Anthony's Blog

It’s Time For How

anthonyfranco — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 16:31:19 +0000

For the last 8 years I have been blogging and speaking to convince companies why user experience matters. They now get it. For the last year, we have seen exponential growth in our space. Even though my company, EffectiveUI, was the first, we are certainly no longer the only firm saying that designing for user …

The Human Interface Manifesto

anthonyfranco — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 17:39:11 +0000

Since the first days of early man, technologists have pushed the boundaries of gathering and sharing information. Early in our history, we shared stories, fables, and myths to communicate values, lessons and historical context. Paper allowed us the ability to share our wisdom for all of time, and the printing press gave us the ability …

Transparency in the Water Sector

anthonyfranco — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 14:49:55 +0000

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWST4qfcQ2Q&feature=youtu.be

This Hangout tackles questions such as: The shifting transparency debate: from expenditures to lasting impact Whether increased transparency improves quality of work Tools/techniques the sector is embracing to augment transparency Water For People's Ned Breslin hosts this discussion with our colleagues: (Speakers from left to right) Anthony Franco, EffectiveUI James Leten, Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) Jennifer Platt, WASH Advocates Patrick Moriarty, IRC Rachel Cardone, Independent Consultant Tom Murphy, A View from the Cave blog Ned Breslin, Water For People Binayak Das & Alexandra Malmqvist, Water Integrity Network

iPad 3 / Apple TV Predictions

anthonyfranco — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:51:54 +0000

I just heard about the site that is taking bets on what Apple is planning on announcing next week – it inspired me to make a few predictions on my own (note that I am not placing bets though) iPad It will be called the iPad 3 (not the 2s) Will have a “retina display” …

Yes, my mom is on Facebook (updated)

anthonyfranco — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 03:16:46 +0000

Had to share this funny Facebook moment. My mom is brand new to Facebook. In fact, she is brand new to technology in general. She’s only been texting for the last 3 months, so I thought it was time to graduate her to an iPad with a facebook account. Today I was messing with the …

The worthless “Do not track me act” introduced in Congress

anthonyfranco — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 01:52:12 +0000

Mashable today broke the news on the recently introduced DO NOT TRACK ME ONLINE ACT As far as I can see, the only true benefit is for political gain for those that are introducing the bill. They are latching onto the recent studies that show consumers are worried about their privacy. The bill spells out some …

You are a bunch of elitist design snobs

anthonyfranco — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 18:15:37 +0000

Last night we held an incredible event at the IxDA conference. An opening party that included 2 DJs, a experimental digital marching band, a local band called Snake Rattle Rattle Snake, an open bar, and catering by the Top Chef winner. It was the best conference party I have ever been to. I was asked …

Mobile Strategy Best Practices

anthonyfranco — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 11:59:52 +0000

Recently I had the opportunity to discuss mobile strategies with Vidya Drego of Forrester Research. We chatted about how businesses are looking at the emerging mobile market and how they are approaching application development. We quickly got to the subject of mobile app development best practices. Our conversation motivated me to look at what we are …

Innovatively Innovative Innovations

anthonyfranco — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 19:09:25 +0000

I was asked to speak in a panel at this year’s Adobe Max about innovation at EffectiveUI. I initially thought: “Of course, why not. We are an incredibly innovative company!” Then I sat down to construct our point of view on innovation, and I went blank. I stared at my blank keynote template and… nothing. …

The reports of Silverlight’s death have been greatly exaggerated

anthonyfranco — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 19:23:15 +0000

Microsoft has made a few announcements this week about their positioning on Silverlight. It all started when Bob Muglia was quoted at Microsoft’s PDC by saying Microsoft’s strategy for Silverlight has shifted. That quote caused a firestorm of controversy and a lot of unanswered questions. “Is that code for Silverlight is no longer a priority?” “Is …

WSJ Breaking News: Information on the internet is not private

anthonyfranco — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 21:04:01 +0000

The Wall Street Journal published a breathtaking revelation (yes, the sarcasm is thick) that some information on Facebook is not private, even with the strictest privacy settings enabled: Many of the most popular applications, or “apps,” on the social-networking site Facebook Inc. have been transmitting identifying information—in effect, providing access to people’s names and, in …

Does footprint matter anymore?

anthonyfranco — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 22:07:51 +0000

5 years ago we were building “Rich Internet Applications” using flash alone. We were odd birds in the development community. Outcasts. We didn’t have Flex, we had Colin Moock’s book and Grant Skinner’s fabulous components. What separated the good flash developers from the greats? Footprint. Our file sizes were small. We took pride in the fact …

Everything wrong with eTail summed up in one site

anthonyfranco — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 17:20:45 +0000

First, I should say I am a big fan and customer of Express. Their fitted MX shirts are the only shirts that fit me since I’ve been working out, they are not crazy expensive, look great, good quality, and they offer a fantastic selection in all of their stores. I received a direct mail piece …

Web 2.0 Presentation – The UX Factor

anthonyfranco — Tue, 11 May 2010 14:58:47 +0000

Had a great time with Kelly Goto at Web 2.0 – She is crazy smart. My favorite quote of the day was something she said during our panel discussion. “User Experience is like Vegetables for the enterprise – its good for you”

Initial Thoughts on The Apple iPad

anthonyfranco — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 22:41:48 +0000

I wasn’t going to do it. I was going to wait to buy an iPad. Damn Juan and Jon (originators of the Ideate app EffectiveUI built) … I went out an bought one just because I could not do without it :) Purchasing and Accessories First, it was quite easy to find an available one …

EffectiveUI launches our collaboration tool, Ideate, for the iPad

anthonyfranco — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 20:01:09 +0000

Saturday is a big day for both Apple and EffectiveUI and a bad day for the napkin industry. I was going to wait to buy my iPad for a few months, but it looks like I’ll be standing in line tomorrow. I’ve just reviewed the final build of our first iPad application, Ideate, which was …

iPad changing the game sooner than I thought

anthonyfranco — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 18:32:02 +0000

Just a quick note on something I read today on Gizmodo (linked to Jalopnik). Hyundai has decided to ship their new luxury sedan, the Equus, sans the owners manual. They have decided to include an iPad loaded with a digital version of the manual instead. http://jalopnik.com/5507349/hyundai-equus-to-ship-with-ipad-ditches-owners-manual I know this may initially appear to be an …

Google: Utility, Usability, Monetization

anthonyfranco — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:08:57 +0000

About a year ago I saw a google executive, Vince Chirico speak on a panel at a local conference. One of the things that stuck out from that session was what he said about Google’s philosophy on how it builds new applications. He said: Google focuses on Utility, Usability, and Monetization. And in that order …

Mass Confusion: The hysteria over Flash, Silverlight, HTML 5, Java FX, and Objective C

anthonyfranco — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 23:41:22 +0000

I’ve been working on a whitepaper titled “Choosing The Appropriate Web User Interface Technology” for more than a year now, with input from Sun, Adobe, Microsoft and everyone here at EffectiveUI. I’ve rewritten the damn thing four times now and have decided to abandon the effort. The blunt truth is that there is no credible …

Software Planning and Requirements – Effective UI

anthonyfranco — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 22:51:19 +0000

Thought I’d share an excerpt from Chapter 3 of our book “Effective UI: The Art of Building Great User Experience in Software“. By far, this the most definitive explanation of why enterprises need to reconsider how they’ve approached software development in the past. RFPs, Fixed Bidding, Waterfall, all have dangerous implications to the success of …

Predictions on the new Apple Tablet

anthonyfranco — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 00:02:13 +0000

I thought I’d have a little fun predicting what Apple will be announcing on Wednesday. Apple will preview OS 10.7, it will feature: the once code-named “Marble Interface” be more oriented to gesture based interactivity snow-leopard was almost a complete rewrite, no big new features. 10.7 will be focused on “sexy” new features that were …

How to break a patent in 5 minutes

anthonyfranco — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 21:57:59 +0000

Patents were invented in order to encourage innovation. They are supposed to protect inventors that spend money in research or discoveries made by innovative thinkers. Without them, many would argue, the United States would not have ever seen the industrial or digital revolutions. However, there are enterprises that using the patent system in a way …

Apple’s iPhone dominance is going to be hard to topple

anthonyfranco — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 23:40:29 +0000

Interesting article today on Flurry (and also summarized on MacRumors.com) We’ve been internally debating about Apple’s continued dominance in the smart-phone market. I’ve taken the position that Apple will be the leader for at least 4 years, it appears I may have been understating it bit. Looking at the chart above, it becomes clear that …

Qwest and Herff Jones make CIO Top 100

anthonyfranco — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:33:12 +0000

Congrats to our team and our good friends at Qwest for making CIO Magazine’s Top 100 IT Projects list of 2009. Excerpt from the online article at both InfoWorld and CIO Magazine: Qwest Communications www.qwest.com/business Web Portal Project lead: Rick Wertheimer, Program Manager; Betsy Keyes, Director of eMarketing Project description: Qwest, in partnership with EffectiveUI, consolidated 12 portals …

Publishing’s future is in its past

anthonyfranco — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 07:38:54 +0000

We have been doing some very interesting work for the publishing industry of late. Many publishers are trying to figure out their “digital” business model in an effort not to become extinct. The truth is, their evolutionary model has been staring at them this whole time. Their history is their future. Most of them have …