Checkmate is a design-sprint project completed for UXL 2022. Our team was challenged to ideate, design, and pitch a digital solution to exploring and "unlocking" curiosity.
Ideation, UI Design, Logo & Branding, User Research, Journey Map, User Persona.
The following case was developed over the span of a 48 hours.
Michael Malatesta
Aryamik Kakar
Checkmate is a design-sprint project completed for UXL 2022. Our team was challenged to ideate, design, and pitch a digital solution to exploring and "unlocking" curiosity.
Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
The following case was developed over the span of a 48 hours.
Michael Malatesta
Aryamik Kakar
How Might We encourage curiosity by making the analysis of information feel more seamless, engaging, and trustworthy.
Curiosity, defined as the urge to pursue or explore knowledge beyond surface understanding, is a driving force for individuals seeking to dig deeper and go above and beyond. However, trends and research indicate that the volume of media consumption is steadily increasing, leading to information overload.
How Might We encourage curiosity by making the analysis of information feel more seamless, engaging, and trustworthy.
Creating A Clever Way to Keep Up With Vocabulary Trends
“I read documents with loads of unique acronyms that I can’t keep up with on a near daily basis.”
“I read documents with loads of unique acronyms that I can’t keep up with on a near daily basis.” - Private Participant, Accenture
The key ingredients of the feeling of overload which are still with us today: ‘the multitude of books, the shortness of time and the slipperiness of memory’ - Ann Blair, 2011
The Vocabulary Scan picks up proper nouns in an article, within set filters, and converts them to hyperlinks. When hovered over displays a toolbar with relevant details and a pin button that saves the term for later reference.
Research Shows Most Consumers Are Concerned About Fake News:
Let's Cut Through the BS
“It’s only getting more difficult for me to find the time to check the validity of things I see online ” - Bill, Athennian
More than 70% of U.S. news consumers are concerned about “fake news” - Deloitte Digital Media Trends Study, 2021
The Simplify Scan feature breaks down an article into categories such as verifiable facts, opinions, or quotes. Visually represented by live, in page highlights. These highlights, similar to the Vocabulary Scan links, will display a toolbar with relevant details and pin functionality.
Information Overload Makes Learning Intimidating and Tedious to Repeat
“Doing research is the fun part, organizing it is what I find annoying” - Adam, Student
Information overload is a decisive factor driving negative “work environments [that] are killing productivity, dampening creativity, and making us unhappy”
- Dean and Webb, 2011
The Compile & Download feature collects all pinned content from Vocabulary and Simplify Scans, and organizes & transfers it into a downloadable PDF file. Creating an automatically generated glossary of content relevant to the user.
“I read documents with loads of unique acronyms that I can’t keep up with on a near daily basis.”
Web browser extension designed to streamline information access, encourage curiosity, & challenge information overload.
The Vocabulary Scan picks up proper nouns in an article, within set filters, and converts them to hyperlinks. When hovered over displays a toolbar with relevant details and a pin button that saves the term for later reference.
The Simplify Scan feature breaks down an article into categories such as verifiable facts, opinions, or quotes. Visually represented by live, in page highlights. These highlights, similar to the Vocabulary Scan links, will display a toolbar with relevant details and pin functionality.
The Compile & Download feature collects all pinned content from Vocabulary and Simplify Scans, and organizes & transfers it into a downloadable PDF file. Creating an automatically generated glossary of content relevant to the user.
As the volume of media we consume steadily increases with the presence of social media, new trends are constantly developing and changing the way information is exchanged.
The key ingredients of the feeling of overload which are still with us today: ‘the multitude of books, the shortness of time and the slipperiness of memory’
More than 70% of U.S. news consumers are concerned about “fake news”
Information overload is a decisive factor driving negative “work environments [that] are killing productivity, dampening creativity, and making us unhappy”
“It’s only getting more difficult for me to find the time to check the validity of things I see online ”
“I read documents with loads of unique acronyms that I can’t keep up with on a near daily basis.”
“Doing research is the fun part, organizing it is what I find annoying”
Pursuing the integration of artificial intelligence would help Checkmate better suggest information that fits the context of the webpage. For example, understanding the difference between Apple (Fruit) and Apple (Company).
If developing Checkmate, we'd remove its ability to determine facts, opinions, and quotes. While this idea may work in some hard and fast cases, there is a sometimes a difficult line to draw in what is fact vs opinion. Instead, we would focus on its ability to intelligently hyperlink and glossarize valuable information on any and all webpages.
Faced with constraints, it becomes crucial to make strategic decisions about which features to prioritize for development.
By prioritizing and making strategic decisions, even with limited time and resources, we can create solutions that have meaningful impact on the user experience and successfully addresses the challenges faced by the target users.
Looking ahead, we would aspire to further enhance the Checkmate platform by integrating artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms. These advancements will enable personalized recommendations, improved content analysis, and more seamless interactions; ultimately creating a more intelligent and intuitive information consumption experience for our users.
Faced with constraints, it becomes crucial to make strategic decisions about which features to prioritize for development.
The takeaway from Checkmate is to focus efforts and resources on those features that will deliver the most value and effectively address the user needs within the given constraints. By prioritizing and making strategic decisions, even with limited time and resources, we can create solutions that have meaningful impact on the user experience and successfully addresses the challenges faced by the target users.
Jamie is a journalism student beginning her professional career. Her curiosity drives her to constantly explore new topics on the web. As Jamie takes pride in presenting credible work, she's beginning to feel deterred by the increasing amount of misinformation shared online.
Jamie wants to continue to explore the content that interests her and inspires her journalism career, but needs a way to save time when analyzing information online; as she lacks the technical expertise to constantly compile the large quantities of digital information she references.
We created a journey map to understand Jamie's experience when researching and consuming information. Jamie starts with excitement but quickly becomes overwhelmed by the amount of content available. The initial enthusiasm dwindles as comprehension becomes challenging, and the task of organizing information becomes tedious. Jamie completes the task but hopes to avoid repeating the process in the future.
Jamie is a journalism student beginning her professional career. Her curiosity drives her to constantly explore new topics on the web. As Jamie takes pride in presenting credible work, she's beginning to feel deterred by the increasing amount of misinformation shared online.
Jamie wants to continue to explore the content that interests her and inspires her journalism career, but needs a way to save time when analyzing information online; as she lacks the technical expertise to constantly compile the large quantities of digital information she references.
We created a journey map to understand Jamie's experience when researching and consuming information. Jamie starts with excitement but quickly becomes overwhelmed by the amount of content available. The initial enthusiasm dwindles as comprehension becomes challenging, and the task of organizing information becomes tedious. Jamie completes the task but hopes to avoid repeating the process in the future.