I use a news aggregator app called Zite. It is excellent, allowing you to choose from a set of topics that interest you and making recommendations based on your choices. The app collects news articles from sites based on your topic choices, aggregating them together into a single news stream. You can ban particular sites
What kind of sharing should your app support?
It is becoming more common for apps to support sharing to social networks, be it Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Google+. The major smartphone platforms have been integrating these social networks deeper into the operating system. For example, Apple’s iOS platform has system-level support for Facebook and Twitter, providing an easy way for apps to share
A Fictional Day with a Smartwatch
The next wave of digital devices look to be headed towards wearable technology, quickly moving from fitness trackers like the FitBit (http://www.fitbit.com/) to smartwatches like the Galaxy Gear https://www.samsung.com/us/mobile/wearables/. No one can predict the future, but we can all dream, so today I’d like to walk you through a fictional day with a smartwatch. Morning
Should you build an app?
Push Interactions is a custom app developer: we’ve primarily only built other people’s apps. This puts us a great position, because we deal with a huge variety of domains, ideas, concepts, and business plans. In this post, I’d like to outline four main types of apps we’ve encountered and built, and what you should know
Getting users to create app content – Getting started
Last week, I wrote about a special kind of content consumption app where developers could, in essence, trick users into creating content for others to consume, thereby reducing the creation stress on developers. This week, I want to expand on this idea by describing some strategies apps can use to get users started in the
User Generated Content – An Overview
As my PhD supervisor, Carl Gutwin, says: “Ideas are cheap. Good ideas are hard”. Through my years designing mobile apps, I’ve thought hard about what it takes to make a compelling app. What, exactly, makes an app a hit? This is, of course, a loaded question. Apps that fulfill a real human need are easier
How can our Interaction Designer help YOU?
As the lead interaction designer at Push, my primary job is to ensure we build the right app. This includes ensuring the app solves the business needs of our clients, while providing a pleasant, efficient, and effective experience for your users. More to the point, my job is to help you create the product you
How to Monetize Existing App Users
Most companies are jumping on the app bandwagon, including established companies releasing existing products repurposed as apps and startups releasing new products, creating entirely new app categories. Regardless of the company, there is a common problem encountered: how can we make money on the app store? It is incredibly difficult to get noticed when your
Designing for BB10 – 3 Great Interface Elements
I’m an iPhone user at heart, but as an interaction designer at CollegeMobile, my job requires me to design for all the major mobile platforms: iOS, Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone. There is no better way to learn a platform than to use it as your actual phone, so I’ve been using different devices (notably