If you’re a fan of the Trailer Park Boys, you will NOT want to miss this month’s event. Even if you’re not a fan, mark your calendar anyway because the discussion is guaranteed to be lively.
Introducing Swearnet
Mike Smith, Robb Wells, and John Paul Tremblay — otherwise known as “the Boys” — are Canadian actors and comedians you might know from the Trailer Park Boys, The Drunk and On Drugs Happy Fun Time Hour, and now Swearnet. This month, we get an inside look at the design and launch of Swearnet.
Swearnet is a new channel for the the Boys to share their style of humour online. It permits them to keep ownership of their intellectual property and better monetize their lives as actors — in other words, they can own the business instead of handing it over to major media outlets and multinational empires. It also frees them from regulatory bodies such as the CRTC and FCC, which to their frustration impose limits on the number of times they can say ****, ****, or even **** *** **********.
Learn about the design and launch of Swearnet
Our guide for this journey is Dan Nedelko of ArtBarn and Honeypot Marketing in Cambridge. Dan has worked with the Boys to make Swearnet’s vision a reality, guiding the production of the website. He’ll share lots of juicy insights into both the design process and the outcomes of the launch, in a 90-minute meetup you won’t soon forget.
The design concept behind the launch of Swearnet is a lot of fun: in a series of weekly videos, the Boys create a narrative arc in which the Swearnet website gets designed and developed by Randy, one of the show’s characters. In each video, they harangue Randy for being such a terrible designer while resetting his priorities for the next week; and with each new video, the website itself changes to reflect Randy’s most recent work, which continues the cycle.
If you’ve ever complained about having a nightmare client, you’ll relate to Randy’s situation. Though it’s unlikely you’ve ever had a client speak so… well, so frankly of their feelings about your work.
Please register for this free event
WARNING: Expect to encounter LOTS of foul language! We’ll be showing videos from Swearnet that make it obvious where the site got its name.
Tuesday March 26, 2013
5:30 to 7:00 pm
Private room at The Barley Works
(upstairs in the Huether Hotel) Note the location change. We are no longer in the Lion Brewery downstairs.
59 King St. North
Waterloo, Ontario
This month, we stretch our skills (and tease our taste buds) by getting an inside look at the role of design in the restaurant business. Many of the principles behind designing great experiences are universal, so there’s lots to learn by exchanging ideas with our compatriots in industries outside our normal fields of interest.
And as far as fields of interest go, it’s tough to knock great food & drink!
Jody Palubiski (Managing Partner) and Cindy Perri (Brand Guardian) of the Charcoal Group are hosting us at the newly-opened Beertown in Waterloo Town Square. Jody and Cindy will describe the goals, considerations, and challenges involved in designing the restaurant experience. They’ll cover ground such as the physical space, menus, logos and visuals, and more. Much of our time together will be open Q&A, so it’s a great chance to learn something new and to draw connections with your own design practice — regardless of the medium in which you work.
Come prepared to buy your own drink during this event, and there’s a strong chance you’ll find a nice selection of foods to accompany it…
Attendance is limited, so please register for this event!
Wednesday January 23, 2013
5:30 to 7:00 pm Beertown Restaurant
(ask for UX Waterloo when you arrive)
Waterloo Town Square
75 King St. South
Waterloo, Ontario
The user experience of the Aeryon Scout is what sets it apart from the pack. We’ve made an aerial vehicle that can be flown by anyone using Google Maps and we’re looking to enhance our current design. As Aeryon’s UI/UX Designer, you would own the user experience, transforming ideas and turning them into real-world product designs.
Job Description
Work closely with the R&D team to build product demos, prototypes, and interfaces
Define user interface design standards for Aeryon products, optimize ease-of-use and achieve an integrated and consistent product look and feel
Represent the “user experience ” and translate customer requirements into defined product features and specifications
Conduct ongoing research on user interface development
Required Skills
Bachelors degree preferred along with 4+ years relevant design experience
Portfolio required to demonstrate front-end product design and graphic skills
Strong graphics production capability experience with Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and other graphics tools
Experience with Agile software methodology
Outstanding interpersonal skills and the ability to collaborate with the team as well as outside vendors
Experience managing multiple design projects
Detailed-oriented and committed to delivering dynamic, visually appealing design under tight time constraints
Willingness to learn new programming techniques and skills
Our mission at Sortable is to make it easy for people to make decisions about which product or service to use, for example their next camera, phone, or tv purchase, or their next meal, movie, or trip. Sortable’s focus is making these decisions easy for ordinary people by handling all the data analysis and surfacing the best options in simple, beautiful interfaces. Sortable is a 7 person engineering driven startup, our fast growing websites are used by millions of visitors each month, and we need to expand!
We need talented frontend engineers to help us build simple and powerful web interfaces for mobile and desktop users. Designing interfaces that make complex tasks simple is what drives you. You live and breathe HTML5, CSS3 and Javascript — we’re talking clean, minimal markup, with fast page loads, and responsive layouts for multiple devices. At Sortable you’ll have the opportunity to build software that get used by millions of people. Join us to change how people make decisions online.
Skills
Extensive HTML5, Javascript, jQuery and CSS3 experience
Experience with Scala, Java or C#
User interface design
Mobile frameworks such as PhoneGap
Ability to take responsibility and release features users love that drive our vision forward
Top-notch communication skills – we’re a small team, you’ll need to fit in well
Bonus: Worked at a startup before, active in open source, personal projects, active blog, linux experience, spending way too much time researching which product to buy
Environment
We use Scala for most of our development. In addition, we have written tools or services in Python, Bash, and Java. We want our team of developers to have fun and be productive, so we’ll expect you to bring your own ideas and suggestions as to what hardware and software should be used.
Other tools and services we use include: Lift, PostgreSQL, Redis, Mercurial, Jenkins, Amazon Web Services (EC2, S3) and Ubuntu.
Benefits
We offer competitive salaries (80-120k+ based on experience and ability), health benefits, equity in the company, and kick ass developer machines. If you’re interested in building the future of how people make purchase decisions with a group of nice, funny, smart people, then Sortable is the place for you.
Thursday February 16, 2012
5:30 to 7:00 pm
Bauer Kitchen (private room booked under “UX Waterloo”)
Located in the Bauer Marketplace
What makes for a truly amazing conference experience?
Not everything we build as user experience designers is digital (service designers have known this forever!). Even if your own work to date has been strictly online, much of your knowledge is transferable to the real world. So this month, we put that idea to the test — by digging into the DNA of a successful conference experience.
Come prepared to share your own conference experiences, or to chime in with reactions to what others have to say. There’ll be no presentations this month, just informal discussion among UX peers. Have you been to a conference before? Let’s hear about it! Describe what you loved about the experience, and share some low points as well.
Your ideas could very well influence KW’s very own UX conference in September, Fluxible 2012.
RSVP requested
We’re meeting in a private room at the Bauer Kitchen, booked for “UX Waterloo”. Please note that food and drinks will not be supplied, but you’re free to place individual orders if wanted.
Please RSVP below if you plan to attend. Attendance will be capped at 20 people, so sign up soon!
Sorry, this event has been sold out! Also, please note the venue change below.
Thursday January 19, 2012
5:30 to 7:00 pm VENUE CHANGE:
Desire2Learn
Meet in the lobby of the Tannery building in front of the elevators
151 Charles St. W., Suite 100 in Kitchener
“It’s a small world, but I wouldn’t want to paint it.”
It’s true: designing user experiences for (or in) a global context can pose an enormous challenge. But it can also present enormous opportunities and rewards. This month, we’re joined by the authors of Global UX, a recently-published book that acts as a travel guide for UX teams tasked with blowing away borders and boundaries. Whitney Quesenbery and Daniel Szuc based their book not just on their own professional experience (which is considerable), but on dozens of in-depth interviews with design professionals who represent over 60 countries and 25 languages.
So needless to say, this will be a great event for anyone thinking about global design and UX.
What to expect
In the spirit of a connected world, Whitney and Dano will join us via Web conference in one of Communitech’s most tricked-out AV rooms in The Hub. Whitney will connect from her home in the Eastern US. Daniel currently lives in Hong Kong, but will dial in from London UK. So we’re going global in almost every sense!
Whitney and Daniel will lead us through a discussion of how UX practice is changing and how UX practitioners and teams around the world are designing for a global context. Their goal is to share what people are thinking about how they work in UX practices in global, cross-cultural, distributed team environments. They’ll challenge us to think about the process of understanding people from different countries and cultures. And they’ll share insights into how other teams have tackled the challenges of working on global products.
These glimpses into global practice may serve as either a mirror, reflecting your own work — or as a beacon, showing a path ahead. Either way, this event will both inform and inspire you!
About the presenters
Daniel Szuc (@dszuc) is Principal Consultant at Apogee, a usability consulting Services Company based in Hong Kong. Dan previously worked on a usability team for Telstra Australia. He is currently VP of the International UPA (Usability Professionals’ Association) and has lectured about UX in Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, the USA, Israel, New Zealand, and Japan. He co-wrote a “Usability Kit” with Gerry Gaffney, which is an implementation guide providing best practices and guidelines for usability teams. Dan holds a BS in Information Management from Melbourne University in Australia.
Whitney Quesenbery (@whitneyq) is a user researcher, user experience practitioner, and usability expert with a passion for clear communication. She works with organizations from the National Cancer Institute to IEEE, Sage and The Open University. She has been president of the UPA and served on two national advisory committees for usability and accessibility. She enjoys meeting people around the world and using those insights to design products where people matter. She is the author of Storytelling for User Experience (with Kevin Brooks, Rosenfeld Media).
InGamer Sports provides a new form of fantasy sports game that allows people to play on a game by game basis. Players pick any five athletes they want and change those athletes during the game. This removes the barriers that classical fantasy puts in the way of the casual fan. Our technology is in market with Rogers Sportsnet.ca.
You will have an opportunity to make very direct and substantial contributions to the product. This job requires that you:
Have worked on at least 3 professional projects from start to ongoing maintenance phase
Can re-interpret interaction approaches for delivery platforms
Believe that product creation demands craftsmanship
Deliver successful software through efficient teamwork
You will be implementing your solutions in the web browser stack, experience with any of these additional technologies that our platform uses would be helpful:
Ruby on Rails
Linux (Ubuntu)
Amazon Cloud Services
ssh
Apache
git
bash
MySQL
To see what we’re about, come play a game!
All applications must include a cover letter and resume to be considered. Please send applications to apply@InGamer.com.
How can the digital world be more emotionally resonant and human? Now that a large amount of web activity takes place in real-time social environments between people directly instead of graphic interfaces, we’re bringing together some of the best people who know how to do this in live performance: actors, directors, dancers, casting agents etc. We’ll investigate how they work to create conditions for great emotional engagement and mix them in conversation with innovative thinkers and makers from the digital world.
Heather Gold, solo performer, social artist, web veteran and co-founder of TummelVision.tv has mixed web and performance approaches for over 10 years exploring public intimacy. She’s now extending her inquiry to the broader community and will “tummel” the workshop, bringing together to come up with our collective insights in this landmark gathering to discover direction for the next stage of social web and business and possibly even performance.
This month we’re meeting once again at the Red Baron Lounge, located on-site at the Brick Brewery in Uptown Waterloo. We’ll have a couple of brief presentations about UX happenings around town — and plenty of time for meeting new faces, talking shop, and raising a few glasses together. This is a private gathering for UX Waterloo, in which you can sample just about everything the brewery has to offer.
Where and when
Thursday August 18, 2011
5:30 to 7:30 pm
Red Baron Lounge at the Brick Brewery
(Entrance at the side of the building near the front)
181 King Street South
Waterloo, ONT
[Map]
RSVP required
You must RSVP to attend, as this is a licensed event. We’ll be checking names at the door. Sign up early before it’s sold out!
We’ve got something special on tap for UX Waterloo this summer. In both July and August, we’ll be meeting at the Red Baron Lounge, located on-site at the Brick Brewery in Uptown Waterloo. Our thanks to Brick Brewery for sponsoring this event! It’s a private gathering just for us, in which you can sample just about everything the brewery has to offer.
We’ll have a few brief presentations about UX happenings around town. And plenty of time for meeting new faces, talking shop, and raising a few glasses together.
Where and when
Tuesday July 19, 2011
5:30 to 7:30 pm
Red Baron Lounge at the Brick Brewery
(Entrance at the side of the building near the front)
181 King Street South
Waterloo, ONT
[Map]
RSVP required
You must RSVP to attend, as this is a licensed event. We’ll be checking names at the door. Sign up early before it’s sold out!
Please thank our sponsor!
Many thanks to Brick Brewery for sponsoring UX Waterloo this summer. Please visit Brick on Facebook and “Like” them. Maybe even drop a comment to let them know you appreciate their support!
Join uxWaterloo on Meetup to connect with other members, receive alerts about monthly events, and RSVP when you're planning to be there.
About uxWaterloo
uxWaterloo welcomes anyone with an interest in user experience (UX) design, whether you're a seasoned veteran or hoping to get your career started. Located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, we meet once a month and engage in a range of activities such as workshops, presentations, or informal meetups over food & drink.
