Monthly Archives: January 2011
Last month Richard Branson released the iPad only magazine Project. As one of the first in its class it has the potential to set the standards for magazine based interaction on the iPad. Although Wired, Popular Science, Oprah and many others have released iPad versions of their magazines. Project is the first iPad only magazine.
Project has a really informative ‘how to use’ screen, however, there are a lot of different interactive elements and it still runs the risk of being overlooked as it comes off a little too complex.
After sharing with a few friends, I noticed they were having some issues with the interactions. There are sections on the page that contain numbered screens which hold different content when the numbers are selected, and without reading the how to, I can see a lot people missing this really unique area. I also found that some of the galleries are not labeled as galleries, so it does take some exploring to get a feel for the magazines standards.
Once you get used to the interactions however, the magazine is quite amazing. You can fly through it easily and the interactive nature of the content is engaging and informative. This is the new way of viewing magazines. I’m confident that the interaction issues will be ironed out in future issues, and this is one iPad magazine I can’t wait for every month.
As the iPad is still a new medium, it is interesting to see the variety of interaction standards between apps and magazines and it will be fun to keep an eye on which ones develop the standard for interaction.
Darren is an Information Architect in our Calgary office.
COMMUNITIES
WordPress challenges bloggers to post daily in 2011
If you’ve already made your new years resolutions for 2011, whip that list back out because WordPress has one more for you to add. WordPress is challenging users to create at least one blog post each day for 2011. There are dedicated tags (postaday2011?) that users can use in order to make sure their posts are counting. While this may seem like an intimidated feat for many, WordPress has also included a list of inspirational and evocative topics for users to check, just in case writers block pops up during the 365-day adventure.
TOOLS & TECHNOLOGIES
Schweppes App Lets You Hack Your Facebook Profile
Ever since Facebooks latest redesign, users everywhere have been coming up with ways to display their creativity using the photo stream at the top of profile pages. Schweppes, and Amsterdam-based digital agency, Super Social, have decided to get in on the action as well. Their latest app allows users to use one profile photo to spread across the entire photo stream. Check out this video for full details, and to learn how to “hack” your profile as well.
MEASUREMENT
Facebook Users Uploaded A Record 750 Million Photos Over New Year’s
After all of the celebrating, it seems that most Facebook users rushed straight to their computers to upload their New Years photos. In fact, all of these users set a Facebook record and uploaded 750 Million photos to the site. Most of the time, the average daily number of photo uploads is around 100 Million, but due to this crazy huge influx of photos over the holidays, that number is now higher. Looks like Facebook has more to celebrate this year than simply the new year!
INFLUENCERS
Tech’s Winners and Losers of 2010
2010 was quite a year for the technology industry, but it was an even bigger year for those behind those tech companies.
Read More
As the ‘noughties’ finish, those of us in the marketing/advertising/PR (more simply termed, ‘communications’) industry recall last decade’s tectonic shifts with nervous anticipation. Brands are finally able to offer its customers advertising they can choose to watch, services they genuinely enjoy and dialogues that are, well, actual conversations.
At the same time, a large number of traditional agencies have disappeared while audiences seem to be everywhere but in front of TV sets or newspapers. And yet the French adage, ‘the more things change the more they stay the same’ still holds. Here are 10 books published last decade offering a good shape of the communications industry and what’s to come:
What’s Changing?
1. The Idea Writers by Teressa Iezzi: If you want to get caught up fast, read this. It’s a great primer with plenty of insights on what’s changed and what’s still required to get an audience’s attention, online or off. Teressa is the editor of Advertising Age’s Creativity magazine and an expert on branded campaigns. Highly recommended.
2. Baked In by Alex Bogusky and John Winsor: This book was written by what could be the alpha and the omega of advertising in the past decade. Alex Bogusky is arguably one of the leaders of “a second “Golden Creative Age” and “Creative Revolution”. John Winsor is the founder of crowdsourcing agency Victors & Spoils, perhaps the end of what we call agencies today. Together they’ve written a book that expands the marketing process into product design, anthropology and beyond.
