Web Zoo

Some animal logos chilling together in the Web 2.OO.. I mean ZOO. Can you recognize where they belong?

Filed under: Uncategorized

Indian Families as Consumers

The Big Picture

* There are approx. 226 million families in India (72 mn urban, 154 mn rural)
* 25 mn families (11% of all families) have more than 1 earning member
* 28 mn Indians (2.5%) prefer to read in English, marginally more than Malayalam
* Average monthly family income in India is Rs.5,930 (‘per capita’ is Rs.1,350)
* 70% of all Indian families earn average to below-average incomes

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Vista Features I Would Like in Win7

I hope these Vista features stay in Windows 7, which make small but positively significant differences to the user experience.

1 Bite-sized Breadcrumbs- Easier to navigate than the previous Windows explorer tree view
2 Hiding the menu (File, Edit, View, Tools..) and showing only the most relevant menu items highlights simplicity for the average user.
3 Favorite Links (option of adding your own folders)
4 Extra Large Icons (ideal eye candy for image and magazines- could be the default display option for multimedia folders)

Easy Keyboard Navigation (being a heavy keyboard user, I like these to be added)
5 Keyboard shortcut Alt+UP (more intuitve than backspace)
6 When going back a level in the explorer, focus remains on the file/folder where you started from.
7 To rename a file, pressing F2 highlights only the name and does not include the extension (nice!)

8 The brain-friendly menu system aka the ribbon should extend its presence to native Windows applications (like Movie Maker).

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Tags

Tag Clouds dont work for me. Reasons-

1 A tag cloud is all visual clutter, no information (or wisdom).
2 Only big text shows clearly, what about all others? Are the small ones only there to be ignored?
3 No one except the creator knows how the tags are interlinked.
4 You cant expect to find what you are looking for by clicking on a tag (which unfortunately is their purpose).

Seems to me tags are very “individualistic” in nature and does not help for a visitor or as a community feature.
Examples of tags- gmail labels, del.icio.us tags, google notbook tags, imdb keywords

If only tag clouds could look something like this..

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Unofficial Guide to Google Search

Am putting down some points that I use to do secondary research using Google and other sites.

0. Question Yourself
Before asking Google, ask yourself- “What do I Want to Know About?” Always mention places (where) and times (when). This will refine your query and easier to search for Google.

Place
Always think- Where? It can be a place in the physical world, but in the virtual world too. Mention countries, cities, (India, Boston) or virtual places (Microsoft Website, Windows XP, Recycle Bin)
Time
Always mention the time – 1940s, 2012, August, “six months”. Think- When?

1. Read!!
(Note: If you don’t like to read from a screen, please start liking it.)

 

2. Use Magic Words
Some keywords, when added to a query, helps you find more accurate answers. Here are a few that I use for research. You can think of new ones as you search. Examples are in brackets and the magic words are in bold.

* How do the best people do a certain job? (best practices mobile learning)
* What will happen to Indian retail industry in 2 years? (trends Indian retail industry)
* I mostly use it for software issues like a computer virus (troubleshooting xp win32.dll not found)
* To find more about the landscape of a new domain (online bingo market Europe) or (online bingo industry)
* Want to compare two phones, two religions, two cities.. (Jessica Alba vs Jessica Biel). Other substitutes could be Comparison or Better Than
* For marketing/ user research data (demographic cameraphone users japan)
* To see what people are saying about a certain product or service (canon EOS 40D review)
* (video tutorial podcasting)
* Good for finding summary of events, annual briefings (McKinsey 2008 report web2.0)
* Who’s who of a certain topic (2008 top 10 pop songs US )
* To find free goodies (free blu-ray disc burner)

3. Search Other Places
Digital format makes everything sharable over the internet- photos, newspaper articles, maps, TV program snippets (news, sitcoms), documentaries, conference talks, presentations, books, magazines, music…. and all of them can be searched too! Think of how will information you are looking for is likely to be represented (in a video, image, ppt, presentation, book, map or blog). You can search directly on some sites if you know what you are looking for-

YouTube- for videos, tutorials, gadget reviews, ads..
Slideshare- for presentations
StockXChange, Creative Commons Search- for free images
SmashingMagazine- for free icons and other free graphic design resources
Google Scholar- for academic papers
Amazon- for searching books and book reviews
Twitter- for searching hottest topics (happening right Now) that you won’t find in blogs or newspaper sites (I came to know details about the SriLankan crickt team attack in Lahore through twitter before anywhere else).

If Google repeatedly throws up a site for information (wikipedia, for example), you can directly go to the site and search too.

4. Make Search Come to You
Use Google Alerts to make Google search for you and send results via email. For example- I get daily results for the term ‘usability’ to my gmail. The results are unique and sometimes insightful. And I don’t even have to search for it!

5inally, don’t be afraid to open lots of links

You’ll find the information quicker.

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Its Not That Easy..

Update (Sep 25 08)
Teachers have been using Samorost in their classrooms for students to learn analytical and critical thinking skills. Another teacher talks in length about reasons children should play Samorost. The interesting thing to note here is that the teachers are using the same game which everyone plays and not a modified version.

Update (Sep 1 08)
The design team behind Samorost are working on a full-length game called Machinarium. I was reading an interview they gave, and the most interesting thing that I found was they did the BBC game only because they needed money to make ‘their kind’ of games.

<Original Post>

I eagerly clicked on the link to play Questionaut. After all, it was by the guys who had made Samorost.
(If you have not played Samorost, I suggest go play it before reading ahead. Make sure to play the game with your headphones on).

Samorost2 (2005)

Samorost is pure magic! Its an engaging and well thought-out puzzle game. The basic goal of Samorost is to get the guy’s dog back. There are basic levers and push button mechanisms which u need to “play with” in order to solve a puzzle and move ahead. The ambiance of the game is amazing. But am not reviewing the game here.

The same creators have made a ‘educational’ game for BBC titled ‘Questionaut‘. The goal in this is to get the guy’s hat back. On various levels, there are planet-heads who ask you questions. The gameplay is almost the same as Samorost. Still, the magic is missing. And the kids love the problem solving part and not the questions. Here’s proof.

Questionaut (2008)

(Click on the image to play the game)

How the magic is lost? I think its because it feels as if we’re playing two games- the ‘Fun’ game and the ‘Questions’ game. The fun part is when you to make the planet rulers ask you questions. After that, its just multiple choice questions.

I don’t blame the creators, but I certainly believe that this kind of parallel format neither brings fun nor education. The only motivation for me was to see the fun part in the next level. By the time I’ve finished the game, I forgot what is a preposition and a conjunction. They did not think about how the questions could be integrated into the game. And its not easy to make such a game.

Have a few ideas how to do it. Will share them in another post.

Filed under: Mind Musings

Overflow of Cover Flows

Ever since Apple bough cover flow, it has fascinated many by its graceful display and ease of browsing information. Clones of cover-flow are now floating across the web, here are some of them we can use.

SpaceTime- A browser plug-in which shows you everything in 3D- search results, ebay products, browser windows..

SearchMe- This is a search engine which shows results (web pages) in a coverflow format.

FotoViewr- You can use widgets provided by this site to put ’stunning 3D galleries’ in Facebook, iGoogle, WordPress.

Cool Iris- This browser plug-in shows all related media of a page as an interactive 3d wall. Crashes my firefox a lot, but worth a look.

TouchFlo 3D- HTC is putting this technology in every upcoming phone of theirs. Faces are great to watch in a cover flow format, as mentioned elsewhere too.

TiltViewer- This free application displays 25 photos at a time in a very nice way. See it in action.

Even Microsoft has introduced this look for their new xbox 360 dashboard interface.

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Photosynth- The Missing Picture

Photosynth makes a 3D image composed of a collection of images created by thousands of people all over the world. It got out of ‘beta’ recently after we saw the promising demos for two years. I still dont see why would anyone use this..

Wont it be an elegant and easier solution to shoot a panoramic HD video and let an application make an interactive 3D picture out of it? You can do that easily in Flash (PC) or Final Cut Pro (Mac) link

Of course, its the ’social’ angle that makes Photosynth special, but then we have to assume that everyone will click pictures from a different angle. I went to the Photosynth site and saw the Taj Mahal. All key photos are by National Geographic. A similar effort by London Eye shows all images being clicked by a professional photographer.
So, tourists like you and me will click a million photos at the front bench with the Taj in the background, and 10 photos on other places, how will 3D space will be created?

Some things that would excite me with such an application-

1 See a place at different times (photos of Taj at day/evening/ night).
2 Use of Videos to create a 3D picture (will be much easier for a person to shoot a video)
3 Filters to see only those photos which I clicked.
4 Click on a particular place in the 3D picture and see all photos associated with it.
5 Release it as an API for dedicated communities like Flickr where everyone is trying to show something unique.

Scenario: if there’s a wedding, then can it show us the whole venue in 3D if the photos of every digital camera at the event were uploaded? And perhaps a slide show with photos appearing the time they were clicked? Then, it’ll be magic. Right now, its not.

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Mobile Banking in Delhi!

Just read an article in The Economic Times about money transactions being tested by aam-junta through mobile phones.
The article however, does not mention details about payment gateways and what are the participating operators and banks doing for trust issues and security concerns.
If the scenario mentioned below is true, then this could be the next revolution for the great Indian masses.

Some excerpts-

“A pilot phase has already been successful between HDFC and Bharti Airtel in West Delhi. Chemist shops, general stores, residents, NGOs, anybody can register to become an authorized outlet. ET spent a day with one such outlet – Gupta Medicals doubling as an authorized mobile banking outlet in West Delhi to find out how the system works.

A customer (Kamla) comes to the shop in immediate need of Rs 200. She comes to the outlet and asks for withdrawal from her mobile bank account. Sumit Gupta, the outlet owner SMSes from Kamla’s mobile phone the following code – “*543*123*(the outlet’s mobile number)*200*Kamla’s 10-digit Pin code#”. He sends the SMS to 54321. Instantly, Rs 200 get deposited into the outlet’s account withdrawn from Kamla’s HDFC account. Mr Gupta hands over Rs 200 to Kamla with which she goes and buys fresh flowers for garlands. The transaction takes less than five minutes.

In order to confirm the transaction, HDFC bank sends an SMS to Kamla’s phone: – “Balance in your HDFC account as of 3/7/2008 is INR 900.” Kamla’s account is a no frills account. To graduate to a savings bank account she will have to submit additional documents.

With Mobile Money Transfer (MMT), the user can transfer funds to a mobile number, that is registered with mChek with a valid VISA card or to any 16digit VISA card number in the country. About Rs 20 is charged for a card-to-card transfer.

The SMS receipt can also be treated as a legal document under the new IT Act. Overall, while operators seem gung-ho on the service, it remains to be seen how much popularity mobile banking will find amongst India’s 270 million odd mobile subscribers and whether it will encourage 90% of the population which uses no bank to open a bank account.”

You can also read the full article.

Filed under: Copy+Paste, Indian

On My Reading List

Alan Moore is one of the most famous writers for graphic novels and comics. The ones that I have read are  V for Vendetta, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Batman- The Killing Joke. Incidentally, I haven’t been able to read his most famous work, which now is being made into a film, Watchmen.

I have high hopes of “Watchmen” because of
1. Zack Snyder- Watchmen is being directed by the guy who floored me with the movie adaptation of 300.
2. Alan Moore- When you read his work, you can almost feel the era in which the stories are set (he. The atmosphere is so complex and mysterious, yet so real. Watchmen is not one of the first comics which tries to show the “other” side of super-heroes, but it is certainly the most sophisticated and celebrated one.
I hope to read it asap! Meanwhile check out the trailer for the film!

Filed under: Inspiring