Their well-prepared animated slides have amazed me though they are quite
simple. This is like the Flipboard itself, simple yet attractive. They have
brought some insightful suggestions. While the three most important points
Michael and Jesmond have highlighted are simplicity,
attention
to details, speed.
Simplicity
I have to say no one like complications, being it
acedemic content, game or even a relationship. If we observe carefully, it not
hard for us to realize that all successfully applications have this feature
e.g, Instagram, Drawsomething, Apple products and etc. This feature enables
users to have a quick hands-on of that application without trying hard. As such
user experience will be greatly enhanced. This will be something we all need to
focus on regardless what we are doing being it Facebook Application,
Application Critique or Blog entry.
Attention to details
How people feel largely depends on details. This explains why sometimes
people do not like a certain stuff but they can’t tell you why they do not like
it. How did Flipboard did successfully in this area? They achieve high UX
satisfaction through considerate observation. They completely think on the users’
side, being thumb move on different platforms or size of displayed articles.
Speed
People get increasingly impatient to wait for loading. If we make them
wait for a sec more, they will just never use it or delete it, and we can go
back eat ourselves.
My
Thoughts
Flipboard is something what I desired before Michael mentioned it. And
now it is in my hands. Thanks Michael, Murali, Jesmond and Trung Hieu for
introducing this apps to me. If it is a reader application, which allows users
to read with flipping, that will be awesome. Notes making is always quite
intuitive when you are reading some inspiring or useful contents. That’s it! I
love it so far! The best is yet to be.
We are all one-step closer.
Interesting read: simple yet with sufficient details, like Flipboard's features. Commendable for the ease of reading writing style.
ReplyDeleteThanks! I love simple things:D
DeleteThis is one of the apps that every iPad user should use and an indication of how media will be consumed in the future. I think Flipboard is just the beginning of how design can be used to make content consumption on tablets not just viable but desirable.
ReplyDeleteLi Zhaorui: After the presentation, i did install it in my app. It is awesome! I hope it will be better if it allows user to make and share their own magazines.
DeleteYup, i think one of the most important cards that Flipboard played right was paying careful attention to details. Much like the Apple philosophy to simplicity and details, Flipboard had all the tiny design nuances addressed such as flipping speed and how unobtrusive their ads actually are. I have some friends who actually enjoying seeing the ads! That is a huge success in my honest opinion.
ReplyDeleteTo quote one of my profs, "Simplicity is not simple". Flipboard does simple things, but doing it right and appealing to a wide spectrum a user is one mean feat.
I have always heard and read about flipboard and yet I never got down to downloading it.
ReplyDeleteAgree with your point that alot of effort is really spent on the design of the app. Even the details such as how you can read the stacked text when you half flip the page is made to look so real.
However i find that content sources is lacking in the app. So far they have only managed to get a few publishers to work with them. Thus the articles are always repeated from a few sources. In order for Flipboard to become mainstream, they must really find a lot more publishers and original content. Also, 2 of their big time publishers just pulled out, so the future of flipboard is still uncertain at this point in time
Jay
Want to be geek - http://wtbg.blogspot.sg/
Yea, they only have a few suppliers of reading sources. It is more desirable to make it like a reader, so that reader can use it to read anything they want, refer to my inserted picture for reference:D
DeleteI have just tried it out. I totally agree that its UI is really cool and intuitive. The centric UI design is astonishing as despite that no instructions were given, I can still somewhat know what to do next.
ReplyDeleteAs what Kai stated, it's lack of content compared to other major reading sources, like Zite. But it could be double-edged.For some users who only want to get casual and simple readings experiences, it is really great. On the other hand, it may not be the best
choice if users are those who keen to look for information.
I guess one of the other reasons for why Flipboard is popular, is it gradually feed user with information, instead of throw a chunk
of thing at them.
Their news feeding is slower than the rest? I didn't notice it. How did you know that?:)
DeleteI believe the lack of reading resources could be due to Flipboard's current approach to how it gets its content. Rather than offering subscriptions to various magazines and news articles, Flipboard leverages articles from your Twitter and Facebook feeds. Think of the occasions that you learn a piece of the latest news not from a newspaper but from your Facebook news feed. Similarly, Flipboard chose this approach perhaps because it keeps the articles relevant to you by extension of it being relevant to your friends (I know this isn't necessarily true). You also have to understand that Flipboard is free so getting a large variety of free news sources would be difficult. Nevertheless, to my knowledge Flipboard does offer support to news sources that are already free (e.g Kotaku, Gizmodo, TechCrunch)
ReplyDeleteI tried Flipboard long ago and I remembered that the reason I stopped using it was because I could not quickly browse through the headlines of all newest articles, to select what I really want to read. Perhaps they can have a function to consolidate all the headlines intuitively? ahah.
ReplyDeleteI remember that they allow the adding of RSS Feeds, therefore, adding news sources shouldn't be a problem.
hahaha thanks for sharing! they can RSS? I have to explore more then:D
DeleteIt is really crazy to see so many comments here. That means you are popular hahahaha.
ReplyDeleteI think you forgot to mentioned about the caching which is a big issue for Flipboard. Ah never-mind, I also forgot to write that in my blog.
I am also impressed with the UI and the speed of reading. It makes users easy to get the main information from headlines. And only show you the details when you need it.
Hey Siao Kz,welcome to my blog!!
DeleteI guess i gt mentioned something similar as caching. I meant to make it like a reading apps, refer to the picture i have inserted!
Haha, we were under the impression that Flipboard was so popular, but anyway, we're happy to introduce you to it. Once you get the hang of it, I think it is hard to consume content by any other method. It really proves that being first doesn't matter, as long as you do it right. Anyway, looking forward to working with you for the next assignment! :)
ReplyDeleteMy blog is also under the effect of popularity of Flipboard! Yo, see u tmr!!
Delete