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You scratch my back…and I’ll give you a Pollock painting!

August 27, 2009

News & Updates

Remember when you’d run downstairs to see what presents awaited you? Birthdays, those December-holidays (hey, just wantin’ to be PC here), anniversaries, or any other occasion when loved ones shower you with goodies?  And how about those times when your heart swells after a huge smile lights up your friend’s face after he/she opens a gift from you? See, now you can relive those same warm and fuzzy feelings—this time with our virtual loot!

picasso_sketchbookOkay, okay, I know we had an earlier blog post about this topic, but it’s time to revisit them and convince you how totally cool they are.

Take, for example, the Picasso Sketchbook (pictured to the right). All of us in the office are after it. Sure, it looks benign enough, but that thing there is worth 5000 points. If you own it, then you: a) are a loyal VOOzer who faithfully plays on the site, and/or b) another VOOzer loves you that much (almost like bouquet-of-roses-on-Valentine’s-Day degree). So we’re all steadily working our way to this prized piece o’ virtual loot—you know, to be the “cool” one in the office.

And maybe you’re wondering why the hell would we (or you) want to worry about silly little online items?  That’s a totally legitimate question. Collecting loot and sending gifts can be run o’ the mill social media, but trust me: it’s far more fun when you have cooler stuff to play with. We ain’t no ordinary site: we have neat categories (Art, Emotions, and Urban Sprawl) with killer illustrations. You won’t be sending some boring teddy bear or a bland candy bar. You can send a Jackson Pollock painting or a SPICY sign or a traffic light! Just think of the fun messages you could attach to each gift:

 Pollock Painting

Hi Jack! Just wanted to send you this Pollock painting ’cause, just like his style, you’re crazy and fun and all over the place. Love ya for it, bro!

SPICY

Hey. You are totally hot. Seriously. Dinner sometime?

Traffic Light

Hi Jill! When you helped that old lady cross the street today, it totally showed what an amazing gal you are!  I hope you always have green lights in your life so you feel nothing is ever holding you back!

So, come on, visit VOO!, play around, and get you some booty! (That’s what pirates called loot, right?) Go ahead, give some of your friends and other VOOZers some love—send ‘em a small gift. You never know, they might send you back a piece of loot you’ve had your heart set on for a while. (If anything, you’re workin’ on those karma points. And we all need those.)

Props Go To…

…the completed photobook Build a Coherent Sentence!

The point of this VOO was to upload photos of words such that a meaningful sentence came out. What was the final product, you ask?

Dead cats look haunted, only hobos miss unlimited Pabst.

You gotta admit, it’s a pretty coherent sentence for the combined effort of 9 different VOOzers!  Check out the original photos that made it come all together!

A Taste of Our Inspiration

deviant-art deviantART is an online community of artists and a really rad one, at that! Art used to be so classist: patrons commissioned artists. Now, just as the internet has been liberating in so many ways—be it broadcasting current events through Twitter in real time, reconnecting on Facebook with people you might never have been able to find before, or being able to access information otherwise reserved for elite institutions (OpenCourseWare Consortium)—now art has become accessible, both for the artist and the audience. deviantART provides a new forum to showcase, highlight, sell, and build community around art; and with a space like this, art can more readily be by the people, for the people, among the people. Maybe it’s the socialist streak in me, but if the people behind the site were standing here right now, I’d definitely give them a high five. A double-handed high five, actually. Check ‘em out!

Around the Office

After a brief hiatus, Claire is back with our marketing mafia! And she brought back her lovable dog Squeegee. C’mon, who doesn’t love puppy therapy on a bad day?

Also, there seems to be a cold going around; so far we have two fallen soldiers, Greg and Will. But Greg is forever the trooper and is faithfully found at his desk. Just the other day, when the first signs of headache and sniffles began to tug at him, the rest of us got on his case:

Aayesha: “You’re sick, Greg? Why are you here? Go hoooooooome!”
Greg: “I’m about to go, really.” (as he continues to type away)
Chris: “Riiiight. Just a couple more emails…”
Claire: “As if he only had internet here, and not on his phone, or at home!”
Greg: “Hey now! I only need one wife!”

But he finally gave in and konked out once he got home. So, kids, what’s the moral of the story? Health above all. Take your vitamins, eat your veggies, and learn to just give in when your body tells you it needs some TLC.

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A tattooed UI designer walks into a bar…

August 18, 2009

News & Updates

We’re currently undergoing a lot of UI/UX (user interface/user experience) talk.  Yes, our job hunt for a talented UI lead designer is underway, but we continue our pow-wows, scratching our heads about how users are actually using our site.

So what does this mean for you?

Well, how would you feel about being part of our user feedback study group? That’s right, we get to spend an hour or two together, you play around on the site and talk away, and I’ll be there with you, hanging on your every word. So it’s kind of like a date. Sort of. Well, you can think of it that way if that piques your interest in coming in!  We’re looking for a whole variety of users, anyone from a tech nerd to a stay-at-home mom; we just want to hear your thoughts.

Now you’re probably asking, “What’s in it for me?”

Furthering the creative collaboration of mankind! Winning major karma points by helping out a small start-up! An excuse to visit downtown San Francisco! And a sincere reason to pat yourself on the back and go to sleep knowing you did good. Yeah, you know that feeling—it’s a good one, isn’t it?

If you’re up for coming into our office one afternoon for some UI fun, please do email us!

(And if you love homebaked goods, just let me know ahead of time, and I’ll be sure to bring treats for us to snack on. My mom once said that I bake to win friends, and she’s totally right!)

Props Go To…

carpe-diem-tatoo…the completed photobook Rad Tats!

Our office is headquartered in the lovely city of San Francisco. This week’s props go out to a photobook that truly captures one [very prominent] aspect of Bay Area culture: tattoos.  If you walk down any San Franciscan street, you’re bound to spot ink on a good number of people.  We figured it was about time we pay homage to our city’s aesthetic—so go ahead, check out some of the awesome tattoos featured in this photobook!

A Taste of Our Inspiration

heckert_gnu_smallVOO! is about collaboration. It’s about coming together online and everyone putting in their two cents.  Sooner than you know it, we have a riff or story or photobook that’s complete, with a different slant from each user.

So, in the spirit of collaboration, this week we’re highlighting the GNU Project. It started way back when in the early ’80s, and it’s part of the Free Software movement. What does that mean, exactly?  Well, free software honors “users’ freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.”  If you visit the GNU site and read about their history and the Free Software Foundation, you’ll begin to see how important this really is. It builds community around software and gives users agency and space to foster growth and revision of software.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the saying, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Well, it also takes an involved, collaborative community to better a product. And that’s why we salute the GNU Project for blazing the trail in arena.

Around the Office

A common office topic is, “Where am I going for lunch today?” We are conveniently located in one of the happening intersections nestled between Chinatown and the Financial District. Here are 5 of our favorite spots to drop in for a bite:

  • Baladie – Mediterranean yumminess
  • Banana House – Thai food (spice, baby!)
  • Boxed Foods Company – characteristically Californian sandwiches
  • Latte Express – Vietnamese sandwiches (order by number, please!)
  • Working Girls – sandwiches and salads…faster than you can imagine

And in other news…

It’s Tumblr mania! We all really dig Tumblr, so if any of you loyal readers want a peek into our personal lives, see what we tumble about out of the office!

chris-head will-jumps green-solo
Chris
(VP of Product)
Lost in the Fog		 Will
(Marketing Dude)
2 Eyes 2 Ears		 Aayesha
(Blog Mistress)
Flutter By

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ConVOOsations

August 6, 2009

News & Updates

We want YOU—yes, you. Picture me pointing my finger directly at your pretty face staring into this screen. We want you to be part of our user feedback group! As you may already know, our site is still in beta, and we’re working through the kinks; therefore, we’re super curious how users are, well, using our lil’ baby, our VOO.

What does that mean for you? Well, darlin’, if you’re reading this, then you’re probably one of the folks we’d love to talk to. We’re having IM conVOOsations! (Was that too corny? Hmm, maybe.) At any rate, we want to know what you think, how you experience the site, what you feel needs changing, and what you already love. How? Therein lies the fun…

  • Find us on AOL Instant Messenger, and IM us at talkVOO!
  • Playing around on Gmail? Then find us on Google Talk, and message us at info.voo!

It’ll only take 15 minutes of your time. So for those long days when you’re stuck in your cubicle, the fluorescent lights are starting to drive you bonkers, your coworker’s humming is making you twitch, then sign onto AIM or Google and talk up a storm with us!

Props Go To…

caterpillar…the recently completed story The Popper.

This story is a good example of the excitement of collaboration—where it can take you, what pitfalls you come across along the way, how people interpret things differently. Our former intern Claire started the story with only a title and very sparse instructions, and now you can see what came of it! It’s funny how different threads of thought can somehow put together a [semi]coherent story.  Major lesson learned: sometimes you gotta reach waaaaay deep down for a creative streak to save the story. But hey, that’s where the fun is. Check it out!

A Taste of Our Inspiration

tumblr-logoToday we tip our hats to Tumblr! They’ve experienced amazing growth in the past few months; and just yesterday Mashable gave them the spotlight with an article entitled Tumblr Takes Over the World. We don’t have any ambitions for world domination, but we do dig Tumblr’s style and love how it’s caught on with users. Simple interface, straightforward design, varied media support, a quickly growing community—what else would a fledgling site want? So, Tumblr, we salute you for a job well done.

Around the Office

We’ve started interviewing candidates for our Lead UI Designer opening. But there’s still time if you want to submit a resume and cover letter! Email us at info.voo@gmail.com. Extra points if you post a YouTube video of why you think you’re the most worthy candidate.

In other notes, the office is quiet these days. With Claire gone and Gil on sabbatical, we’re down to a 5-person crew.  It makes for quiet days, so sometimes we come up with games to pass the time, such as:

The Drawing Game!

Here we have collaborative drawing, kinda like the real life version of our site. Someone starts off with a line or a shape and then passes the paper to the next person (in this case, it was between Will and Chris). Sooner than you know it, you’ve got a funky masterpiece in the making!  See what the gentlemen came up with this morning (click on the drawing to enlarge it):

A Whale of an Escape

drawing1

Pumpkins and Bananas

drawing2

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A New VOOdoo

July 28, 2009

News & Updates

We have a new release set to come out tomorrow! Yep, tomorrow! Happy dance.

What cool new features will you find? Well, you’ll now be able to edit and delete comments in riffs and stories. Don’t you hate it when, after you’ve posted, you notice a spelling error or realize you posted to the wrong riff/story or maybe you just sounded like a complete numbskull? Now you can change all that in one click of the mouse! (If only real life were so easy…)

sambaWe’re also rolling out an awesome Facebook Connect feature. On our photobooks, you’ll be able to publish the photo directly to your Facebook profile page. Nifty, right? I certainly think so. In the photobook The Unexpected, I came across a photo of a third trimester samba dancer that I would have loved to publish to my wall. I mean, c’mon, wouldn’t you? It’s priceless!

And last but not least, we removed our cap on votes. So we’re that much closer to being like the corrupt government of a developing nation! But seriously, here’s the deal: you can visit any riff, story, or photobook and vote for whichever entries you feel are the best. That’s right, send some love all around! Build that good karma. And get this: each time someone votes for you, you get 5 points!  It’s not as good as a new car or Hawaiian vacation, but hey, we’re just gettin’ started.

And in other news, we want you all to keep in mind we’re still looking for a Lead UI Designer. Got any qualified, unemployed friends? (Doesn’t that describe half our social circles these days? Ha!) If you do have someone in mind, send ‘em our way!  See the previous post, or send resume/cover letters and inquiries to info.voo@gmail.com.

Props Go To…

…the completed riff Mic Check, Mr. Prez, Mic CHECK.

The prompt? Which President would have made the best rapper? Please choose one and provide us a rhyme.

History meets rap. How does it get any better!? Get a whole new take on Washington, Jackson, Polk, Nixon, and good ol’ Obama, of course. Don’t just sit there intrigued—go read some killer rhymes!

A Taste of Our Inspiration

Our office is based in San Francisco; naturally, we get our taste of fashion-consciousness in our lovely city. Walking down the street is like a runway show sometimes; riding the subway can be a magazine ad waiting to happen.

So, in honor of our fair city, we want to highlight the website Polyvore this week. It’s devoted to fashion trends and styles and allows users to create sets of items, a la wish list. Here’s their overview:

Polyvore lets you create sets composed of individual images using an easy to use, drag and drop editor. After you have created a set, you can publish and share it with your friends and the Polyvore community.

Around the Office

puppy-love

Claire, one of the beloved members of the marketing mafia, will be leaving us at the end of this week for greener pastures. We thank her for her initiative and dedication…and for letting us give Squeegee, her dog, some office lovin’. Thanks for your hard work, Claire!

On a separate note, every Friday the office above us starts blasting music around 3:00pm. So I’ve come to one of two conclusions: a) I’m going to start wearing headphones in order to get work done, or b) I’m gonna make me some friends upstairs. Yeah yeah.

It was early evening; the fog was rolling in over the bay. We were cycling across the Golden Gate Bridge and finally reached the Sausalito side. There stood Battery Spencer, an old fort atop a hill. We cycled up, caught the view of the tops of the bridge peeking through the fog and decided it was time to head home. Careening down the hill, the road abruptly ended, and there I went skidding into gravel. I rode the 8 miles home a bloody mess.

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What? You said you’re hiring?

July 24, 2009

WE ARE HIRING.

Aren’t those beautiful words in economic times such as these?  Mmm, let me let that roll off my tongue again…

WE ARE HIRING.

If we could place an ad in the personals section, it would read something like this:

Single start-up seeks unattached UI designer for a close relationship. Start-up is intelligent, good-humored, group-oriented, supportive. Enjoys dogs, working and playing hard, and fostering a sense of creativity in everyone it meets. Ideally seeking a mate with similar interests that is willing to commit.

But since the personals section on Craigslist has turned a bit sketchy (c’mon, you know what I’m talking about), we posted it in the jobs section instead. So, here, read on and let us know if we’d be a good fit for one another!

Open Position: Lead UI Designer for Social Entertainment Startup

The Company:

VOO! is an early stage start-up creating online social entertainment experiences focused around creativity and fun. Our small team (7) hails from the online games industry with several years experience as founders and executives at Pogo, Electronic Arts, Viacom and iWin. We just recently launched the early beta version of our site. Our offices are located in a cool brick and timber building in downtown San Francisco.

The Opportunity:

We believe that great design is at the heart of any great user experience. We are looking for someone, who is fueled by passion, creativity, curiosity, and execution, and wants to push the limits of what’s possible to create breakthrough new user experiences. As a social entertainment experience, our challenge (and opportunity) is to strike the right balance between fun, intuitive user interaction and rich, stunning visual design. We are seeking someone who will bring their own ideas and solutions to these challenges, and be a passionate advocate for the user. This position will report to the VP Product/Co-Founder.

Requirements:

  • Interactive, GUI, user-centered, and web design experience for consumer facing web sites with a particular strength in user interaction design
  • Expert creative and design skills as they apply to typography, color, layout/composition, perspective, imagery, and web interaction
  • Production of final pixel art for page and UI designs
  • Strong, almost obsessive, attention to detail
  • Natural collaborator
  • Expert-level experience with Adobe Creative Suite, HTML, XHTML, CSS, DHTML, and CSS layout skills
  • Demonstrated experience with AJAX, JavaScript, and JavaScript Toolkits such as jQuery or Prototype
  • An outstanding body of work
  • Strong desire to change the way the world connects with each other!

Experience:

  • 5+ years in user interaction and web design with an emphasis on social media
  • Ideally, 2+ years as a lead designer
  • Bachelors or other degree in graphic design, interaction design, or a design related field

Contact:

Email us your cover letter and resume. (And keep your fingers crossed that Cupid’s out and about with his bow and arrow—you never know when a perfect match will blossom.)

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Summer Love

July 20, 2009

News & Updates

We’re planning on having a live event in San Francisco! Okay, you’re probably thinking, “Wait, what happens at a live event for a website anyway?” Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. But consider what VOO! is: you sign in, you pick a project to participate in (be it a riff or a story or a photobook), and then you contribute! So just imagine that same sequence of activity, only this time…

dolores-park-people

You’re in a bright, sunny park on a beautiful San Franciscan weekend afternoon. And whoa, out of nowhere, there’s a kid in a cowboy hat, a gal in a bright neon shirt, and another gal in pearls and a boa asking you, “Hey, want to take this Polaroid camera and capture some of the nifty stuff goin’ on in the park right now?” You shrug, take the camera, and proceed to have an amazing time taking snapshots of all the weird and endearing park goings-on. You return to the oddly-clad trio, and they post your Polaroid shots on a large wall behind their little station.  Later, all those same photos get posted on VOO! in a photobook dedicated entirely to that day/time/location.  Yay, collaborative memory making!

Seriously, wouldn’t that be cool? Or are we just kidding ourselves? (Because if we are, you should really let us know. ‘Cause the last thing I want to do is run around Dolores Park in the sunny Mission District of San Francisco, sporting heels and sweating underneath a stuffy feather boa. Really.)

So keep your eyes glued to this blog for more info. When we work out all the details, you’ll be able to find them on our VOO! in Real Life page.

Props Go To…

michael…the recently completed photobook Favorite Michael Jackson Look.

Good ol’ Michael will live on in the hearts of many. But you know you can’t resist a trip down memory lane—from the cute little kid with an afro to the pop sensation sporting sunglasses. Check out the photobook for all the faces we have known and loved.

And if you feel particularly nostalgic, we encourage you to take on a Michael Jackson look yourself and start a new photobook. Just think, you could be in our “Props Go To…” category later this week! (Come on, we all want our 15 minutes of fame, right?)

A Taste of Our Inspiration

This week we want to send out some love to Youth Speaks. Spoken word meets social justice in this awesome non-profit organization based right here in our home of San Francisco.  Take a look at their mission statement to get a sense of the great work they’re doing:

Youth Speaks empowers the next generation of leaders, self-defined artists, and visionary activists through written and oral literacies. We challenge youth to find, develop, publicly present, and apply their voices as creators of social change.

A lot of their programs reach out to inner city youth, encouraging them to explore the spoken word and use it as a vehicle of expression and mobilization. Making the literary arts accessible and fun? How cool is that!? Want to hear some of their pieces? Then you should definitely check out their YouTube channel!

We here at VOO! just wanted to highlight YouthSpeaks for what they’ve done for the community and how they’ve made the literary something that isn’t so high and mighty. That’s what we want to do: make writing, thinking, and doing a fun, collective adventure.

Around the Office

  • Our graphic designer Linda was visiting us last week from NYC. Not only can she illustrate like no other, but that woman has stellar taste in boots.
  • Will, one of our marketing interns, chopped off his hair. No more sexy long locks for this one.
  • It was Bastille Day last week and we all went to the Irish Bank for one of our meetings. Booty-shaking music started blaring from the speakers mid-meeting. So much for that idea.
  • We have a newly acquired office plant, a Chinese Evergreen. If you have any suggestions on how not to kill the poor thing, we welcome them with wide open arms.

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The Points Shall No Longer Be Pointless!

July 6, 2009

Here at VOO, we love to get feedback from you guys, our earliest, trend-setting users.  Of everything we hear, the most frequently asked question since the launch of VOO Beta is, “What on earth are the points for?” We’ve all been earning points by contributing to Stories and Riffs and Photobooks, but they’ve just been racking up for bragging rights. Now you will be able to use them for something!

The first thing that you’ll notice on VOO these days, following our latest update, is a change in your profile interface. As VOO transitions into a world of virtual currency and goodness, our participants may begin rewarding each other and themselves for their creative efforts. Points will continue to be earned the same way—only now, you can actually spend them on virtual items.

loot post-it note

Our items, which are organized into Categories, will include funky things that we think are cool, funny, or just pleasing to the eye.  These knick-knacks and doo-dads will be stored in a new area on your profile called “My Loot.”

With your hard-earned points, you will be able to purchase more by going to the “Get More” link, perusing the market, and clicking “Buy It” on any item you desire, as long as you can afford it! We encourage you to rack up points and accumulate many items, but if you really want to emulate the spirit of VOO, you should give them to your circle of friends as gifts! Once you’re in possession of any item, you’re free to give it to whomever you want.

Receiving an item as a reward for a great story entry or a fantastic photo will be more satisfying than buying one for yourself, or eating cake by yourself.  So, enjoy our first release of virtual items, and be on the look out for rare and hard to find items as the marketplace evolves.  Keep giving us your input by going back to the site and clicking the Feedback button in the top right corner. Let us know which items you like or dislike, and what future items and item categories might interest you. Finally, be generous with your items. VOO, its points, and its virtual items provide a place to enhance your creativity and karma.  Play it forward, and then pay it forward.

Here’s a look at some of our virtual items, from the Art, Urban, and Emotion Categories, respectively.

Picasso's Sketchbook

Picasso's Sketchbook

Caution Tape

Caution Tape

Incredibadass! Duh!

Incredibadass! Duh!

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This is not a blog.

June 18, 2009

Welcome to the official blog of Voo!  

As the first decade of the new millennium nears end, we, the people, have undergone a ridiculously rapid transformation.  The world has become more “connected” than ever. Infinite resources of information and multimedia are available in the palm of our hands. With the use of technology, any dream can now become reality. I can video chat with my friend in Beirut while simultaneously playing a game against someone in Bangkok. The world is smaller. Yet, in the past few years, despite the opportunity to become one powerful collective, we have witnessed a rise in the popularity of individualism.  Social networks have connected us, yes, but what has been produced? Hours are spent online in the name self-promotion. You may follow someone’s every Tweet, but what are you doing with that knowledge? The world has been shrunk in connectivity, but it remains stuck in a rut of low productivity. Enter VOO!

WE  is  the  new  ME.

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