Tips for Apps and the Web: Designing for Teens, Part I

Jakob Nielsen, of the Nielsen Norman Group, recently wrote an interesting post about designing website for teens. He provides good information for anyone considering this age group.  The study includes tips for designing for smaller screens such as laptops with track pads, touch-screen tablets, and smart phones.

Teenage Usability:  Designing Teen-Targeted Websites

Jakob Nielsen, Alertbox, 2/4/13

The research shared in Nielsen's post is important. The results of research conducted 8 years ago are compared with current findings.  Nielsen discusses some of the myths about teens and technology. As Nielsen points out, teens might appear to be tech-savvy in some ways, but they possess brains that are in the midst of cognitive development,  just one factor to consider when designing web experiences for this age group.

Nielsen Norman Group's related product, "Teenagers (Ages 13-17) on the Web" provides additional information on this topic. It includes 110 design guidelines informed by research conducted with teens.  Busy web developers might find the fee of $149.00 for this report appropriate.   

The information in this report would also be useful to design/development teams who aim to provide web-based educational content for this age group.

Pew Internet & American Life

Another good resource for designers/developers targeting applications or websites for teens is the Pew Research Center website.  The Pew Internet & American Life Project continues to investigate a wide range of topics related to the use of technology among people of all walks of life.  What I like about the Pew Research Center is that their reports are free, and include summaries as well as samples of interview questions.

Researchers from the Pew Internet and American Life Project share their knowledge in a variety of forms.  Data is available for download in SPSS and comma-delimited format, crosstab files and questionnaires.

The website also provides access to number of presentations, such as the one below:

Teens 2012: Truth, Trends, and Myths About Teen Online Behavior from Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project

RELATED/SOMEWHAT RELATED

Nielson-Norman Group Research Reports

Children 3-12 on the Web

Teenagers (Ages 13-17) on the Web

College Students (Ages 18-24) on the Web

Pew Research Center Resources
Featured Research: Teens
Pew Research Center Trend Data (Teens)
In-store Mobile Commerce During the 2012 Holiday Shopping Season

Teens and Education Resources 
The following websites also provide resources for other age groups and related topics.
Edudemic
Edudemic Ed-Tech Tools 
Edutopia
Edutopia: 6-8 Grade Level Resources
Edutopia: 9-12 Grade Level Resources
Mind/Shift

Part II will focus on teens and considerations for educational technology.

LINK: Mobile's Role in a Consumer's Media Day: Smartphones and Tablets Enable Seamless Digtal Lives -Study by ABIresearch (IAB Mobile)

I've been reflecting on how much I do things differently, now that I'm surrounded by digital devices throughout the day - and also surrounded by other people, who are also linked to more than one device or screen.

More often than not, we are all connected to the web, or at least one person/device away!

I don't think we've figured out the "seamless digital lives" part!

MOBILE'S ROLE IN A CONSUMER'S MEDIA DAY: Smartphones and Tablets Enable Seamless Digital Lives (pdf)
(An IAB Mobile Center of Excellence Research Project)

Web Version

Press Release:
Tablets & Smarphones Generate Strong Ad Engagement, According to IAB Mobile Research
IAB Media Contact:  Laura Goldberg  7/16/12



Credit:  IAB, via Flat World Business

Good news for knowledge junkies! Data Journalism Handbook: How journalists can use data to improve the news- available online.

Data Journalism Handbook: How journalists can use data to improve the news
Jonathan Gray, Liliana Bounegru, and Lucy Chambers, Editors


The book is available for free online.  Below is a link to a useful chapter:


Data visualization DIY:  Our Top Tools



RELATED
Open Knowledge Foundation

Tools for Knowledge Junkies: Document Cloud, CALAIS , Linked Data

For all of the knowledge junkies out there, here are a few things that might fuel your passion for interactive information exploration and consumption. Although the tools below were adopted by people in journalism/news related fields, I think that they have potential for use in education and other fields. I'm interested in learning more about how people from different disciplines currently use these tools, and I'd also like more to this list.

CALAIS: "We want to make all the world's content more accessible, interoperable and valuable. Some call it Web 2.0, Web 3.0, the Semantic Web or the Giant Global Graph - we call our piece of it Calais. Calais is a rapidly growing toolkit of capabilities that allow you to readily incorporate state-of-the-art semantic functionality within your blog, content management system, website or application." CALAIS is published by Thomson Reuters
MORE ABOUT CALAIS
PR Video for CALAIS:

How CALAIS Works:

CALAIS for Publishers
CALAIS for Bloggers
CALAIS for Software Providers
CALAIS for Content Managers
CALAIS for Developers
Open CALAIS Content Maps by Jer Thorp

"Jer Thorp is a software artist, writer, and educator. He is a contributing editor for Wired UK. He is currently Data Artist in Residence at the New York Times."

DOCUMENTCLOUD
"DocumentCloud runs every document you upload through OpenCalais, giving you access to extensive information about the people, places and organizations mentioned in each."

DocumentCloud Blog from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.
MORE ABOUT DOCUMENT CLOUD
DocumentCloud Merging with IRE 
Amanda Hickman, DocumentCloud, 6/9/11 (Note:  IRE = Investigative Reporters and Editors)
Newsrooms using Document Cloud
Document Cloud: Not Just For Journalists?  (Excellent article!) Konrad Lawson, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/8/11 (Konrad is a Ph.D student in the history department at Harvard University.)
For Techies:  Document Cloud's VisualSearch.js | Autocomplete Faceted Search Queries
Losterium Posterious, 7/9/11


LINKED DATA

-linkeddata.org
"Linked Data is about using the Web to connect related data that wasn't previously linked, or using the Web to lower the barriers to linking data currently linked using other methods. More specifically, Wikipedia defines Linked Data as "a term used to describe a recommended best practice for exposing, sharing, and connecting pieces of data, information, and knowledge on the Semantic Web using URIs and RDF.""

Tim Berners-Lee: The Year Open Data Went Worldwide

"....Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web. For his next project, he's building a web for open, linked data that could do for numbers what the Web did for words, pictures, video: unlock our data and reframe the way we use it together." At TED2009, Tim Berners-Lee called for "raw data now" -- for governments, scientists and institutions to make their data openly available on the web. At TED University in 2010, he shows a few of the interesting results when the data gets linked up."-TED

LDOW2011: Linked Data on the Web workshop


COMMENT
I plan to share more information related to this topic in future posts.  I welcome input and links from my readers!

NEWSEUM, a highly interactive museum in D.C. with an online component -I want to visit!

What is a newseum?

"The Newseum -- a 250,000-square-foot museum of news -- offers visitors an experience that blends five centuries of news history with up-to-the-second technology and hands-on exhibits.  Within its seven levels of galleries and theaters, the Newseum offers a unique environment that takes museum-goers behind the scens to experience how and why news is made."

"The Newseum is one of the most technologically advanced museums in the world. The Newseum ordered 100 miles of fiber-optic cable to link up-to-the-second technologies that include electronic signage and interactive kiosks, two broadcast studios, 15 theaters and a 40-by-22-foot high-resolution media screen."


Below are some examples of what visitors can experience at the Newseum, located in Washington, D.C.:


Bloomberg Internet, TV and Radio Gallery

-Newseum
Time Warner World News Gallery

-Newseum


The New York Times --Ochs-Sulzberger Family Great Hall of News 
Surrounded by the flow of information

-Newseum
"Around, above and below, visitors to the Great Hall of News are surrounded by a continuous flow of news. Instant, breaking, historic news that is uncensored, diverse and free."


NBC News Interactive Newsroom

Photo by Maria Bryk/Newseum

"In this 7,000-square-foot interactive gallery, visitors can select any of 48 interactive kiosks or experiences where they can immerse themselves in the many roles -photojournalist, editor, reporter, anchor — required to bring the news to the public. The gallery features eight “Be a TV Reporter” stations that allow visitors to choose from a variety of video backdrops, take their place in front of the screen, read their report from a TelePrompter and see themselves in action." -Newseum










NEWSEUM exhibits have an on-line component.  Here are a few:

Time-Warner World News Gallery Press Freedom Interactive Map

Online Virtual Tour of the Newseum

Newseum Online News Trivia Game

Newseum Microsite (Great for use on an interactive whiteboard to introduce students to the museum.)

Video:  How to Be a TV Reporter

Bloomberg Internet, TV and Radio Online Exhibit

Pulitzer Prize Photograph Gallery

Social Sound Waving: Sound Cloud

One of my Facebook friends recently shared a link to the SoundCloud website, a site that is new to me.  I was pleasantly surprised to learn about it!


"SoundCloud is a platform that puts your sound at the heart of communities, websites and even apps. Watch conversations, connections and social experiences happen, with your sound as the spark." -SoundCloud

Here is the screenshot and the link:

Jurassic Park Theme (1000% Slower)

Yet another rabbit hole for me to follow in the future!

PRIVACY AND THE INTERNET: A HELPFUL VENN DIAGRAM via Flowing Data via buriednextoyou via We Love DataVis

via Flowing Data via buriednextoyou via WeLoveDataVis

SOMEWHAT RELATED

Flowing Data  (Nathan Yau)

Privacy and the Internet

Q. What schooling should I take to learn about visualization and data graphics?

Find your flight via visual interface

Buriednexttoyou (David Makes)

datavisualization.ch (curators of WeLoveDatavis)

Review: Processing for Visual Artists

Visualizing the 2010 Afghan Elections

Illustrating Information with Photography

WeLoveDatavis

The Digital Native Speaks.

One of my Facebook friends posted this video of a digital native letting teachers know that in no uncertain terms that they MUST get on board with the interent & technology thing:




I sense that this kid's dad has a job in educational technology- this video might be his way of motivating teachers to get along with the digital natives they face every day in their classrooms.

Courier: Microsoft's "booklet" prototype: A cross between a netebook and a...what? Via Gizmodo

To see a visual walk-through of how the courier UI works:

Courier: First Details of Microsoft's Secret Tablet


The scoop from Gizmodo:

"Courier is a real device, and we've heard that it's in the "late prototype" stage of development. It's not a tablet, it's a booklet. The dual 7-inch (or so) screens are multitouch, and designed for writing, flicking and drawing with a stylus, in addition to fingers. They're connected by a hinge that holds a single iPhone-esque home button. Statuses, like wireless signal and battery life, are displayed along the rim of one of the screens. On the back cover is a camera, and it might charge through an inductive pad, like the Palm Touchstone charging dock for Pre."

Also from Gizmodo:


Leak:  Inside the Microsoft Store with Wall-Sized Screens and the Answers Bar

Boxee and Digital Convergence

This post is an update to a previous post, Digital Convergence & Interactive Television

Have you heard about Boxee?  I first learned of it today when I came across an interesting post on the Boxee Blog of a debate with Mark Cuban, author of the post, Why Do Internet People Think Content People Are Stupid? on Blog Maverick.

This debate led me to the following related posts:
Boxee CEO: Consumers Will Get a la Carte Online
(Ryan Lawler, Contentinople: Networking the Digital Media Industry)
Bewkes Defends TV Everywhere (Post by Georg Szalai on the Hollywood Report of how Time Warner would provide subscribers to view cable TV network content online.)

What is boxee? Sort of a social-network-internet-cable-TV-Wii application....
"On a laptop or connected to an HDTV, boxee gives you a true entertainment experience to enjoy your movies, TV shows, music and photos, as well as streaming content from websites like Netflix, CBS, Comedy Central, Last.fm, and flickr."

quick intro to boxee from boxee on Vimeo.
From the boxee blog:

"boxee is the developer of the first “social” media center. boxee plays media from your computer and other devices in your home network, as well as connect you to various Internet sources that allow you to stream or download movies, tv shows, music and photos. boxee is based on the xbmc open-source project. we have been working with team-xbmc since early 2007.

We are in the process of alpha testing boxee, so this is why you need to get an invite to participate.. sorry. the alpha is for Mac OS X 10.4 (and above), Ubuntu and Apple TV (a Windows version will come out towards the end of the year"