Audience Experience

I came across the following post: http://www.onstageblog.com/columns/2015/7/28/theatre-saved-my-life-from-depression-it-can-save-others-too And am aware of the positive effects of theater in general, but am recently becoming more aware of the larger pattern that it seems to create. I've noticed positive effects & strange parallels in sports, military, computers and social health in the elderly.  I think this is something that can be further explored across many disciplines. Furthermore, I think that the general perception is about "theater people", with all the accompanying stereotypes of qualities of being dramatic or theatrical.  In actuality, the population is more of a collaborative effort, requiring several different personality types to interact consistently to produce a live event. The art is often a byproduct of the larger psychological experience.  The "Art", in fact, is based on the altruistic notion of creating an experience for strange...

Target Corporation has long been known for its highly "targeted" marketing research and highly successful techniques.  As cited in this New York Times Article, " How Companies Learn Your Secrets ", they can predict if a woman is going to have a baby by the shift in her purchasing habits.  Even before her (or THE) father knows. It is done through a series of purchasing trends and analyses of numbers, to develop an algorithm that The System can implement to offer future coupons and incentives which will increase customer loyalty. I am here to argue that the same intense focus can be used to prevent bad UX, not only within a computer interface, but also within the context of the larger relationship of a customer and a business. I have received a few emails recently, generated automatically and from a do-not-reply email.  The last message frustrated me to the point where I considered writing back.  For a split second.  Once upon a time, if you got a letter and ...

NPR Headlines "All Things Considered" has Tech on their minds lately. Great government doublespeak of the day: This plan is "predecisional". The government is estimating that the need is about 30k to 40k people. And as a country, there are maybe 1000, total.  I don't know what qualifications they are talking about, or training or job duties.  They just need to hire a bunch of people that don't exist for threats they are not sure about to keep America "safe" in a future that nobody can predict. Immediately after, NPR turns to Apple falling behind in the world market.  Cellphones are the actual wave of the future.  Of the entire world.  (Not just nerdy Americans in Brooklyn.  And wannabes.) The Chinese market is growing.  India. Africa.  The numbers will be going after innovation.  The quickest, easiest smartphones that can deliver quick bits and bites (and bytes) of info.  The device has got to be inexpensive, smooth and work...

This landed in my email box the other day, from a company I am always rooting for. They put on  excellent conferences and help me to keep my ideals high. Quoting from Mark Hurst's (1/15/13) blog post at Creative Good : "For years I've been fascinated by the work of Natasha Dow Schüll, an MIT professor who has studied Las Vegas gambling for many years. She gave a great talk at Gel a few years back . . . The question is unavoidable: if UX methods are effective in projects with a wide range of outcomes, which do you want to spend out your career on? Those that benefit the customer in the long term, or those that are in the long run harmful? And don't think the slot machine example is foreign to online business. Social-gaming company Zynga has been trying to enter the online gambling market. The company has always paid close attention to user behavior, and now they seek to maximize the profits from such a skill." However, the job market does not seem to ag...

There are LOTS of definitions of "User Experience" as a field. And then also, LOTS of definitions in terms of expectations of what the job should entail.  Most companies don't have a "mature vision" of what to expect, or how to integrate the UX person into their larger product cycle. I was trained to look at the overall picture, always get input from the end-user and to keep in mind the business requirements.  Also, from the business POV, to keep in mind the ENTIRE Customer Experience within the overall process.  The customer clicks a buy button online, but every interaction with the brand prior to that is a huge influence.  The abandonment rate does not exist only online. When you hear about "growing job opportunities" within the UX field, most are for short term contracts described below. Note to the beginning UX'er: BEWARE!! Quoting from an email on a (closed) UX professionals listserv: "Sadly, the majority of companies here stil...

There is a professional User Experience email group, and every so often, someone posts a cautionary tale.  It is usually a story of the significance of usability, as reported in a failure to act on recommendations.  I am quoting it, but leaving out the author's name, unless I have her permission.  Company names are always best left out as well, non-disclosure being what it is.   The story itself is common enough that most UX people I know have at least one experience like this in their past.   This is included here for those of you who might be working on a product OF ANY KIND and who ignore the UX people and/or initial warning signs that things are "clunky".   I have seen this over and over again in the Usability Field.  A MAJOR disconnect between the companies who create product and their actual market.  There's a push to add "UX" to everyone's job title, UX Developer, UX Designer, UX Architect.  The actual UX piece of it-talking to ...

As a User Experience Strategist, I am amazed at how some websites don't invest in their greatest assets.  If you are an ebook marketer, why not expose your repeat customers to your wide selection of titles?  Kobo, please give me a reason to give you my money!! Full Customer Profile & Experience: I love being surrounded by the books I have purchased.  Not that I have read all of those I own, not by any stretch.  And frankly I create a whole new pile of books TO READ everytime I tidy up and rearrange them.  That is what it means to have a physical artifact. When I am on my computer, I vary my time between work, surfing reading and allow my mind to go wherever it wants (as long as I'm not under deadline).   If I purchase an ebook, I can only read it on my laptop or my iPhone.  I refuse to purchase yet another device, when I should just read one of these paper artifacts. While doing research, there was a book that was only available on kobobook...