Sunday, April 20, 2014

[personal UX/UI review] packaging stickers

product: School Food's packaging stickers
issue: difficult to open
recommendation: try using easily detachable stickers 
reasoning: unboxing experience is not just important for electronics companies but also in any products which require customers touch

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

[personal UX/UI review] McDonald's card reader design

Product: McDonald's card reader
Issue: difficult to tell which side of card needs to go where when swiping 
Recommendation: make each side of the reader read cards

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

[personal UX/UI review] iOS bug

Product: iOS for iPhone
Issue: box within a box
Recommendation: keep box interaction consistent 

Saturday, April 12, 2014

[lecture] Fireside Chat with Mitch Lowe and 유영철

Title
Fireside Chat with Mitch Lowe, App Marketing
Place
D.Camp 5F Seminar Rm C
Time
April 10, 2014 4:30PM~9:30PM
Speaker
Mitch Lowe, 유영철
Organizer
Wisdome
Focus
multi-platform service, app marketing

I.       Mitch Lowe, CEO of Quarterly
1.       Message
1)      Netflix Info
  Business: launched in 1998 as Kiball? (Netflix’s previous name) (c.f. Amazon 1994 launch)
  Internal rule- if business doesn’t succeed, reiterate business model renewal every 90 days
  Stat: grew up to 40 million customers, 7 million DVD via mail before he took off the company
2)      Redbox Info
  Business: started small with 6 kiosks->40,000 kiosks in North America in 2012
  Pattern: 40% of DVDs are returned via different kiosks than the ones they rented out from
3)      Advices for start-ups
  Execution is the key for success
A       Build the right team: find someone with whom you can be with long hours
B       Try zombie test to find the right partner: meaning when you get bitten by zombies, will he tell you about that fact
C       Keeping the momentum going: improve and do something about your business to keep investors and customers continuously interested
4)      Regrets
  Didn’t fire bad people early enough
  Got lazy in raising money (c.f. US Congress raise money every 2 weeks)- one of the key reasons why raising money is to recruit best people
  Didn’t hire enough smart people and didn’t overpay them

2.       Q&A
1)      What factors did you consider when launching a service in different platforms; which platform to introduce first?
  Studied cancellation rate for each platform and asked what makes users quit and how often do they quit using them
2)      For CineMatch, can you make a comment on how do you find matching movies for individuals? -> Collaborative filtering <source: link>
  Searches the CineMatch database for people who have rated the same movie - for example, "The Return of the Jedi"
  Determines which of those people have also rated a second movie, such as "The Matrix"
  Calculates the statistical likelihood that people who liked "Return of the Jedi" will also like "The Matrix"
  Continues this process to establish a pattern of correlations between subscribers' ratings of many different films

3.       Takeaway
1)      Recommendation algorithm: CineMatch
2)      For start-ups, the importance of interviewing applicants with as many employees as possible and quickly firing people if they are not a good fit with the company




II.      유영철, CEO of GameBerry 
1.       Message
1)      App marketing strategy: utilize platforms (e.g. “카카오 게임하기” ranking, “카카오 친구초청하기”), tracking rules (e.g. CPK: 카카오 연동)
2)      General strategy
  Game app- usually peak downloads go one month and can last up to three months
  Non-game app (e.g. utility apps)- try discount pricing
3)      Success case: Polaris (e.g. US- Facebook; JN- Twitter; KR- blogs)
  Tried price discount
  Paid attention to competitive apps and put marketing money when the number of those apps is going down

2.       Takeaway
1)      For mobile app marketing, trends in Korea are moving to non-incentive ad network such as AdMob or Inmobi
2)      For non-game app marketing, put budget on mobile ad platforms such as Facebook
3)      For Google Play marketing, put money incrementally such as 1 million KRW-> 5-> 10 instead of the other way around
4)      Shoot to be featured in each app marketplace to increase your revenue
5)      Take advantage of competitors’ app ranking trends (e.g. perhaps with App Annie): meaning put money in when they are going down
6)      Facebook ads provides 10~20% conversion rate on average (c.f. 1~3% on AdMob)
7)      When advertising, always put analytics and tracking tools together
8)      For CPI marketing, run a test such as 1,000 downloads first?



Friday, April 11, 2014

[personal UX/UI review] designing a button icon

-. case: a button design on YouVersion website
-. issue: the button looks clickable but it isn't in reality
-. recommendation: do not differentiate the background color for the button if it's not going to be clickable :)

[personal UX/UI review] a fly image in a toilet

-. case: a toilet
-. positive: a good example of affordanace concept, subconsciously assisting peeing gentlemen to aim farther away from toilet edge

Wednesday, April 9, 2014

[personal UX/UI review] Seoul subway color for Line 6

<case: subway Line 6>
Issue: color difference between signs and train which can confuse people

Recommendation: make both colors the same 

Monday, April 7, 2014

[conference] KR Mobile Week 2013

Title
KR Mobile Week 2013
Place
COEX Grand Ballroom 101
Time
July 15, 2013 10AM~5PM
Speaker
Chris Yerga, Dan Galpin, Haisoo Shin and more
Organizer
Google Korea
Focus
Android, Google+, YouTube API

I.       Welcome & Keynote [yerga@; Chris Yerga, Engineering Director]

II.      Android Platform Updates [dgalpin@; Dan Galpin, Developer Advocate for the Android team]
1.       Updates
1)      Google Play service updates
  Google Maps Android API v2
  Location APIs
A       Fused Location Provider- more accurate result
B       Geofencing- (A geo-fence is a virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area. <source: Wikipedia>)
C       Activity Recognition- help users measure physical activity
  Google+ Sign-In
  Google Cloud Messaging (GCM)- synced messaging
A       GCM (Definition: a service that helps developers send data from servers to their Android applications on Android devices, or from servers to their Chrome apps and extensions. <source: Wikipedia>)
2)      Google Play game services updates
  Cloud save
  Achievements- share achievement w/ friends
  Leaderboards- how much better you are compared to friends
  Multiplayer- through mashed network
3)      updated Android Studio, NDK
2.       What’s next?- Faster UI, reordering & merging, multi-threading, Bluetooth LE (low energy), Android on TV (Latest Chrome, Project Butter, NDK)

III.     YouTube API Platform Updates [amandas@; Amanda]
1.       Updates
1)      YouTube- is a platform that can empower the next generation of video-based businesses
  Tastemade (food network)
2)      YouTube API
  Creation
  Disocvery + context
A       Topics API- e.g. intersante (recommendation), Soundslice
  Live streaming- e.g. elgato
  BuzzFeed
  Enterprise- E.g. mediastudio
  Analyticis + promotion- audience analytics (e.g. tubular’s awesomenesstv), trend meter (e.g. Next Big Sound; for artists how to improve their marketing)

IV.     Google+ Platform Updates [cartland@; Chris Cartland, Developer Programs Engineer]
1.       Updates
1)      Google+ benefit: one identity (one google account) relationships (circles),  sharing and recommendations (share w/ the right people)
2)      Social Sign-in Examples
  The Guardian- user choices (facebook, g+, twitter, etc)-> user control
  Snapette- increased user registration by 16%
  Fandango- app installs-, 40% acceptance rate for over-the-air installs
  Fancy- cross-platform single signon
  OpenTable- explicit sharing (interactive post), deep linking
  Glamour- YouTube integration
  Forbes- content recommendations
  Flixster- Google Calendar integration

V.      Google+ Sign-In partner Fancy.com talk [Haisoo Shin, Director of Engineering at Fancy]- G+ Sign-In
1.       Fancy service intro
1)      Fancy- means like
2)      USP- includes purchase function
2.       Key takeaways
1)      Barrier examples for users- discovery, app installation, sign-up, payment
2)      An example to lower registration barrier- Google+ Sign In
3)      Examples to enhance installation and discovery function- app installs, interactive posts, cross-platform SSO, etc.

VI.    Play Services API (Location / GCM) [htchan@; Tony Chan, Android Developer Advocate]
1.       Updates (for Google I/O video: bit.ly/io13-android)
1)      Notification
  Cloud Connection Server (CCS), Upstream Message, User Notifications, etc.
  CCS vs. GCM
2)      Location APIs- using sensors like gyro, barometer, accelerometer, GPS
  High accuracy- 10 meters, 5 sec
  balanced power- 40 meters, 20 sec
  no power- 1 mile, N/A
3)      activity recognition- vehicle, on foot, still, on bicycle
4)      Geofencing
2.       Key takeaway
1)      How to combine two Geofenching & GCM: e.g. promotion in a geofence

VII.   Supercharge your Apps with the YouTube API Platform [jarekw@; Jarek Wiliewicz, Developer Advcate]
1.       Updates (4 kinds)
1)      Creators- Creation e.g. elgato, everyplay,
2)      Viewers
3)      Enterprises
4)      Marketers
2.       Reference: youtube.com/dev

VIII.  Modern Android Design [pakoch@; Adam Koch, Android Developer Advocate]
1.       Updates
1)      Design patterns: navigation, navigation drawer, unofficial patterns
  Action bar: consistent bar (component: brand/app icon, drop-down spinnup, search, movie), Action Overflow (extra options)
  Navigation: spinner (drop-down navigation item), fixed tabs (underneath action bar), scrollable tabs, drawer (primarily for main app navigation, Action Bar stays in place, Drawer overlays content)
  Navigation Drawer Interaction: introduce the drawer on first use, give the user a quick peek, highlight the current screen)
  Unofficial patterns: Fading Action Bar (introduced in Google Play Music, part of other Play apps as well), Swipe to Refresh (experimental pattern, currently only used by Gmail app), Action Drawer (used by Google+, One Today for app notifications, shows scrollable list of items), Cards
2)      Responsive design: why responsive?, SlidingPanelLayout, Other tips
  Device variety- screen size, resolution, vertical to horizontal support
  Why responsive? – android:layout_width=”match_parent”
  Combination- side-by-side
  Fragments
  Master/Detail Flow template-> File > New> Android Object
  SlideingPaneLayout- enough room then show everything, if no, then slides to the right (e.g. Google I/O 2013 app)
  Dimension files- page_margin, headline_text_size, etc)
3)      Pure Android: Why Android/Holo?, Balancing Brand andPlatform Consistency
  Why design Android/Holo?
A       Better User Experience- Platform consistency, intuitive use of app, improved usability, engaging content-first design)
B       Easier, More Robust Technical Implementation- designed to handle hardware variations such as screen sized, densities, on-screen vs. hard navigation buttons, OS version and device compatibility)
C       Beautiful, Flexible Design- efficient use of white space and typography
D       Brand consistency- split into IA, IxD, Visual design
4)      Examples- Fancy (card base, scale on a different sizes), Expedia (split screen into 2 for tablet), TED (action bar, thumbnails)
2.       Reference
1)      Google I/O 2013: Google.com/io
2)      Android Design in Action: androidDesignInAction.com
3)      Android Design Site: developer.android.com/design
4)      Navigation Drawer: developer.android.com/design/patterns
5)      Responsive Design: Goo.gl/RY1dT
6)      Other resources: goo.gl/hh8pg

IX.     How to build a great Android app [khmin@;Kyunghwan Min, Korea Lead, Apps & Games Google Play]
1.       Key takeaways
1)      ABC of Building Application
  all screen size adaptable
  Android design guidelines (esp. Action Bar, Navigation, Pure Android)
A       #1: Action Bar- delete unnecessary items
B       #2: Navigation (Up vs. Back)- in game, back button-> pause
C       #3: Pure Android- use Google identity icons (e.g. no text included icon, no right arrow, use API)
  Quality Checklist
  Localized screenshot, video, etc
2)      ABC of Marketing Application
  Create an awesome Play store listing
A       Feature Graphic- need a promotion banner (device image, screenshot)
B       Description, Title- use user query, be careful in using promotional description
C       Icon- use unique representative icon
  Simplify Sign-in w/ G+- drive downloads/ increase engagement
  Increase downloads through Play badging- e.g. Get it On Google play
  Immediate Play- get ready for users to start playing games right away (include GUEST LOGIN icon)
2.       Reference
1)      developer.android.com/distribute
2)      play.google.com/+

X.      New words
1.       Schema: In psychology and cognitive science, a schema (plural schemata or schemas), describes an organized pattern of thought or behavior. It can also be described as a mental structure of preconceived ideas, a framework representing some aspect of the world, or a system of organizing and perceiving new information. <source: Wikipedia>
2.       URI: In computing, a uniform resource identifier is a string of characters used to identify a name or a web resource <source: Wikipedia> c.f. http://goo.gl/4XGVDv
3.       JSON: or JavaScript Object Notation, is a text-based open standard designed for human-readable data interchange. It is derived from the JavaScript scripting language for representing simple data structures and associative arrays, called objects. Despite its relationship to JavaScript, it is language-independent, with parsers available for many languages. <source: Wikipedia>
4.       Geo-fence: A geo-fence is a virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area. <source: Wikipedia>
5.       Taxonomy: is the process of naming and classifying things such animals and plants into groups within a larger system, according to their similarities and differences <source: Collins Cobuild>
6.       Google Cloud Messaging (GCM)- is a service that allows you to send data from your server to your users' Android-powered device, and also to receive messages from devices on the same connection. The GCM service handles all aspects of queuing of messages and delivery to the target Android application running on the target device. GCM is completely free no matter how big your messaging needs are, and there are no quotas. <source: developer.android.com>
7.       Alan Kay- Alan Curtis Kay (born 17 May 1940) is an American computer scientist known for his early pioneering work on object-oriented programming and windowing graphical user interface design. <source: Wikipedia>