Looking back, I was somewhat surprised to find that a year had passed since I first started blogging. Happy Birthday to my blog.
I took this opportunity to look back at some of the reasons I started blogging. I felt this was especially appropriate after a talk at CHI that had an apathetic, if not negative, approach toward blogging (and an audience member who “detests” blogs and is convinced that they’ll be all gone in 2 years).
A handful of the MHCI students went to a steakhouse / sushi restaurant over lunch today called Vargas. It was quite amazing, and in a word, delicious.
There was an article in the New York Times a couple days ago discussing new uses for wikis – namely, using them in the context of product reviews, as Amazon.com has started to do.
For those unfamiliar with the technology, a wiki essentially allows multiple people to edit one webpage. A well-known application is Wikipedia, which attempts to be an encyclopedia that is editable by all users. The idea is that, if everyone builds on each other’s knowledge, we can compile a well-informed encyclopedia on the web.
Frequent blog readers have probably checked out some of Vince’s games that I’ve written up. Well, I’m through blogging about them. Why? Because Vince has created his own blog to chronicle his games!
On a related note, I’ve been writing essays for my Game Design class, and Vince suggested that I post them on his site. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. My first essay is already up, and more will be posted over the coming months. Check it as often as you check mine!
That’s the number of hours that people played solitaire around the world last year. Yikes.
One of the presenters from Carnegie Mellon has been doing work to try and tap into that manpower for tasks that humans do better than computers. By creating games that have meaningful output, suddenly those hours are being better spent, even though the people are still playing games and having fun.
So, next time you want to mix up your solitaire game playing (or if you need some new games for your toolbox), check out The ESP Game or Peekaboom. Not only did they seem fun, but they also are helping to categorize the images on the web in a meaningful way. Very cool.
I took my first CHI course today, and it was on the politics of usability - not to be confused with the usability of politics, which could always use improvement:
Anyway, right, politics of usability, Rolf Molich. I liked this session, but at the same time, I think I was hoping for something a little extra. The format was cool - we were presented with a business case, and we worked individually to come up with some recommendations for Mary, our hypothetical usability professional.
I arrived at Montreal with most of the HCI Institute at CMU, and it’s shaping up to be a fun time. In celebration, I’m going to be doing usability-related posts this week! Exciting! Stay tuned, I’ll have a post or two each day, starting today!
I got an email from Progressive today. I have my car insurance through them, and they sent me an email six months ago offering me $50 if I chose to install a TripSense in my car. The idea was that the data would help them conduct some research, and every six months, they would email me and request the data.
Well, the time has come, but I’m starting to have second thoughts. In my Service Design course on Monday, we had a guest lecturer from a company called Peer Insights. I can’t find a website for them, but they were written up in Business Week. Peer Insights specializes in trying to create services that result in good experiences for the customer.
An example that they gave was car insurance - the experience is mostly a negative one, because your rate can always go up, but it can never really go down (unless an accident leaves your record, or you turn 25, etc). It’s a punishment model, really: If something bad happens, customers are punished, but they are never rewarded for good driving.
The folks at Peer Insights offered Progressive’s TripSense as an example of fixing the punishment model - by studying how individuals drive, Progressive can adjust the rates accordingly.
Hooooold the phone. I went back and found a little excerpt from my offer letter to start using the TripSense. It goes a little something like this:
The data you provide are for research purposes only, and will not, under any circumstances, have an effect on your current or future car insurance rate.
So which is it? If Progressive really is trying to move toward a more accurate model, which Peer Insights seemed relatively sure of, then I’m suddenly not feeling a lot of trust for my insurance company. But on the other hand, I’m getting an immediate reward of $50, which is always nice. Should I just take the money, or should I be a little more skeptical?
Nothing like brunch with friends to celerate Easter. I made a Chicken Dijon Strata, and was surprised at how it came out! Experiments in cooking that go well always make me want to cook more. Maybe in Seattle.
In case you forgot what Easter was about, here is a little reminder. (The saddest part is I’ve been waiting 11 months for Easter just so I could link to that). Did you leave cheeseburgers on your lawn this morning?
Meghan sent me a link to a moving jigsaw puzzle today, and I thought it was a cool use of Flash. It takes a bit to get the hang of it, but in general I felt pretty accomplished compared to playing A Tale in the Desert.
