Lack of Progress

I used the LinkedIn iPhone app the other day to download my connections to my iPhone address book. Immediately upon starting the download, I was greeted with a familiar foe: the dreaded progress bar. Yep, the empty rectangle that never seems to give you an real indication of how long the current process is actually going to take.

We’ve become accustomed to the progress bar over the years, but I constantly wonder how the experience could be improved for end users. Granted, it only lasted about 30 - 60 seconds in this example, but why must I be subjected to such a stellar waste of time?

Before I go any further, I want to be clear that LinkedIn was only selected because of the recency and fact that it got me thinking about this subject again. As you already know, this “problem” if you will, spans way beyond any one particular app or web culprit.

I mean, move the progress bar out of focus and show me SOMETHING of value—whether it be of the entertainment or informative variety. Because almost anything would be better than looking at a progress indicator that more often than not doesn’t provide an accurate measure of progress (anyone who has sat and watched a software installation spend 50% of the total time showing 99% progress knows exactly what I mean).

To LinkedIn’s credit, shortly after my poor experience with the main app, I downloaded their new contact management app, LinkedIn Contacts. Instead of a progress bar hogging up the entire screen, this time I was greeted by a moderately helpful tour of the app. As you’ll see below, the progress bar was still visible, but it was no longer the only thing in view.

(Bonus points if you noticed the state of the progress meter in this screenshot)

We can only hope that LinkedIn Contacts represents the beginning of a broader shift away from traditional thinking around progress bars, but that remains to be seen.

So, from all of us sick and tired of a lack of progress to anyone who crafts experiences for software, we plea to you: please make progress bars suck less.

Don’t base your happiness on people caring [about your stuff], because they won’t.

— Answer on Quora to top 10 things we should be informed about in life.

...by Matt Galligan: Products should solve a problem →

mattgalligan:

“…I’ve seen companies that seemed to provide a product that didn’t seem to be solving any actual problem. This tends to make the whole product development process incredibly difficult, as well as the marketing of said product.”

Several colleagues and I were at TEDxBoulderLive on Wednesday of this week to catch the morning and early afternoon sessions of TED2013.

Aside from being a great community gathering event at the new eTown Hall (thanks Andrew!), it was an inspirational and moving experience for me.

As someone who has long been fond of TED, I believe there was something quite different about watching the event live (streamed). In watching the conference live, it occurred to me that there is a very humanistic side to TED that I hadn’t been exposed to in previous interactions with TED.

When you watch edited recordings of the talks, you don’t get to see the candid, on-stage interactions between Chris Anderson and the speakers between talks, nor do you see the numerous TED speakers whose presentations aren’t quite as well-polished (Sergey Brin, I’m looking at you). I think that’s because the videos I (we) tend to favor on TED.com have a bias towards the best of the best. We choose from the most viewed and highly rated talks that filter to the top. After my TEDxBoulderLive experience, I came away with a much deeper appreciation for both sides of the equation.

A perfect example of a talk that I believe has all of the makings of an instant classic is Amanda Palmer’s self-reflective examination on “The Art of Asking.” Her story provoked an unconventional thought process, gave me a new perspective on life and did so all in a beautifully articulated way.

If you haven’t already seen it, I would highly suggest you do so.

Ignite Boulder 20

[Apparently Slide Steve likes to lick the audience]

On Thursday, I spoke at Ignite Boulder 20. It was an experience I won’t soon forget.

Not only was it my first time presenting at Ignite, but it was also my first stab at public speaking. Beginning on the evening when I received the email from Ryan notifying me of my nomination until the moment when I stepped foot on stage, I experienced a complete range of emotions. At times, I was full of anticipation and excitement. At others, self-doubt, anxiety and disorientation dominated my consciousness. It was not easy by any means.

But that was exactly what I was hoping for.

As a “resolution” (if you will) for 2013, I made a commitment to get outside of my comfort zone. I believe doing so will teach me a lot of things I didn’t know about myself, provide me with new perspectives and generally help me grow as an individual.

Before Thursday, Ignite represented a seemingly insurmountable challenge.

Before Thursday, I would have said I could do it, but I wouldn’t have done it.

Before Thursday, I wouldn’t have believed in my ability to get up in front of a sold out audience and tell them a very personal story.

Of course, it wasn’t impossible, and I wasn’t completely awful (but there’s certainly plenty of room for improvement). I actually had quite a bit of fun.

For those of you that don’t already know this from your own personal experiences, there’s something very liberating about facing your fears head on. Sure it’s hard, but that’s the point. That’s how you grow.

I’m not sure what my next adventure will entail, but I’ll know as soon as I hear that voice telling myself that I can’t do it.

An oldie but a goodie, Simon Sinek makes a case for human contact in a digital age.

Write down every single idea you have, no matter how big or small.

— Richard Branson’s Top 10 tips for making lists

life:

‘Tis the season: Photos from the set of ‘It’s a Wonderful Life.’

Here, LIFE documented the use of a revolutionary new snow-making process employed during the making of It’s a Wonderful Life — a process that, for the first time, allowed filmmakers to produce and control remarkably realistic onscreen snowfall, drifts, flurries and landscapes. The look and feel of holiday movies would, quite simply, never be the same.

Geeky Christmas Card

(Source: nevver)

Every company has a culture. The only question is whether or not you decide what it is.

— Jason Cohen, as quoted in Joel Gascoigne’s The Evolution of Culture at a Startup