Awesome Samsung Ad

Selling Vaastu .. lol!

This is a fun thing I did a while ago. I posed as the wife of a Vaastu obsessed husband and went around hunting for a perfect Vaastucompatible house. Don't ask me the reason but just listen to what happened. What i want to exhibit through the conversation is to what extent the brokers sell vaastu with their half baked knowledge. 

Me: Bhaiya, is this house Vaastu compliant?

Broker: Absolutely madam!! Take it and go

Me: How can you say its Vaastu compliant?

Broker: Madam the entrance is north facing which is best in vaastu.

Me: Since my husband and I are manglik, we want south facing entrance. 

Broker: It is south facing madam...

Me:...but just now you said its north facing

Broker: No madam you are standing opposite to me no.. so its south facing for you.

Me:(perplexed .. :~ ..wtf!!) Do you have a compass to prove?

Broker: (is compass a thing to carry:-)) Madam, what are saying..i have been working here for past 10 years i know this house?

Me: So you havn't sold this house for the past 10 years!!

Broker: He he.. not this one, I am refering to other houses in building..

Me: How do I know that this is a south facing entrance?

Broker: You can ask the neighbours

(So we go out and there is noone in sight except for some construction guys)

Broker: (shouts at them) Raise you hand and tell madam that it is a south facing entrance

(Unanimouslythey all pick up their hands and tell me that it is a south facing entrance..arghh! Is there anyway to beat this guy!!)

Me: There is a garbage waste outside the building entrance... this is inauspicious.. you cannot have such a thing according to vaastu

Broker: No madam, vaastu says there should be no waste on the same side of the road as of the building.. the waste you saw is on opposite of the road madam... its fine!

Me: (phew) Why is the bathroom right in front when you enter house?

Broker: It signifies that you discard harmful substances right at the entrance and then enter the house in pure form.

Me: (i need to nail him down ...) According to vaastu the bedroom should be in the south east...but this one is not so?? (got him!!)

Broker: No Madam, remember you just asked for a south facing entrance no.. the bedroom then should rightfully be in the north-west, it is there madam..

So finally convinced (but not convinced) I made an excuse and went out fuming with disbelief.

A Mallu Party

I have decided to be more visual than literary. This is how I expressed myself when my mother asked me to think of getting married into a mallu family. After seeing this poster she suggested it no more. 

Learnability vs. Likeability

For one of my recent projects I had to supervise graphic design work. This was the first of its kind of experience. My whole career was UI/Interaction design centric. Frankly it was a different world all together. Here is what i felt differently

When I make a UI, I use the design scenarios to test its usability with users. So the user walks through it, while I watch him using the interface. Its like water flowing. As a rock comes by, it obstructs the flow and one can notice it and correct it. But when it comes to graphics, what the hell do I test and how?? What do I say.. do you like it? Why don't you like it?? (don't you know how much time we have spent in coming up with this 'not seen before' graphics and you don't have the taste to appreciate it??) 

Well unlike UI there is nothing to learn here.. You can make the user learn something but you cannot make him like something!! This is a big challenge. I cannot say that "oh sure he will like it over a period of time". If he doesn't like, he doesn't like it. Simple. Get on with work and make more alternatives..phew!!

Another challenge is how does one decide what is best for the user. This is tricky because even if you ask him if you like this and he says yes and then ask him why do you like it and the user is shut up. He never seems to know why he likes or doesn't like something. It's a feeling, how does he explain it?? Well, to get over this problem we researched on how coke and pepsi are tested with end users. We then designed a test to efficiently and indirectly test the graphics with the users. It gave us the user's needs, wants and desires that he wants fulfilled. Something that gives him what he wants to feel about it. 

This experience was certainly an eye-opener towards visual design and how hard it is to get it right. I can now appreciate the rigour of what graphic designers go through.

iPhone ... is Diwali par, Knight in Shinining Armour

I am back from my Diwali Holidays and it was fun especially if you belong to Delhi. My parents shifted to a new house recently. So naturally this Diwali was spent in introducing me to the new neighbors. There is a signature style of talking that distinguishes a Delhite from a non Delhite and it goes like this. And here goes Iphone to my rescue.


// Neighbour of my age who is a programmer in Delhi //
Smartass Boy: So what do you do in Haiderabad... are you a programmer?
Me: No I am a User Interface Designer (hoping that he understands.. but no)
Smartass Boy: I didn't get it... (next question is the typical question they ask when they don't understand anything)...ahaan.. konse pletform par kaam karte ho?
Me: (platform no. 12 coolie no. 420).. actually our job is platform independent..
(Not so)Smartass Boy: (Now that all his concepts are shaken..aggressively) Now does you application run on Java or .Net?????
Me: I design how users will interact with the product... on the desired platform (I add this extra bit for his convenience).
(Not so)Smartass Boy: Accha (ye to bavakoofon ka kaam hoga) to aap GUI banate ho? ... Koi course kar rakha hai ismein??
Me: (yea that's wat girls do right..course!! wtf) I studied in NID, Ahmedabad and the "course" is called Software and User Interface Design..
(Not so)Smartass Boy: GUI design (in a comtemplating pose as if he is the personal advisor of Narayan Moorthy) .. hmm.. ye to bada easy kaam hai... ismein aapne course kiya??
Me: (no... i just went to NID to make out with my BF).. itna easy nahin hai... we measure and improve the usability of the product...it requires user research and design skills.. its the basic difference between an iPhone and any other phone.
Smartass Boy: (happy on listening about iPhone).. iPhone! My friend just came from US and got an iPhone...u should see it... its amazing... blah blah blah...
Me: (thank you iPhone!!! .. You are my Hero.. :D)
Smartass Boy: Nice Meeting you .. give me your number.. see I have a Samsung.. I like its usability... its very good to look at and see now how i enter your number... the navigation is great too.. blah blah blah.

Thanks God there are some people in the industry who have done their designer's worth of job. People now know what a designer is capable of doing after the iPhone...

A Good Form Example

Today I was trying to download a few games for my new phone. Most of the sites i came across were baffling in terms of the amount and density of information they contain. I couldn't figure out anything so I ran from one site to another. At last I came across eqo.com

The best part was that the site didn't mention the word register anywhere. It happened so seamlessly. So apart from the usual these are the highlights -

Layout-

1. Similar fields are grouped together which makes the form look easy to fill. Each group does not have more than 4 items.
2. * are all aligned neatly one below the other for quick uninterrupted scanning. So people instantly know which fields are mandatory.
3. The form does not show the "create account" button till the user fills up a few mandatory fields.
   

Support-

1. It mentions clearly (in orange) who should fill up the form. Other people need not bother. This shows that they value my time and effort.


2. The support is amazing. For example in case I didn't know my phone model the form tells how to find that out.






3. It even shows you the right image of the phone model I have selected for reinforcement. And no loading time, its instant.
   


4. The field country is already pre-filled with India(its where I live) and as a consequence the phone number prefix is set to 91.


5. When it is asks for the e-mail id and I enter my ID and press 'tab' for the next field it pre-fills the field with the same ID! cul! On top of that it even check on its own if the ID is available.



6. Each field is justified clearly and nothing is taken for granted. For example even a simple thing like language has an instruction stating "(Choose which language you’d like to use EQO in)".

Widgets

1. The button is not called "submit" but "Create Account" which actually tells me what will happen if i click on that button.

All these highlighted points make a form filling experience seem to be a painless process. It brings pleasant surprises to the user and create eagerness about the service for which he fills the form

Its in Africa

Saw this interesting imagery in Google Earth. It is somewhere in South Africa. Its a lovely sight.