whenever a new concept, new app, or new feature is released that includes some new search function, I always try to do the same thing… I try to break it.

I don’t think I was the only person that was confused about facebook holding a media event to announce graph search. I didn’t get it.

as soon as graph search was enabled on my facebook account, I could wait to have another reason to hate facebook. then, it all I blew up in my face…

I couldn’t break it.

in fact, I immediately began to rely on it. within minutes, i realized that graph search is probably one of the most powerful search and discovery engines available today.

let me give an example:

“Thai restaurants in Los Angeles, CA that are liked by people from Thailand who live in Los Angeles, CA”

there is a fairly specific string of words needed to return the exact results that you’re looking for, but results are the most specific and most accurate that I’ve seen.

last year, I went to Austin, TX for SXSW and found a great coffee shop called Houndstooth. this year I had to go to San Antonio, TX for a weeding. I love coffee. as soon as I landed, I opened up graph search:

“Coffee Shops in San Antonio, TX that are liked by people who also like Houndstooth Coffee in Austin, TX”

sure enough, I got a short list of great coffee shops in San Antonio.

if you already have graph search enabled on your facebook account, here are a few thought-starters that will help you take advantage of the power of graph search…

“Mexican Restaurants in Los Angeles, CA that my friends like”

Coffee Shops in Santa Monica, CA that are liked by people who also like Intelligentsia Coffee”

“Single girls who are friends with my friends”

…you’re welcome.

and, my personal favorite:

“Bars and Nightclubs in Los Angeles, CA that are liked by single girls that went to University of Southern California”

have fun.

videos are not photos.

i’m beginning to think that i’m in the minority of people who understand this concept. 

photos are easily consumed. they don’t require attention. they can be enjoyed anywhere, at anytime, without being disruptive. they can convey everything that they need to communicate within a single glance.

videos are not photos.

more and more i’m coming across video apps and video sites, video sharing and video streaming, video with filters, video, video, video. yes, videos are the natural evolution from photos, the imminent successor, but they serve two completely different purposes. everyone is having trouble understanding why instagram got 100 million users in 2 years, yet similar services for video are relatively unknown. no one likes airtime, viddy never went anywhere, facetime and google hangouts require too much attention to be used regularly, and videos are usually passed over when coupled with a stream of photos.

videos are not photos.

photos provide an insight. a different perspective on the day, a captured moment, a quick snapshot of another part of the world.

videos are a storytelling device. they demand engagement. they require a specific environment. they allow you to transport yourself somewhere else and immerse yourself in that place for a short period of time.

stop treating videos like photos. stop trying to give these two very different mediums comparable functions. try to understand the beautiful purpose that videos serve, and cater to that purpose.

for the past few months, i’ve been complaining about email a lot.  

people don’t respect email.

it’s used for communication, tasks and assignments, updates, news, sharing, etc.

it’s been around for 20+ years and hasn’t changed. every inbox looks the same and there’s nothing that categorizes email based on their different use cases.

i’ve been throwing around ideas of tagging systems that would allow a user to assign a task to someone that’s cc’d on an email. it would include the ability to highlight text and give it a specific attribute. then, once those things were categorized, those snippets would be organized into different action areas. once the email was sent, it would remain in the recipient’s archive, but the action items that were intended for the recipient would be placed placed in their correlating sections of a mail app.

things tagged “task” and “parker” would then show up in my “tasks” area. things tagged “update” would then show up in an “updates” area and be threaded. things tagged “sharing” would then show up in a “shared” area and could be used as “read later”.

then, no need to respond to every email, just mark it completed, and just as it is no longer an action item for the recipient, the sender would be notified of the status. 

as i’ve been throwing these ideas around, i’ve come across a few people who have recognized the same problems, and i couldn’t be happier that there’s light at the end of the tunnel.

why am i writing this?

there are some huge issues with email, and it needs to change. there are people working hard to fix these issues. if we’re all aware of the problem, it will be easier to adopt a solution.

dotmailapp

mailboxapp

fluent

UPDATE: looks like AOL is getting in on the action, as well…

alto

six years ago, building a website was easy. a little css, some html, and maybe a form or two. get it to work on a few different browsers and your job was done.

today we have desktop, tablet, and mobile. everything needs to be responsive and adaptive. everything needs to be optimized for different shapes, sizes, orientations, and now, resolutions. even a single page site has a dozen different factors that need to be taken into account. if there was ever a time for good web designers and developers to really earn their paycheck, now is that time. 

it’s also a very exciting time. all of this advancement is leading to a lot of really great innovation. and now, with retina displays hitting the market, one major new factor in development is load time. even sprites load slowly at 326 ppi.

so, i thought i’d share some fun tools that i’ve come across that help with development in this time of transition…

get rid of gradient background images. get rid of them for pages, for buttons, for divs, for everything. i use this A LOT:

ultimate css3 gradient

linking to social is important. stop using images. there are now a few fonts made up entirely of icons. you can even create your own. it’s like the wingdings of the future…

socialico (used on this tumblog)

icomoon

beautiful fonts are easier to use now too. there’s no point in creating images just to use them for typography. i’m willing to bet you can probably find what you’re looking for here:

google web fonts

typekit

want a little responsive web design inspiration? 

mediaqueri.es

if you ever need a form for anything, go here:

wufoo

here are some shortcuts to writing css3:

css3 generator

css3 maker

if you want to learn more about web development, these are my favorite:

css-tricks

treehouse

code academy

i love my internet. let’s all make the best internet ever!

i write this not as a disgruntled fan of the game, but as a befuddled designer.

i play words with friends a couple times a week, half the time from my iPhone, the other half from my iPad. one thing that i’ve always liked about the game is it’s simplicity. it’s easy, it’s fun, and can even be a little competitive from time to time.

words with friends recently made an update to their iPad app…

(my open letter begins now)

WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!

i understand that a lot of popular apps use a sliding container as a means of accessing navigation, but there is a time to use that functionality, AND A TIME TO NOT USE IT.

PROTIP: just because something is cool, or trendy, doesn’t mean you have to figure out a way to implement it.

why the hell would you have a container that slides left and right with swipe gestures when your entire game is based on swipe gestures in every direction?! do you take pleasure in frustrating your users with accidental gestures?

maybe you’ve done more user testing than i have on hand positioning when holding an iPad, but you have now moved all of the buttons to the most inconvenient part of the screen.

you’ve also made the letter blocks smaller. you do realize that the PRIMARY INTERACTION of your game is to move the letter blocks. why the shit would you make them smaller?!

lastly, the one thing that i’m willing to bet that most users do, when they’re not moving letter blocks, is switch between games, which you’ve decided will now be 2 taps instead of the previous 1 tap. ARE YOU KIDDING?! I realize that I’m bitching about 1 tap, but you couldn’t have had a simpler interaction, so instead, you decided to make it a little more complicated?

i’d love to know who decided all of this was acceptable, because they seem like an idiot. you’re building a game app, not a facebook app. OVERLAYS ARE JUST FINE. they work very well.

i’m sure there’s more, but i got so frustrated while playing that i decided to come write a stupid blog post about your stupid game.

don’t be dumb. fix it.

UPDATED:

i love social media.

so, apparently i wasn’t the only person that complained. i really respect companies that listen and respond to social media. i really appreciate companies that care about their users and listen to feedback.

i got the following push notification about 36 hours after i originally posted this blog entry, and since then, a new ipad version of words with friends has been released, addressing most of my concerns. i’m super impressed. and, i kinda feel like an asshole now.

for years now, i’ve been saying that tv networks should have the same subscription model as magazines. pay for a month, or pay for a year. only pay for the networks that you’d normally watch. premium and major networks would cost $9.99 per month and cable networks would cost $4.99 per month. those networks would be provided via individual mobile applications.

for the last couple days, i’ve seen a lot of people tweeting about takemymoneyhbo

…apparently, i’m not the only person that feels like this. people everywhere are wanting hbo to offer a standalone app, so much so, that a site has been created to show how many people are willing to pay a monthly fee for it.

can we stop living in the past? I have 500 channels, I watch 4 of them. this is ridiculous.