The Truth About Men

Social Media of Youtube

It seems what is understood as a Social Networking Site encompasses a wide range of varying concepts of “social”.  In the article “Publicly Private and Privately Public: Social Networking on YouTube”, a resource is quoted as explaining. “Research on SNSs has shown that the meanings of social network site practices and features differ across sites and individuals”.  In the case of Youtube, there is a page dedicated to a user’s profile called a “channel”; friending is also allowed.

Through formal interviews and analysis of videos, comments, and video responses, the author of the article “describes how participants manipulate media to maintain social networks and intimacy amid public scrutiny”.

Social networks are arguably useful for understanding social dynamics, and whether a site constitutes as a social network is dependent upon the measurements used while studying the interactions.  For the most part is seems that a social network is understood as a site that allows users to cultivate a valued relationship with other users.   More formerly: “Social network sites are defined as websites that allow participants to construct a public or semi-public profile within the system and that formally articulate their relationship to other users in a way that is visible to anyone who can access their profile (boyd & Ellison, this issue).”

Youtube videos may serve important social functions that is not dependent on technicalities.  However exchanges of a social nature may not need to be based on information gathering.   These videos may create feelings of openness and affinity to the creators. The artciel explains, “How and why media like instant messages or videos are viewed, enjoyed, and forwarded reveal much about the participants and their relationships. How they are shared also provides insight into distinctions between public and private.”

I think the most useful conclusion for the group to understand from the reading is the ” findings also have design implications. As social groups and professional organizations increasingly supplement their websites with social network site components, it is important to be alert to fractalization touch points, where greater amounts of publicity or privacy may be required to meet different individuals’ and groups’ social needs.”

Paper Prototype Question (From 12/1)

The question i had about our paper prototype was if users would find the categories adequate for picking videos. Youtube does have a set of categories and for the shuffler, since it will base itself off of the user’s preferred categories, they should cover what user’s will want to look through.

In our prototype I am hoping that by providing categories in a list in a general range, users will respond by either requesting more categories that are more specific or suggesting their own category that they would like to see on the form. Users should be able to appropriately set what video types come up in the shuffler even though they will be able to decide for each video if they like it. The hope with the prototype is to help us get a better idea of what users will expect.

We decided for the prototype that the form would have just four more general categories and through the results we can find if users see this as inadequate or if the wide range of available videos is more desirable. Along with this is if users will select multiple boxes or just one. The categories could be set to only allow one to be selected but should probably allow multiple categories if users desire.

Pukinskis Set: Youtube(From 11/17)

Our final concept of a Video shuffler (C1) came from our first predisposition (P1) youtube watchers watch the same videos as well as the predisposition that users don’t watch videos from youtube directly at their site but are instead lead there to watch a video by another site (P2), this lead to our survey where our results advocated our thoughts that users don’t spend alot of time on youtube browsing videos and usually see the same videos that are most popular (R1). Looking at other sites we found that StumbleUpon’s video feature, by randomizing videos in selected categories, created an interesting experience for users. (R2) This lead us to our insight that if youtube had a shuffling feature it will encourage users to stay longer and see new videos that interest them. (I1) From there we developed our concept of having a video shuffler page and encouraging users to use it on the front page.

Question about the Proto Type

One of the questions I had about the proto type and the process, was how a user without a Youtube account would be handled, since a majority of our new feature relies on logging in.

My question actually came up when I was going through the proto typing process with my subjects.  Later it was brought up in group where it was discussed and addressed.

This problem was address through a decision to restructure the design of the original feature, changing it to be more friendly to the account-less user, but also creating incentive for them to join the site.

Paper Prototype

The one question that came up in my mind is about the pressure of creating account/logging in to use video shuffler to its full extent. Most users don’t want to create or log-in into their accounts just because it’s too much of a trouble for them. For many people it would get into their nerves and make them annoyed to be asked to login to use the video shuffler feature completely.

I asked one of my friends what does he think about our paper prototype and he got the same problem as I did. He said it’s too much trouble to sign in/create account for him, he would simply would get frustrated/discouraged of the Shuffler feature and won’t use this feature for a while/simply quit using it. The one way to go about this is either to create a video that would explain about advantages of the shuffle feature or add more entertaining/interesting things that would get users’ attention. One simple but at the same time difficult thing for our project to do would be just to get rid of the need of sign in/create account.

Paper Prototype – Question

The question I was most interested in exploring was whether people would be most likely to create a log in name if they didn’t already have one and whether the prompt to sign in would become annoying and discourage the users. Our team has created the shuffler in such a way that it suggests to people that they should create an account if they don’t have one and to log in if they already have an account. We did this by having the video shuffler provide more options when a user is logged in vs. when they are not logged in. We also made it so that every three video plays a message appears prompting the user to log in for more options, create an account, or cancel to continue watching videos. 

When my roommate assisted me in doing the paper prototype my initial assumptions proved mostly correct. I had assumed that the users would most likely get annoyed being prompted to register after 3 consecutive video plays. My roommate explained to me that he decided to create an account and be able to log in prior to watching videos. He said if he didn’t create an account he would become very frustrated with being prompted to register. He explained that if he kept getting prompted he would either only use the shuffler for three videos then quit or he would seek another videos shuffler site. He also created an account so he had access to personal features that weren’t available on the quick use. Overall, it seems that our ideas to prompt users to register at the start of use and to not provide all features to the quick use shuffler were good ideas. However, we may want to rethink prompting the user every three videos. This may discourage users and shy them away from our feature. 

Paper Prototype

The one question I have regarding my groups design would to whether or not the users will find using the video shuffler confusing or whether they felt it was very user friendly.  Based on what i’ve learned about usability in the class, I felt that if we were designing this new feature for youTube it should be very user friendly so that more people would visit the site more frequently.

So with the help of our paper prototype, I asked the user to just play around with our video shuffler and see how he felt about it.  During this time i watched the user to see how he would recact to the video shuffler.  Whether or not he showed signs of frustration, happiness, etc while using the video shuffler.  I also performed an interview after the user finsihed using the video shuffler.  Some of the comments I recieved were that he would have perfered having a tutorial section for first time users of the video shuffler.  Also another thing was that the user would have perfered more categories for the differnet videos he could have browsed.

Paper Prototype

One question that I have regarding our group’s prototype is whether or not users will think it is necessary to create an account/sign in in order to use the Video Shuffler. Based on my previous run of the prototype, I gathered that it was important that we, as a group, provide the user with a better understanding of what logging in does for them and how it is not necessarily required in order to use the shuffler itself. I feel as though further prototype testing will continue to expose this weakness because it is not made clear within our design how the login process really benefits the user.

Upon completetion of my prototype run, I conducted a post-interview and found that, in the case of my test subject, the user felt pressured into creating an account/signing in. It even took the user a few minutes to realize that she could continue using the shuffler without signing in. She also was quick to point out that she had no idea why being logged in would improve her experience while using the shuffler. Overall I feel that the prototype study done by our group will reveal a need for providing users with better information regarding the login process and how it effects their use of our feature.

Paper Prototyping

A question I came up with based on previous YouTube knowledge is whether people will use our personalizing feature of the Video Shuffer. Personalizing the users experience requires them to be have a YouTube account, and I wondered whether our shuffer would encourage users to sign up and log in.

I ran the paper prototype three times. Two had high YouTube experience, and the third had limited experience. The results related to my question were quite surprising. One frequent user and the limited user did not “log in” to YouTube when prompted during the test, which the other frequent user did. The reason for the two who did not log in was it was too much of a hassle, even when the login form is in the foreground, on top of the main viewing area.

A reason for this could be the third use who did log in simply uses YouTube more often, and already uses YouTube’s features that require an account. The other two, after a quick interview, just use YouTube to watch videos they are linked to, and use the “Related Videos” feature to find new videos. A reinforcement for this idea was that the user who did log in actually logged in before our prompt. He logged-in to use our rating feature before the prompt to continue shuffling even appeared. This was very unexpected.

I believe our shuffer will be used, but based on this small amount of information, a majority will have the impression that logging into YouTube is still too much of a hassle. Our shuffler will probably be used mainly by the more “hardcore” YouTube users who enjoy experimenting with features.