dissecting experiences with a critical eye
Some of the most popular sites are the most fugly. It makes me feel good about my dorky-looking blog. :)
http://www.ebay.com/
http://amazon.com/
http://www.facebook.com/
http://www.comcast.net
http://imdb.com/
http://www.weather.com
http://sportsline.com/
JPG Mag - Social photo-sharring (a la Flickr), meets an artsy magazine; some really beautiful photos here.
RIP Odeo - Mega Blogger Om Malik reports on cannibalistic buy-out of Podcast start-up Odeo, which suggests what seems to have been a DUH! thing all-the-while — podcasting is very niche and has little future next to richer mediums like videocasting. One thing to note: the conversation about this move by Evhead is filled with questions about what will really happen to Odeo.
Byespace? - Via the On The Turning Away blog, the Wall Street Journal reports that there is a notable decline in traffic to Myspace and Facebook. Is this “seasonal” as the sites claim, a small tremor, or a the begin of steady shift?
While I migh be slighly biased, I must say Forrester’s Consumer Forum seems to be kicking all kinds of ass.
For those of you, like me, who can’t be there this year, check out the Consumer Forum blog where you’ll find a summary of many of the panels and talks, and some really great ideas.
Talks of note…
Harley Manning’s The ROI of Next-Gen Experiences
Peter Kims pannel on WOM Marketing
Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend. Here’s some Puccini for you, Aretha Franklin style.
The new Google Reader interface is driving me nutso! Yes, there are more features, like other ways to mark articles as read vs. unread.
But, really, the basic experience of a reader is simple. Aggregate content, show it to me, repeat. That’s it!
Any time a design team says they’ve improved something by adding “more features,” I guarantee you they’re doing something wrong (or they work at Microsoft). I for one would choose simplicity over a host of features any day.
So, it was a great relief when I read on the Google Reader blog that you can revert to the previous interface.
Take a look at this A/B image of the old and new reader designs (click it for the bigger Flickr photo):
Hi, my name is Ross and I’m a design strategist, and I'm passionate about studying how audiences connect with products and ideas. I've worn many hats: a market researcher and consultant at Forrester Research, a game designer at Harmonix, a grad student at Carnegie Mellon's Entertainment Technology Center, a composer and teacher at New England Conservatory. You can reach me at ross.spw@gmail.com, or follow me on twitter.
