Cyber Anthropology
Menu

March 2010

My first release here at work!

, , , , 1

Our first agile iteration was end of January. So, in two months we created this application from beginning to end.

http://www.theplanet.com/The-Planet-Introduces-iPhone-Application/

http://www.theplanet.com/orbit-for-iphone/

I was the user experience and interaction designer for the entire application. What does that mean? I am the person that takes all of the requirements and sets out the initial vision of the application through sitemaps, flows, and wireframes. Everyone takes my work and uses that as the basis to start all development and QA testing. Then I go through and work with the developers as they are developing the app to make all of the inevitable changes that will occur along the way and update my wireframes as this occurs. My work is what comes first in the process but also carries everyone through to the end. I am the architect that provides the blueprints then ensures that the building follows the guidelines I’ve set forth.

It all starts out like this.

Pretty cool huh? Hah, well I think so anyway. 😛

Sunday Morning @ SXSW

, , 0

It’s a beautiful day in Austin Texas. I have always said that if I were to ever live anywhere else in Texas it would be in Austin. I simply love this city. Now, I’ll admit that I might be spoiled by my SXSW experiences here, but even visiting it outside of SXSW I still love it.

I’m backin the Blogger’s Lounge today, hangning out with all sorts of geek types and debating whether or not I really want to go to today’s keynote.

There is a guy who just came in and sat down at our table doing a sort of prototype demo for a product meant for the Apple iPad, that is some sort of backing that would make it a wall mount, refridgerator magnet, shoulder strap holder and more. He started talking to one guy about it becaues he had a mac, but another guy picked up on the convo and took over the conversation. It’s very interesting watching the interaction between the three. I love being an anthropologist. It really plays into my people watching tendencies. 😉

I’m currently typing on my Dell Mini 9 running Fedora 12 / Moblin and getting a few looks. I have Fedora stickers on the outside of it that I catch people reading ever so often. It’s kind of fun to see people notice. The guy who took over the iPad prototype convo over is stating how he recently switched from Mac to Linux. I just jumped in to ask what he was running and he said, Mint then commented his laptop was built to run Linux ‘Zareason’ (out of Berkley, will be looking this up later). He states that it’s clunkier, heavier, not as stylish, but it’s what he can afford right now. What’s funny is the room is sponsored by Windows and the new Windows Phone 7.

Mac’s and netbooks definitely have the run of the room. The blogger is an interesting user.

Heading to today’s keynote!

Saturday Morning @ SXSW

, , 0

First stop was a panel on IA sketching, but of course it was at capacity. I really do need to start getting to panels earlier. [Must make opening remarks by Danah Boyd at 2 today!!]

Since I was already on the 4th floor, and it’s quite a trek to get there, I headed over to the Blogger’s Lounge where I met @sarahmworthy. Who when I asked if the free chairs at the table were taken, asked if I was cool enough to join them! Mentioning I was a cyber anthropologist was my ticket in. 😉

Being that I’ll likely get a bit of new traffic to the old blog here due to networking at SXSW, I figured I’d post a link to the podcast I did for last year’s SXSW – an introduction to cyber anthropology.

New visitors will also find that I currently have a lot of posts directed to the Fedora community. You can learn more about my Master’s practicum with Fedora / Red Hat via my short FAQ. Elevator speech: An explorative study on how to maintain, sustain, and grow the Fedora Project open source development community.

Other research new visitors might find interesting includes ethnography of a guild in World of Warcraft (circa 2006), as well as product research for Motorola (ask me for these papers and I’ll be happy to send them to you), and a subject matter expert for Microsoft on how people use the Internet.

I should finish my masters in applied anthropology at UNT this summer and will be starting my PhD in the fall at UNT in Philosophy of Information Science [Human Computer Interaction], for which I’ve been awarded a fellowship for my studies based on my academic performance that covers my full tuition for the next 4 years!

My day job is that of a User Experience Designer for The Planet. Just as a forewarning, nothing I say here has anything to do with the company I work for and they should not be held responsible for the content of this blog as it is solely mine.

On that note – off to the trade show, you can find us in booths 303 and 305!

Friday @ SXSW

0

So Friday is almost over here at SXSW (well day time programming anyway). I actually got in last night to take advantage of the short lines for Thursday night registration.

After spending all morning on a development retrospective conference I finally made it to the conference center around around 2. I had only two panels I wanted to go to today, UX of Mobile and Long Distance UX, but sadly only got into one as the first had reached capacity before I arrived.

Tonight, hopefully dinner with friends. Tomorrow I’ll see you all at the trade show!

SXSW Bound!

0

I’ll be heading in to Austin tomorrow to check in and get my badge before the crazy lines roll in Friday morning. Tomorrow night I’ll be at the Social Media BBQ at Emo’s. Friday I’ll start off in the Blogger’s Lounge because that’s where all the cool kids hang out. 😉 Depending on how my retrospective call at work goes (it’s the end of our agile development cycle) I hope to attend a few UX panels. You can find all the panels I’ve selected to attend on my SXSW schedule.

Saturday night the company I work for is cosponsoring a party with Tumblr, FourSquare, SoundCloud, and KickStarter at Emo’s. They are also cosponsoring the Houston@SXSW party Monday night at Hudson on Fifth. You can RSVP for that party here.

Sadly there doesn’t seem to be any Austin Barcamp activities going on. If there is something going on that I don’t know about yet, please inform me! I’d like to start a discussion on the need for good designers in free and open source software development and to brainstorm ways to get designers more interested in participating!

If you can’t find me at the panels I’ve posted, the Blogger’s Lounge, or at these parties – you should be able to spot me at The Planet’s booths (303 & 305) in the tradeshow sometime Sat & Sun 12 – 6 and Monday 12 – 4. I’m told there will be sweeeeeet giveaways so I hope to see you there!

Back To Top