Let's pretend

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Playing is simple, even a child can do it, but designing something simple is hard. How can we combine prototyping with production software to get our ideas in front of real people? How can we evolve our software over time? How do we measure if something is fun? I will talk about how Ruby’s flexibility and a strong testing ethos can bring some sanity to this uncertain world. And when I say testing, I’m not just talking about RSpec, Cucumber or Capybara, I’ll share stories from Mightyverse about how we test whether our software actually “works” for the people who use it — sharing failures, I mean, learning, as well as success.

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Let’s PretendSarah Allen @mightyverse

Mightyverse

A network for sharing language & culture

Mightyverse

A network for sharing language & culture !

where the people create and benefit from a global corpus of human spoken language.

collections of language around an experience

native language videos with translations

across multiple languages

Marketplace for Language

Social Mission

Almost 50% of the world’s languages are endangered One goes extinct every 2-3 weeks

A global, crowdsourced living language community can make documenting an endangered language easy and accessible to all.

At the beginning…

2008

Mightyverse web app — Rails 2.1 — Globalize — whatever we used before devise !

2008

Mightyverse web app !

2008

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature !

2008

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature - and fix a few bugs !

2008

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature - and fix a few bugs !

- and I needed to learn Rails

2008

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature - and fix a few bugs !

- and I needed to learn Rails and Ruby

2009

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature - and fix a few bugs

2009

Mightyverse web app - need to add recording feature - and fix a few bugs - finish application development

“the smallest thing you can build that lets you quickly make it around the build/measure/learn loop” !

— Eric Ries

Tests Define the Product

learn: what do we know? (numbers are good)

hypothesis: what do we believe? (numbers are good)

test: how can we check against reality?

analyze: does the data support our hypothesis?

the majority of the people in the world speak a second language

How do we find this huge audience of

language learners? “

How could our target audience

find us?

“How can you say...” Google Searches in English

Googlehttp://www.google.com/trends?q=how+do+you+say&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0

“How can you say...” Google Searches in Spanish

Google

8x increase in search traffic thru SEO

Rails 3 upgrade

dinero.com article

broke caching

fixed caching

green tests

green tests WTF?

Google Custom Alerts

Alert

Every web application should have an immune system.

What is does it mean for software to work?

Language Exchange

Social Game Language learning processshould be reflective of the interaction they are seeking:social, engaging, fun

Mightyverse Database

Web App

Juan Bill Xian

View

Record Request

Content Creation Feedback Loop

People can also ask their friends to record phrases

Phrase Contributors

Mightyverse Database

Phrase Contributors

Thank you in Japanese

Mightyverse Database

More Search Results

Content Creation Feedback Loop

Phrase videos create phrase pages

Phrase Contributors

Thank you in Japanese

Mightyverse Database

More Search Results

Web App

Content Creation Feedback Loop

Phrase pages drive traffic

Social Mission of Mightyverse

Almost 50% of the world’s languages are endangered One goes extinct every 2-3 weeks

A global, crowdsourced living language community can make documenting an endangered language easy and accessible to all.

Crowdfunding as Validation

Crowdfunding

Lean Startup Landing Page technique - create an ad for your product - measure click-thru to validate an idea

Crowdfunding

Lean Startup Landing Page technique ++ - start with an ad for your product - collect advance orders - only create the product, if you raise enough

funds to build it

4 Drivers of Crowdfunding Success

Make a video (raise 115% more) !

Multiple founders (raise 94% more) !

Ask for less than $10,000 !

Experience running a successful campaign

4 Drivers of Crowdfunding Success

Make a video (raise 115% more) !

Multiple founders (raise 94% more) !

Ask for less than $10,000 !

Experience running a successful campaign

<$10K 38% success

< $50K 18% success

< $100K 7% success

Crowdsourcing Language

Life Cycle of a Phrase

Designing a game

Getting Gamification Right by Sebastian Deterding

Meaning Connect to personal goals and passions !

Mastery Goal + rules create interesting challenges !

Autonomy A sense of freedom, the ability to curiously explore opportunity”

Fun is just another word for learning “ ”RAPH KOSTER

Fun is just another word for learning

under optimal conditions “

”SEBASTIAN DETERDING

Getting Gamification Right by Sebastian Deterding

Think design process not features. !

Know your users: you are not your target audience.

Getting Gamification Right by Sebastian Deterding

Create a paper prototype.

Play test and iterate.

Test #1 Did we have fun?

Test #1 Did we have fun?

Best Practices in Language

!

Immersive yourself in your new language Don’t speak your native language Avoid relying on translations

Test #2 Are we moving toward our goal?

Test #2 Are we moving toward our goal?

Test #2 Are we moving toward our goal?

What did we learn?

Both games were fun. !

This game was much simpler. Only required one bilingual player. !

What did we learn?

Both games were fun. !

This game was much simpler. Only required one bilingual player. !

This could actually work as a card game…

Learning is the essential unit of progress

for start-ups “

”ERIC RIES

Test #3 Would anyone else play our game?

Shut up and sit in the corner and watch. See if people who play your game are having fun

and playing the way you expect, and are able to learn the rules easily

“”

MATT LEACOCK

M. E. Stevens

What did we learn?

Validation of our language learning model - helps people learn - sparks curiosity - scalable across language !

The game created an ecosystem !

New Experimental iPhone App !

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Thanks John Fox! @djembe

Tweet @mightyverse How do you say “_________” in Spanish? #rmr2014 !

or !

@mightyverse How do you say “_________” in Japanese? #rmr2014

KENT BECK

Agile is what works. “ ”

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