a new creation. So I had another go, this time producing a skilful depiction of a three-legged, bug-eyed, flying caterpillar. But as it painstakingly took form, somebody quite literally defaced my bugs cute smiling face with a malicious scribble. I had no choice but to retaliate. I draw a gun and illustratively shot the face off a Picasso-esc gentleman hoping that this was the work of my saboteur. Revenge was sweet. I can only assume his act of malice towards my bug was an act of jealousy and a compliment to my work.

Nice work Stefan. The Scratchpad is an extremely distracting piece of fun.