week two: asking and mapping

this week i've worked on honing the questions i'm asking and trying to answer. because i tend to work counter-intuitively, i had started with too academic of a questions, full of abstraction and semicolons, and a smattering of similarly lofty subquestions. here's where i've been, and where i'm going.

audit of existing web experiences

the long distance relationship websites in existence tend to be the work of one person or one couple, writing article after article, heavy with the implication that what worked for them will work for everyone. the deficit i find here is the lack of simultaneous, equal voices and personal interconnectivity that a social media platform allows for. 

the mindmapping

i knew i wanted a component of this to be a stream of information or moments, sortable and limitable in a variety of ways. working from the blurry to the specific, i first brainstormed all the different ways to look at the information this system would wrangle.

marty helped me to clear the clouds and focus instead on what specific activities i'm envisioning for a user to be able to complete using this hypothetical platform i'm blueprinting.

what is it i want people to be able to do?

my umbrella question may still be how can social media help provide reassurance and external support to an individual in a long distance relationship?

but here are my new sub-questions, each directly relating to a branch of this map, with the answer to be illustrated in parenthesis:

• how can "mentorship" be used to encourage those who are frightened about the beginning of an LDR? (finding and contacting a mentor)

• how can the online community help someone navigate a "rough patch" in their LDR? (seeking advice on a topic, e.g. cheating)

• how can interactive information design help a separated partner connect with others' experiences? (sorting the overall stream by mood/tag)

• how can this platform allow for both online and offline friendship and companionship?

(finding a live meet-up)

further mindmaps ensued.

by what parameters can users find each other personally? 

what sorts of content can be found and sorted through in the stream?

i'm also presently working on organizing and putting together the surveys i conducted, the designed results of which should be available on this blog soon. 

to-do calendar

anyone who has seen how i work on my computer can attest: my native mechanism is a text document. this one contains a schedule for how i'd like my next few weeks to shake out over this project.

early spatial experience concept

the kcai website says, "do things your way," and "you travel off the beaten path." for our concept, we tried to work with this idea of finding your way, as well as highlighting the diversity that kcai prizes. 

firstly, here is a location plan of where we determined a need for wayfinding/boundary-setting, with several levels of hierarchy and purpose.

as for the visual concept itself, we're envisioning a system of colorful and angled shapes that guide visitors to their destinations while referencing the outline of the core graphic element. each destination would have its own color designation, and these shapes would emerge from the ground or from architecture along the path to confirm that you're on the right track. an interesting visual complexity will emerge along main through-ways where, like downtown highways, several paths use the same route. in these places, there should be an interplay between the colors, so that it's easy to tell when your path either joins with or separates from others.

moments of crossroads, such as entrances, should clearly elucidate each color and in what direction you should start walking to follow its path. we imagine these navigational guides to be harmonious with the traveling shapes, whether they take the form of the traveling shapes emerging, labeled, from the ground, or if they look more like a signpost with smaller color-coded elements to represent them.

materials we've imagined so far for these elements include clear colored plexiglass, opaque colored plastic, or painted metal.