Who: Everyone who uses Google Calendar and has an Android phone
What: An application that sets alarms to wake you up an hour or two before your first scheduled event on Google Calendar
When: Preferably before I have to wake up tomorrow
Where: Android phones, iOS
Why: Alarms work fine for people who do the same thing every day, but those who don't commonly use a calendar application to keep track of everything, and need to set alarms each night according to what's going on the next day. When they forget, there are consequences, so why not make it automatic?
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Write or Die Extension
Who: Writers, students, anyone who writes using Google Docs
What: Write or Die is writers block's worst enemy: it forces you to continue writing, or suffer dire consequences. These consequences can range from trivial annoyances such as temporarily coloring your screen red until you resume writing, to playing eery noises, to deleting words every second you don't write (after a 15-second or so threshold, of course).
When: Writing is forever, and writers block is here to stay. There will always be the need to fight it.
Where: A Chrome extension that activates on a Google Document page
Why: Write or Die's desktop client is sold for $10, and its web client isn't very friendly (in a bad way). It is off-putting to have to write in a site's text box and then copy it over to Word or Docs each time you want to save. Integrating with Google Docs would allow people to easily turn it on in an environment they already use whenever writers block strikes.
What: Write or Die is writers block's worst enemy: it forces you to continue writing, or suffer dire consequences. These consequences can range from trivial annoyances such as temporarily coloring your screen red until you resume writing, to playing eery noises, to deleting words every second you don't write (after a 15-second or so threshold, of course).
When: Writing is forever, and writers block is here to stay. There will always be the need to fight it.
Where: A Chrome extension that activates on a Google Document page
Why: Write or Die's desktop client is sold for $10, and its web client isn't very friendly (in a bad way). It is off-putting to have to write in a site's text box and then copy it over to Word or Docs each time you want to save. Integrating with Google Docs would allow people to easily turn it on in an environment they already use whenever writers block strikes.
Google+ Photo Viewer
Who: Google+ has 40 million members, many of which who are professional or amateur photographers who participate in things like #SilhouettesOnThursday and #MyTownTuesday every week. In total, 3.4 billion photos have been uploaded to Google+.
What: A site that searches Google+ for the weekly tags of every event, and compiles everything into a beautiful at-a-glance viewer for every event.
When: Until someone else does it first!
Where: It would live at its own site and attract Google+ users.
Why: Everyone loves looking at amazing photographs. Curating them into one place allows for a much more in-depth browse. Additionally, having all of the events in a centralized place will help people remember what they are, because it's difficult remembering every event for every day: today alone I've seen more than 20 events for Tuesdays.
What: A site that searches Google+ for the weekly tags of every event, and compiles everything into a beautiful at-a-glance viewer for every event.
When: Until someone else does it first!
Where: It would live at its own site and attract Google+ users.
Why: Everyone loves looking at amazing photographs. Curating them into one place allows for a much more in-depth browse. Additionally, having all of the events in a centralized place will help people remember what they are, because it's difficult remembering every event for every day: today alone I've seen more than 20 events for Tuesdays.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
City of Wonder Autohelper
Who: City of Wonder players on Google+
What: A Chrome extension that periodically checks the Google+ game feed and "helps" every friend that has posted a story
When: Relevant as long as Google+ keeps a game feed (i.e. a long time)
Where: Google+
Why: Not only does helping friends in games have implicit benefits (friends sending gifts back, being more likely to help you, etc), but you usually gain coins or other rewards every time you help someone else. For Wonders, having your friends run this program increases the chances that your Wonder will be helped by everyone possible.
What: A Chrome extension that periodically checks the Google+ game feed and "helps" every friend that has posted a story
When: Relevant as long as Google+ keeps a game feed (i.e. a long time)
Where: Google+
Why: Not only does helping friends in games have implicit benefits (friends sending gifts back, being more likely to help you, etc), but you usually gain coins or other rewards every time you help someone else. For Wonders, having your friends run this program increases the chances that your Wonder will be helped by everyone possible.
Google+ Circle Manager
Who: Google+'s 40+ million users
What: A Chrome extension in two parts to bypass the 5,000-user circle limit:
What: A Chrome extension in two parts to bypass the 5,000-user circle limit:
- Exporting individual circles by using Google+'s built-in circle sharing functionality to allow for temporary deletion of the user's circle
- Importing circles from private shares by using Google+'s built-in circle sharing functionality
When: Relevant until Google+ lifts the 5,000-user circle limit (i.e. for quite some time)
Where: Google+
Why: The vocal Google+ users are power users, and complain that they can only circle 5,000 people. However, they also tend to separate those they circle into interest-based circles. Allowing someone to, for example, save their Photographers circle and delete it to free up a thousand people would be useful. Any time they have the room, they can import their Photographers circle back, and not have lost anything.
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