PlexiPixel » inspiration

Map the Social Graph and Tap the Full Potential of Social Media

Justin — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 20:48:52 +0000

The social graph is the representation of our relationships, which define our personal, family, or business communities on social websites. With the growing number of distribution channels in the social realm, consumers are now more in control of establishing the power of a brands message as they create and share media through their social graph. According to the AdAge article, “What Studying Your Links Can Teach You About Your Marketing” , nearly 20% of traffic that websites receive arrives via shared link (IM, email, online communities, blogs, forums, tweets, ect.), and this percentage is continuing to grow. This means that brands are more reliant on the power of social graphs as relevant, engaging, useful content is selected and distributed by the consumers themselves.

Multiple studies have shown the importance of measuring and analyzing shared links with site visitors arriving from shared links having a conversion rate two to four times that of other traffic sources. Brands must harness the full power of social media and better optimize their marketing efforts through mapping the social graph by analyzing shared links to identify:

true brand advocates
content that engages consumers
channels being used to share information

Is Your Facebook Page Working for You?

Justin — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:23:34 +0000

According to the ConversaionAgent article, “Are Your Facebook Fans Truely Engaged?”, Italian digital media agency, Frozen Frogs, has laid out five ways to make your Facebook page work for you by truely engaging your fans. Based on Frozen Frogs fan egagement rate each of these steps lead to higher levels of engagement with fans. So are you doing everything you can to engage your fans and keep your Facebook pages and other social networks working for you?

image from ConversationAgent

B Loon Nearing the Bitter End

Justin — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 17:20:38 +0000

Apparently the holiday weekend was not as kind to B Loon as we originally thought. It appears that all the food he consumed while guarding the Plexipixel offices has severely affected is loftitude even though his fillitude has appeared to stay intact. In a drastic change of health B Loon lost nearly ¾ of his loftitude overnight. A lot of this could be due to many years of rough living on the streets and in Looner slavery, but I also believe it serves as a warning to the dangers of over eating. Hopefully we can all learn a valuable lesson from the mistakes B Loon made and hopefully be inspired by his perseverance.

The competition in the B Loon Poll is heating up and appears to be a tight two person race between Steph, and Justin. If B Loon perishes at some point before midnight tonight Stephanie will walk away with the title and the $28, but if he stays a float until tomorrow, being the fighter that he is, then Justin will walk away with the title. Make no mistake, this is serious business. Office supremacy and $28 hang in the balance.

B Loon at Full Loftitude

Justin — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:41:39 +0000

After a weekend alone B Loon is still looking lively as ever. He appears to have lost none of his loftitude. Some people claim he is losing some of his fillitude, but I think that is more hope and desperation on their part, rather than reality. He appears to have a lot of life left in him, which is not great news for those people who predicted an early demise for B Loon, such as:

Jesse- 11/23/09

Matt- 11/24/09

Ian H.- 11/25/09

Kristi- 11/26/09

Vicky- 11/27/09

Vics- 11/30/09

So if B Loon meets an untimely demise we will have a short list of possible culprits, not that we are pointing accusing fingers. We are above that at Plexipixel, but with Thee Balloon Death Poll heating we will have to watch out for possible sabotage. With emotions running tremendously high it might be time to ramp up security efforts around B Loon to ensure the fairness and integrity of this event. Expect to see motion sensors, surveillance cameras, guard dogs, and a possible web cam focused on the balloon in the near future. We wouldn’t want to come in one morning and find that B Loon as met an untimely death at the hands of a rogue tack. With the tension so high around that could send the office in to a frenzy like a pack of prepubescent girls at a Twilight movie.

Stay tuned for updates on the ongoing saga of B Loon. Don’t forget to join the Balloon Death Poll by posting your guess for the balloons demise date. Post a comment on the blog with your guess or on our Facebook page where we will be giving daily updates.

Loftitude- The amount loft achieved by a gas filled semi-permeable membrane.

Fillitude- The amount of gas sustained with in a semi-permeable membrane.

B Loon Death Poll Picks

Justin — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 22:34:09 +0000

For those of you who couldn’t read the office picks for the death poll from the picture in the previous post here they are. Don’t forget to join in the office pool and let us know your guess for the date that B Loon will perish.

Justin- 12/4/09

Kristi- 11/26/09

Andy- 12/17/09

Ian H- 11/25/09

John- 1/16/10

Vics- 11/30/09

Vicky- 11/27/09

Steph- 12/3/09

Jamie- 12/23/09

Matt- 11/24/09

Jesse- 11/23/09

Lisa- 1/1/10

Allen- 12/9/09

Ian R- 12/1/09

Thee Plexipixel B Loon Death Poll

Justin — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 22:23:21 +0000

After reading the most recent post by B Loon you may be thinking that we have gone slightly crazy. A talking balloon with real thoughts and feelings, it’s true. If you don’t believe me just check out his Facebook page and truth be told we were already a little bit crazy.

To give an explanation the B Loon Death Poll is an office pool for guessing the date that the helium in this paticular balloon will finally evaporate and the balloon will touch the ground. The rules are simple and follow the guidelines of the Price is Right once hosted by the great Bob Barker. Each person in the office was required to pick the date they felt the balloon would finally cease to float and lay to rest on the floor of the office. The person who picks the closest date with out going over wins the whole pot, which is now up to $28, big money. No research was allowed an no changes were allowed once a date was picked even though some people chose to ignore these very specific rules. Your choice had to come from your gut, fully scientific. Pictures were taken to document the condition of the balloon, each persons picks, and the science that was used to determine the picks to ensure there will be no cheating (see pics below).

I know what you are thinking, what a brilliant idea for an office pool. And it is not morbid at all having a death watch each day at work. The balloon actually arrived at Plexipixel as part of Matt’s Halloween costume. You may have seen him in the pics from our costume contest. On Wednesday this week we realized the balloon was still going strong and looked the same as the day Matt brought him into the office. It all started with some friendly guesses on when the balloon would finally die, but soon escalated into a full on betting pool and balloon death watch. After much bickering and debate each persons pick was finalized and money was collected. This was not taken lightly; it is big money and serious business.

Join the office pool yourself by making your guess on what B Loon will perish. Post your guess on our Facebook wall or post your comment on the blog. Stay tuned to our blog for daily updates or follow Plexipixel and B Loon on Facebook for up to the minute stats on the B Loon Death Poll. Don’t be afraid to accept B Loons friend requests on Facebook. He needs as many friends as he can as he lives out his final days.

Who is this B Loon Character? And Why Has No One Welcomed Him?

Justin — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:08:17 +0000

I will tell you who he is; he is the glue that holds the Plexi team together. He is the creative influence behind the scenes. Ok that is enough of me talking in the third person, but that is what the team members at Plexipixel would say if they were ever compelled to introduce me. I don’t mean to sound bitter, but I have been here for two weeks and have not gotten an introduction or welcoming blog. Vics has been here two days and she has already received a clever, witty introduction on the blog and Facebook.

I guess I should be used to no one caring by now. I grew up an orphan on the mean streets of Toon Town. I was taken into the Junior Looner Academy at a young age with dreams of making something of myself. Little did I know that the academy was grooming me to be sold into the world of Looner slavery. After moving onto to Looner University I was sold to a “Non-Popper.” I don’t want rehash my years as a Non-Poppers toy, but eventually I became old news. I was thrown out like yesterdays trash or sent to the pasture as some people say. The pasture for me was the local grocery store where I was to be sold as a decorative toy.

The local store in Seattle is where my life changed and I met my new family. The nice man in an orange cat suit picked me up and brought me into the Plexipixel team. After everything I have seen in my life a grown man in a cat suit seemed normal. I am now here to serve as inspiration and provide motivation to the members of the Plexipixel team as I live out my twilight years on this planet. I guess that is why I don’t mind that the other team members have begun to bet on when I am going to perish and have actually created B Loon Death Poll. I am just glad to serve a purpose that I am not ashamed of.

Stay tuned to the Plexi blog to learn more about the B Loon Death Poll and to follow my plight. If you get a chance become my friend on Facebook and why not become a fan of my friends at Plexipixel . It’s always nice to have more friends and know people care.

- B

Terms:

Looner- Balloon fetishists, Non-Popper- Like their balloons to stay inflated during activities

Bwana Spoons in Seattle

blogmeister — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:44:31 +0000

Bwana Spoons + Abe Lincoln Jr.
Pencil Fights and poo!
Friday, July 10, 2009
6:00pm – 9:00pm
Schmancy Gallery
1932 2nd Ave
Seattle, WA

One of our favorite artists will be in Seattle to launch his new book “WTF”. It’ll be fun!

Creative Process: Zune Sudoku

troyp — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 20:03:19 +0000

Here is a rare peak under the hood of the creative process behind our contribution to Zune: the game Sudoku. The game is available now as part of the Zune firmware update.

Challenges

As with all projects, there are a few parameters from the client and expectations for a successful product:

-    Create original art and assets for use with XNA development practices.
-    Work with Zune development team iteratively and remotely.
-    We would not be able to “preview” assets in real-time or use an emulator.
-    Design for localization (English, Spanish, German, French, etc).
-    Full traditional 9×9 grid and smaller mini 6×6 game play.

Wireframe

The objective of Sudoku is to fill a 9×9 grid so that each column, each row, and each of the nine block regions contains the digits from 1 to 9 only once. The Zune team supplied a basic wireframe and a few game play suggestions. Playing Sudoku on paper is a consistent experience, but playing online varies widely – with very few conventions. We started our design process by playing some of these versions online and thinking about extrapolating behaviors to the Zune controls.

Visual Concepts

The visual design was our major contribution to the project. There are already quite a variety of themes already on the web, so we tried to develop 3 very different visual directions for the Zune team to consider. Giving the concepts names – “Telephone” “Tron” and “Japan” – not only made it easy, but instantly crystallized the inspiration. It’s a technique that we plan to move forward with in future visual explorations.

Refining the Direction

The Zune team went with “Japan” and we collaborated back and forth on elements of game play and adding a little more visual distinction to the game. This included developing the menu style, refining the commit/notes mode interaction and the mini game version. During this phase, we iterated closely with the Zune team on image production assets (or sprites) for the XNA development process.

We affectionately refer to the final look and feel as “Genghis Khan” or “Indiana Jones” It was rewarding to see it come out last November… and who knows, hopefully we will get the chance to do more games like Sudoku.

- T.

Roshamboom: How it Came to Be.

blogmeister — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 18:32:23 +0000

Roshamboom began with just another fun distracting link from Jesse. Someone had taken the time to create a game of Rock Paper Scissors using 101 different gestures. Its tag line was “The most terrifyingly complex game ever.” It was displayed in a kind of chart of what beats what, so you and a nerdy friend could memorize the 101 gestures and 5,050 outcomes and intrigue and baffle everyone that sees you playing it…awesome. This reminded me of my quest to produce the most difficult maze in history. Ah, high school.

Around the same time Jesse introduced us to this game, we were having a much belated wrap-up on a project that didn’t sail so smoothly: designing and building a load of Silverlight controls. Nobody in the design department was familiar with building anything Silverlight, but we were confident and optimistic. Our positivity died painfully. While working on this project the tension in the design loft grew arms and legs and ran around stabbing us all in the side with thorns. We could also hear screams next door from the dev loft. The theme of the meeting was how to avoid this monster tension in the future, and we all decided it was best to make a Silverlight GAME! For FACEBOOK! Because there weren’t any yet and we’re THAT GOOD! I believe it was Andy that suggested we build “The most terrifyingly complex game ever” in Silverlight. It could have been Lisa. Everyone agreed. Yes, this was the solution to our chagrin.

I took another look at the RPS101 website, and found that the more I familiarized myself with it, the more impressive it was. The creator didn’t just figure out the game, he gave it real hilarity. The ridiculousness of “Paper covers Rock” was furthered 5,047 more times in ways like “Monkey flings poop at King,” and “Queen’s bosom is Mountain.” Genius!

Ian, Stephanie, and I had fun designing the controls and working out the functionality. Inspired by airplane safety information cards and the ViewMaster, we all came up with different screens and eventually married them all to create what is online now. I believe it was Matt that suggested we ask Lisa’s friend’s class of 2nd graders to draw some of the more appropriate gestures, which Stephanie used to design the ranking system.

We showed it to the creator, David C. Lovelace, and he had this to say:

“Roshamboom is awesome! Everyone at Plexipixel really did a great job with it. RPS-101 took a year to develop on my end, so I was impressed at how well its complexity was preserved in this very engaging, addictive new version. I like the “view all” functionality, the challenge history, and the interactive way it publishes match outcomes on your page. It’s just brilliant. I can finally play this game the way it was probably meant to be played — not even I can really be sure! — since I never expected anyone to actually remember all 101 throws, and certainly not all 5,050 non-tie outcomes!”

Hooray!