random stuff from me & the interwebs
First, let me just say that I love Path 2 and think everyone needs to jump on board! Ok...
In Brenden Mulligan's UX Critique of Path 2 he mentions the idea of adding an alarm clock to the sleep action. I agree with everything he said about it and think it's a fantastic idea. Some people think that telling your friends when you are asleep and awake is ridiculous but I think it's great because not only does it share a neat little tidbit with your friends but it also let's them know when you're not available. I would absolutely love the feature if it was built on top of an alarm clock like Brenden suggested. So, here is my wish list of how I would like to see it implemented:
1. When I tell Path I am "Going to Sleep" it should automatically ask me "When would you like to wake up?" with two options: Set a time or None.
2. I should able to set my wake up time quickly with a simplified UI that defaults to the time period I will most likely want. For example: if it's currently PM, I probably want AM. If it's early AM, I probably want AM also. (This may seem like an obvious feature but the native iOS clock app defaults to the current time period.) As for the time picker itself, it should be in 5 minute increments so I don't have to scroll through every minute option. Does anyone really need to wake up at "8:03" exactly? No. Just make it 8:00 and stop being a slacker ;)
3. The sound, snooze, vibrate, repeat, etc options should be handled in the app settings as they will rarely change.
4. When the alarm goes off, I should be greeted by a very similar screen as the current "Sleeping" screen. It should still have the beautiful sky background and simple "Awake" button but it should also have a "Snooze" button(if the user has turned the snooze option turned on in the Settings), the current outside temperature, the sky background should reflect my current weather conditions, and lastly, my notifications i.e. "While you were sleeping, …..". Note: this new awake screen should not be dismissed when I hit the awake button so I have time to consume all of the info on it once I'm awake.
Now, Brenden did say: "…don't delay this so it can be spectacular. Just make it useful and start simple. Launch this as quickly as possible." which I totally agree with but I'd love to see these features added asap.
What do you think? Would you use the Path more if it had an alarm feature like this to start and end your day?
The purpose of a domain name makes perfect sense: make it easy for people to get to a website. Unfortunately, that simple idea has turned into a fiasco. Almost every decent sounding and legible name has been registered. Most of them are owned by greedy "domain brokers" aka low-life squatters. These jerks buy names in hopes they can sell them later for an exorbitant amount of money because the future buyer will "need" it. That pisses me off. Companies, especially startups shouldn't have to base their company/product name on the availability of domain names but many do. Yes, it can be fun to get creative with alternate spellings or suffixes like .me, .co, .ly, etc. but that fun lasts about 15min, trust me.
I don't think websites "need" a perfect domain name anymore. If your product is called "Basecamp", you shouldn't need "Basecamp.com" for your website to easily be found on the internet. And guess what, you don't! 37 Signals has been using "Basecamphq.com" for years and they don't have any trouble getting found online. Why? Well, I think people don't use their address bar as much as they have in the past. Now, most people use search engines as their address bar. If they want Basecamp's website, they will type "basecamp" into Google and click the first link that "looks right" on the search results page. This is becoming more and more popular because it's easier than typing "Basecamp.com" and being wrong.
I think it would be easier if you could just type where you wanted to go without knowing the domain name and without going through a search page. So, I created this proof of concept:
Let me know what you think.
Steve Jobs passed away today. This made me sad, more sad than I thought it would because I didn't personally know him. I am sad because Steve had a huge impact on my life just as he did many, many others. He, of course, impacted my life through the technology and devices he envisioned but also, he inspired me to be who I am today. He's my "Michael Jordan", "Peyton Manning" or "Muhammed Ali". He is my hero. His achievements make me want to achieve. He makes me want to be a better leader, follower and person. I have him to thank for many of my beliefs about company, design, usability, work ethic and life. Now he is gone. Fortunately for all of us, he will live on forever in his work. Amazing.
"You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something -- your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever."
-- Stanford University commencement address, June 2005.
Thank you, Steve.
Dustin
