Drew Cogbill | Thesis Blog

• a minute to leave a voice message telling your world what you’re up to
• a minute voice message telling your world what you’re up to
• one voice message to tell your world what you’re up to
• one voice message telling your world what you’re up to, in a minute or less
• one voice message for all your friends and family
• one voice message for one minute, connecting you to your world
• one voice message for one minute telling your world what you’re up to
• what you’re up to in a voice message
• tell your world what you’re up to: one minute, one voice message
• one voice message, one minute: tell your world what you’re up to

My midterm presentation (in pdf form with my presenter notes) explains my concept development to date and my prototypes carried out this semester.

The simple online presence of Pigeon now allows you to both sign up for the service and sign in if you are a member to add contacts and accept or decline contact requests.

Below is a kind of “script” for signing up for Pigeon and adding contacts via SMS.

If first words sign up or signup (any variation of capitalization should be accepted):

1. Response text: What would you like your 9-digit Pigeon number to be?
2. [9-digit Pigeon number]
3. Response text: What would you like your 4-digit PIN to be? Your PIN will keep your account safe. - or - Response text: Oops! That Pigeon number is taken! What would you like your 9-digit Pigeon number to be?
4. [4-digit PIN]
5. Welcome to Pigeon! Your Pigeon number is XXX-XXX-XXX. Call 713 574-9488 to make contacts and record your Pigeon message telling your world what you’re up to.

If first words sign up or signup (any variation of capitalization should be accepted) and then numbers:

1. sign up [9-digit pigeon number] [4-digit PIN]
2. Response text: Welcome to Pigeon! Your - or - Response text: Oops! That Pigeon number is taken! Please text your sign up again with another number.
3. Welcome to Pigeon! Your Pigeon number is XXX-XXX-XXX. Call 713 574-9488 to make contacts and record your Pigeon message telling your world what you’re up to.

If first word add or addcontact or add contact or addcontacts or addcontacts (maybe addquick?):

1. add [your Pigeon number] [your PIN]. [others Pigeon number]
2. [Pigeon numbers] will be asked to add you as a contact when they next log on.

Or:

1. add (or other version) [your Pigeon number] [your PIN]
2. Response text: Text back all Pigeon numbers you would like to add as contacts.
3. [Pigeon numbers] will be asked to add you as a contact when they next log on.

I’m going to test these by just having people text my phone and signing them up myself.  I’ll use the online dialog for quickly signing them up.  I wonder if there will be any trepidation in sending the PIN number in a way that is not secure.

I’ve created a simple implementation prototype of Pigeon online sign up.  The script currently does not completely validate the form values.  It checks if a member number exists, but doesn’t check if a 9-digit Pigeon number is given and a 4-digit PIN is given.

Both online and SMS sign up don’t allow you to record your Pigeon name, so the phone system will need to prompt you to record it at log-in.  Currently, if there is no Pigeon name recorded on contact playback the system will fail.  This needs to be corrected. (Edit 7 Oct 11:36am) You are now prompted to record your Pigeon name at login if it doesn’t exist.

I want to explore other methods of web and mobile sign up to and distribution of Pigeon.  I imagine the Pigeon web site interaction consisting of a main page for logging in or signing up, a page with a little more information about the system, and a logged in page where contacts could be added and you could listen to your messages.  Also online, content could be delivered to other places such as Facebook or Google Chat away messages.

Wireframes of: home page, logged in page.

One day in class when discussing sign up, Colleen through out the idea that maybe someone would go around communities setting up temporary kiosks for signing up and making contacts or perhaps that an operator could exist which would set these things up for you.  Either situation, at some level, could be mediated through this web interface.  Would these types of activities be carried out by Pigeon proper or could they be small, side businesses by local entrepreneurs?

Jott is a phone service which will do all types of internet-y things such as update your calendar, send emails and texts, create to-dos and notes, and more.

Jott connects to and explands lots of different existing web services, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Remember the Milk.  They will also read RSS feeds to you.

(Thanks Chris!)

During the last week, I’ve had a variety of people try out the sign-up and contact making aspects of Pigeon.  Beyond testing technical implemenation, I did of research into how to talk about the system.

People generally thought that the sign-up time was appropriate.  Most didn’t want to spend more time than they did completing sign up.  I’m still considering if and how profile information should be collected to make searching for contacts easier.

There were some issues in understanding the voice prompts, especially the phrase “member number”.  I may change that to “Pigeon number.”  The chat excerpt below was discussing this issue.

Some users were given the system as is, but I gave later ones some context, telling them that “Pigeon gives you 2 minutes to tell your world what you’re up to.”  I want a really catchy phrase that can sum things up quickly, and I want to be able to talk about the system in more detail clearly. One of the harder things for users to understand without that prompting was that their messages are available to all of their contacts.

I think a set of instructions should be played as soon as sign up in complete with the option to skip the instructions if desired.  These instructions could also be avaliable as the last choice on the main menu.

I also lengthed the amount of avaliable wait time for entering a desired member number, because as a tester said “what if they don’t know you need a number?”

ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré announced in New York that worldwide mobile subscribers are likely to reach the 4 billion mark before the end of this year.

These are the experiments I have carried out to date:

• Creation of a system map of Pigeon and a beeping system
• Implementation of sign up
• Implementation of adding contacts
• Implementation of proper public messaging
• User testing (of above implementation, of instruction sets or how to talk about the concept)

Questions carrying me forward:

• What other alternative methods of sing up should be created?
• What other existing systems of communication can Pigeon be linked with (i.e. Google Chat status message, Facebook)?
• What type of short instruction can be given to create the context for the system (i.e. Pigeon gives you two minutes to tell your world what you’re up to)?
• Should you be able to order your contacts for playback?
• Should optional or mandatory profile information be collected to assist in finding contacts?
• How can the system and promotional material emphasize the voice aspect of Pigeon?
• How can Pigeon be useful in developed contexts?
• Could usage in developed contexts financially support usage in developing regions?
• How can this be a sustainable business?
• How can Pigeon be simply and quickly explained to non-users and users new to the system?