Karen Lin

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Posts written by Karen Lin

January 5

Recent IxDA discussions of interest

by Karen Lin

I recently caught up on some interesting IxDA threads highlighted below that may interest you as well. Wishing everyone a wonderful and happy new year!

o1. Firefox Home Tab Challenge

IxDA has partnered with Mozilla Labs and Johnny Holland for a design challenge. The submission deadline is February 14 for a concept video explaining how the new Firefox home tab should work. Anyone interested in forming a Molecular team to tackle this??

02. GLIDE ’10 Call for Papers

This is a biennial virtual conference sponsored by the National Science Foundation and AIGA UP ST NY dedicated to research on topics related to interaction between designers and global communities. The theme this year is cross-cultural collaboration with indigenous and underserved communities. Abstract submissions are due February 15. Conference takes place on October 27.

03. Google’s Above-the-Fold App

This new app let’s you see in a transparent gradient kind of way which parts of your site is viewable by percentile.

04. Shopping/ecommerce trends

Someone asked the group about what trends people were seeing with online shopping and here were the recommended resources:

o5. Andrew Daniels on uxSEARS

A virtual meeting featuring the UX director of Sears hosted by IxDA Chicago called “The $50 Billion Startup Revolution and How UX Leads the Way”:

posted to: Experience Design, Industry Trends | No Comments »

July 9

A lesson on (im)personal brand management from “LeVideotape” James

by Karen Lin

Okay, I’ve heard of corporations trying to cover up their mistakes and keep their bad rep under wraps, but I had yet to hear of an individual person trying to stifle proof of his or her own most important quality — being a human being. Until now, that is.

I have no problem with LeBron James being the most hyped and marketed NBA player who enjoys likening himself to a king or god of basketball. It’s a wonderful gift to be capable of having dreams and aspirations in life. But when a professional basketball player gets dunked on by a college sophomore, I expect him or her to smile, high-five the student, and take the opportunity as a humble reminder that even the best is, of course, only human. The last thing I would expect is for this person to ask for the video footage back and only after the fact, claiming it was camp policy that cameras weren’t allowed.

This example should serve as a lesson to brands in an age where Internet and social media, in particular, increasingly unveil the human side of corporations. The last thing to aspire to is acting like the polar opposite of being human – putting on false pretenses as an infallible god in the face of proof otherwise.

posted to: Industry Trends, Web 2.0 & Social Media | No Comments »

June 2

Snickering over Snickers

by Karen Lin

I rarely ever have a Snickers bar, but I really enjoy “eyeing” their candy ads like the one I saw (pictured above) this past weekend in New York. To me, it’s like an inside joke that makes clever sense out of the shapes and colors of the candy bar, their earlier “Hungry, why wait?” campaigns, and of course, the play on words — and I can’t help chuckling to myself whenever I spot one.

They’re also really hard to ignore — unlike most ads plastered on buses and cabs, it’s simply a single word or phrase, however made up it may be. And because its shape is immediately recognizeable, you know the next time you see it in passing that you’re in for a treat.

Now, if only Snickers would print these clever words on their candy wrappers, I might actually have one more often just for the fun of it :)

CORRECTION: Thank you to Paul Pantzer for pointing out that the Snickers wrappers do currently have the words printed there — just on the backside of the bar. (Just goes to show how long it’s really been since I’ve touched a Snickers bar. I will now have to eat my words…)

Snickers wrapper says Peanutolopolis and Nougatocity

posted to: Experience Design | 2 Comments »

April 14

Webcam to the Rescue

by Karen Lin

Would-be burglar captured on webcam carrying what appears to be Wii motes in his hands.
Would-be burglar, Wii motes in hand, is captured on live webcam.

In the age of real-time information broadcasting, who wins when it comes to law breakers and law enforcers? This YouTube video from a Florida woman’s webcam as her home gets burglarized got me wondering: will whoever has the more powerful live surveillance technology — the ”all seeing eye” — always be the winner?

Think of it this way. There are more and more ways to track live information between live webcams, GPS services like Loopt and Google Latitude, and even Twitter (if you can trust the source).  Both lay people and law enforcement agencies are turning to these tools for information about safety. The Boynton Beach PD relied on this live webcam technology to respond to the burglars in the act and, through their own YouTube channel, have also published it as a PSA to educate the public about protecting their homes. Other examples like this abound: an LA firefighter monitors Twitter for reports of fires and even used real-time tweets from citizens during the 2007 Griffith Park fires to relay information to his crew on the ground.

Despite all the greater good these technologies can serve, I can’t help but wonder what would have happened, if say, the would-be burglars had their own system for tracking the whereabouts of the BBPD and knew they were headed to the house? Could they have gotten away with it? Could these technologies actually be used against law enforcement? So far, I haven’t personally heard of any examples, though I suppose one might be able to tune into the same radio channel as the police to get the same effect. But everyday as I look around me and see all the mobile phones with built-in cameras attached to each person’s ear, hand, and hip, I can’t help but wonder what the world would be like if each one of these devices could stream live footage 24/7 to anyone anywhere in the world. What, if anything, would happen then?

posted to: Industry Trends, Technology, Web 2.0 & Social Media | No Comments »

November 10

Busuu.com: Not Another Social Networking Site

by Karen Lin

Actually, you could even call it a “social teaching” site. Busuu.com (website) taps into an international community of language-learning enthusiasts — of English, Spanish, French, and German for now at least — and incorporates easy-to-use language learning methods much like its offline software brethren such as Rosetta Stone. But it doesn’t stop there. Busuu sets its users up to connect with and correct each other via “editing” of other users’ written responses in the form of comments and ratings (pictured below) and live chat. You basically have a network of a several personal language tutors at your fingertips, 24 hours and 7 days a week.

It works because it takes advantage of the fact that every person is already an expert in at least one language — their own — and when armed with an eagerness to learn new languages, this makes for a dedicated community of users who are more than willing to share their own expertise in exchange for the expertise of others. Combined with its interactive lessons, pick-your-own topics, news feed of when others have “edited” or commented on your writing exercises, and even little animated trees that grow as you grow your language skills, Busuu is well on its way to fulfilling the dreams of its co-founders in maintaining the diversity of languages around the world.

The inspiration for the website’s name “Busuu”? A language from Cameroon that is only spoken by eight people in the world.

posted to: Experience Design, Web 2.0 & Social Media | No Comments »

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