We submitted Shake on Friday.
It's not unusual for review to take a week or so, but it doesn't make the waiting any easier.
Here's a video teaser to pass the time...
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Facebook: Apps, Ads, & Adventures in Privacy
Part 2 (of 2)
Jim Bail continues his mission to set up Artgig Facebook business pages and finds it all a little revealing...
Apps:
Who doesn't want a more social experience? That's what FB is all about isn't it? So does this mean that with the default share settings I don't have to do a thing and that shady Estonian warez site that my 13 year old cousin likes to download pirated games from has access to a good chunk of this info? At least they won't know that I'm a Wiccan who is interested in lemur farming. Thank Goddess for that.
Speaking of lemurs...look at what that wholesome PBS Nature app can access after you blithely click “Allow” to view their app – which of course is what 99% of us have become conditioned to do.
Ads:
I love this one. In the future, my friends may see ads with my picture in them. Can't wait for my mother-in-law to see my smiling face in that Valtrex ad a year from now. At least my secret's safe for now.
It depends on what the definition of “is” is:
From Facebook's developer blog: “Facebook has never sold and will never sell user information."
I found it a little interesting that a couple of days after I set up our Facebook pages I started seeing ads for fishing gear appear when I viewed our pages. I had in fact looked at some fishing gear during that time, but not on any FB pages.
I guess serving up targeted ads that companies pay for based on your surfing habits along with who knows what other information from your actual profile (and probably your friends' too) doesn't qualify as selling user information since the ad buyers technically don't know who you are.
Facebook isn't alone in doing this little tap dance around your privacy, plenty of other sites do it as well, but to me it's kind of like saying “we won't divulge your home address to anyone” and then telling the interested party that you “...live in a raised ranch at an undisclosed location between 444 and 448 Main St. and we'll be happy to erect a blazing neon sign with your exciting marketing message directly across the street from said house (who's owner, by the way, is interested in refinancing, according to our data) for a small fee”.
So what was the end result of my little Facebook adventure? I don't think I really discovered anything earth shattering. It was more about seeing first hand how difficult if not impossible it is to manage who sees your profile information. Of course choosing not to share any information at all defeats the purpose of being on Facebook in the first place, but ours was an unusual case.
What was surprising was how many hoops I had to jump through to ostensibly lock things down. I'm still not confident that I was completely successful, but for our purposes it was good enough.
Having gone through this exercise, I can't help feeling, as others have pointed out, that Facebook's user interface appears intentionally convoluted and granular to the point of being burdensome when it comes to matters of controlling who sees your data. Settings are a chore to change, if not outright buried. I found myself mumbling “those sneaky bastards...” more than once.
I guess in the end it's a Faustian bargain. If you really must know what your high school chemistry lab partner had for dinner on day three of her Carnival Cruise to the Bahamas, then be prepared for the world to know the truth – that you're not being ironic when you say you like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain.
This is Jim Bail, signing off.
Jim Bail continues his mission to set up Artgig Facebook business pages and finds it all a little revealing...
Apps:
Who doesn't want a more social experience? That's what FB is all about isn't it? So does this mean that with the default share settings I don't have to do a thing and that shady Estonian warez site that my 13 year old cousin likes to download pirated games from has access to a good chunk of this info? At least they won't know that I'm a Wiccan who is interested in lemur farming. Thank Goddess for that.
Speaking of lemurs...look at what that wholesome PBS Nature app can access after you blithely click “Allow” to view their app – which of course is what 99% of us have become conditioned to do.
I love this one. In the future, my friends may see ads with my picture in them. Can't wait for my mother-in-law to see my smiling face in that Valtrex ad a year from now. At least my secret's safe for now.
It depends on what the definition of “is” is:
From Facebook's developer blog: “Facebook has never sold and will never sell user information."
I found it a little interesting that a couple of days after I set up our Facebook pages I started seeing ads for fishing gear appear when I viewed our pages. I had in fact looked at some fishing gear during that time, but not on any FB pages.
I guess serving up targeted ads that companies pay for based on your surfing habits along with who knows what other information from your actual profile (and probably your friends' too) doesn't qualify as selling user information since the ad buyers technically don't know who you are.
Facebook isn't alone in doing this little tap dance around your privacy, plenty of other sites do it as well, but to me it's kind of like saying “we won't divulge your home address to anyone” and then telling the interested party that you “...live in a raised ranch at an undisclosed location between 444 and 448 Main St. and we'll be happy to erect a blazing neon sign with your exciting marketing message directly across the street from said house (who's owner, by the way, is interested in refinancing, according to our data) for a small fee”.
So what was the end result of my little Facebook adventure? I don't think I really discovered anything earth shattering. It was more about seeing first hand how difficult if not impossible it is to manage who sees your profile information. Of course choosing not to share any information at all defeats the purpose of being on Facebook in the first place, but ours was an unusual case.
What was surprising was how many hoops I had to jump through to ostensibly lock things down. I'm still not confident that I was completely successful, but for our purposes it was good enough.
Having gone through this exercise, I can't help feeling, as others have pointed out, that Facebook's user interface appears intentionally convoluted and granular to the point of being burdensome when it comes to matters of controlling who sees your data. Settings are a chore to change, if not outright buried. I found myself mumbling “those sneaky bastards...” more than once.
I guess in the end it's a Faustian bargain. If you really must know what your high school chemistry lab partner had for dinner on day three of her Carnival Cruise to the Bahamas, then be prepared for the world to know the truth – that you're not being ironic when you say you like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain.
This is Jim Bail, signing off.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Face Off With Facebook on Business Pages and Privacy
Part 1 (of 2)
I recently spent some time setting up Facebook pages for Artgig and Artgig Apps. Although our original profile predates (I think) Facebook's policy, I discovered that it's an official no-no to set up your company as you would a personal profile. Facebook has “Pages” for that. Being one of the seven non-Facebook users on the planet, it turned out to be an interesting endeavor for me.
As part of the process, I needed to hide our long neglected personal profile. We still do use it from time to time for app development, so despite the fact that the content has little to do with Artgig proper, we needed to keep it around. We have some pretty interesting and entertaining friends, but unfortunately their updates don't make great fodder for a company presence aimed at marketing...so sorry, but you won't be seeing the breaking news on our wall when the Auto-Tune remix of Crazy Badass Honey Badger drops.
Setting up pages was a somewhat confusing process in of itself, which I won't detail here. But for those thinking of setting up a company page, I'll save you 10 minutes of searching for where to do it because it's not obvious: set up Facebook Pages
Once our company pages were in place ( http://www.facebook.com/pages/Artgig-Studio/176154829099838 and http://www.facebook.com/pages/Artgig-Apps/183056311741030?ref=ts ) I turned my attention to hiding our original profile. That's where things really got interesting.
General Privacy Settings – Fine Grained Fun:
There are about 20 individual privacy settings available and no way to bulk update them aside from reverting back to Facebook's recommended settings. And it gets better. Not only do you have to set them all one by one, but opting not to share a particular item with anyone requires an extra step, as it's a custom setting. So with a few exceptions, setting each item requires going through two sets of drop down menus to turn sharing off completely i.e. 5 clicks per item. The end result is that 70+ clicks are required to turn off all sharing in your basic privacy settings. Of course you're probably still sharing all kinds of info despite all of that...
Stay Tuned for Part 2: Apps, Ads and Adventure...
Monday, April 25, 2011
Water Safety Games for Home Safety Council
Play Get Wet! or Not Yet! on the Home Safety Council website
We also made an interactive activity for parents and caregivers to polish their water safety badges:
Water Safety Search on the Home Safety Council website
It's never too soon to teach safety so pack a towel and get started!
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Introducing...Artgig Apps
Exhale...
Ah yes, it's the double pleasure of new logo and new website smell.
Allow me to introduce you to our new website, artgigapps.com.
Artgig Apps represents Artgig's commitment to mobile app development and we're really excited by the possibilities for custom development and expanding what we can offer our clients.
The site launches with the recent release of "Being Benny," a children's book app, and "Shake-a-Phrase," a fun language app for kids that is presently in Beta testing.
Coming from a background of educational game development, stretching way back to the good old days of Sunburst Technology, the educational kids apps are obviously a good fit for us.
And most importantly, we like doing it.
And if you're going to bust your ass doing something, it's really best if you like it.
So stay tuned - we've got plenty more up our sleeves and we're feeling inspired to do all kinds of cool things.
Oh, and please take a moment to check out Artgig Apps on Twitter and Facebook – that's where we'll post reviews, news and other insights into the fast paced, high octane world of app development.
Thanks!
And enjoy.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
JFK50.org – History Right Now!
Well, forget that.
We talked to the JFK Library and we all agree, the events are too important and too interesting and well, too cool, to hide from first time visitors and we all know how important it is to be "sticky" when you've got a content rich website.
So we just unlocked everything on the timeline.
Check out the 13 nail-biting days of the Cuban Missile Crisis, presented as an interactive graphic novel.
Or get a jump on the Bay of Pigs, with the anniversary coming up this weekend.
Remember you can dive in to individual cells to immerse yourself in the day and navigate frame-by-frame through the story.
We hope you like it.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Artgig and Benny App in the News!
And the Benny story continues.
Had a nice sit down with Benny author/illustrator and Artgig pal, Dan Wetzel, and Lisa Buchman from the Bedford-Katonah Patch yesterday to talk apps.
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