Vanity RepublicProject

Vanity RepublicProject

SummarySummary

Vanity Republic is an innovative web-oriented application for sharing multimedia content and socializing around it.

The difference from the existing social networks is that people can't delete things they've uploaded. And a lifetime of each shared media piece depends on its popularity, thus turning sharing images into a competition.

About usAbout us

We are animals at getting things done, and are doing this because we are eager to create a perfect virtual world for other creators.

We originate from video game industry. You are reading this pitch very likely because we want to work together with you.

For the first prototype we used Django/Python for backend and HTML/JavaScript for frontend, which might not be the final choice. Besides it, we have a more detailed design document, layout sketches, planning for the future acquisition campaign, and an endless source of improvement ideas in our mind palace :)

ReferencesReferences

Content vanishing over timeHowever, /TEMP is oriented on typical Japanese teenagers. It is shaped like an old image-board and has a lot of barely legal content and no abuse reporting. While what we want is to hit the mass market. /TEMP utilizes parent website community as an acquisition base. We need much stronger SNS support and are going to invite early adopters manually.

Social networking, content feeds, UI

Instagram Deviant Art Facebook Pinterest Vimeo iOS7

VocabularyVocabulary

Republic, Vanity Republic — the whole system.

Unit — a content piece, a contribution, a publication, a post in Vanity Republic. Unit can be an image, a video, a sound, a text — any creative product.

Publishing (Uploading, Contributing), Commenting, Tagging... — actions available with units.

Lifetime — a period of time when a unit stays in the Republic. After being uploaded, each unit gets starting 24 hours and when its lifetime ends, it will be authomatically deleted. However, theoretically people can endlessly continue the lifetime of any unit by commenting it.

Citizen — an authorized user. Citizens can both be contributors (publish units) and commenters. After a citizen uploads a unit, he can't delete or edit it, only add more tags. When a citizen comments a unit, he thus extends its lifetime for 1 hour per character. Exeption is commenting his own unit, which is allowed but will not extend its lifetime.

Feed — statistically organized river of units. When entering the Republic, everybody sees the feed and can fish in its flow looking closer at units of their interest.

Data modelData model

Citizen Unit

Timer

Chat

Otherunits

contribute

comment in

Feed

Othercitizens

follow

tag

group (into)

depends on

affects *edit profile,

authorizeSNS

* Unit disappearswhen its lifetime is up — based on a continuosly countingdown timer.

browse(feed)

Core ValuesCore Values

Touch-screen oriented UI, simple, minimalistic and dynamic at the same time. Utilizing tap&release, tap&hold, tap&scroll but not more complex gestures.

Following present-day graphical design trends: thin lines, saturatied colors, invisible skeuomorphism: flat pixels, but complex gradients imitating reflection on the water or sunset sky.

Following present-day information design trends: incorporating different kinds of media content in statistically driven feeds with reduced commenting, but full SNS support.

Visual style referencesVisual style references

Drei Monument Valley David OReilly 3DAR

Super Hot IOS 7 (or maybe 8?) Vimeo

Frontend flowFrontend flow

Landing page Units

Upload new unit

Sign-in

Sign-up

+ Secondarypages, e.g. Settings, Terms & Conditions

Apply filters(e.g. Search)

Landing pageLanding page

Most of the site modes are feeds that consist of diverse content blocks. Each feed matches specified criteria, e.g. new arrivals, long-livers or units that have the smallest lifetime and will vanish soon.

Landing page feed contains links to all other site modes, which basically are filters applied to this feed.

Header

First visit greeting

Live Feed

Statistically distributed feedStatistically distributed feed

Generally the feed consists of 4-5 columns filled with blocks of following types: content units (1), tags (2), menu + SNS vidgets (3) and banners (4). Taping on a unit opens the unit page.

3

3

1

1 1

1

4

2

2

Statistically distributed feedStatistically distributed feed

All blocks occur in the feed with different probability and according to certain rules:

Item type Chance to appear on 16x9 screen in a column

Special rules

Content unit ~ 80% (most of the information)

Units with the biggest lifetime appear in wide columns. The more lifetime — the higher its position in the column.

Units with the smallest lifetime go to the top of thin columns.

Tag ~ 5% Most popular tags appear on top of the feed.Up to 3 tags can appear together.

Menu and Social buttons

~ 5% (this means to be visible on one screen each 4-5 fullscreen scrollings)

Top left block of any feed — is always a menu.

There is NO 'scroll to the top' button. The feed is approached as an endless information flow that can be browsed from any place. And menu can appear in it more than once.

Banner ad ~ 10% Top 2 blocks of a column (before scrolling) should not be ads.

Unit page overviewUnit page overview

The interface allows citizens to interact with a unit in all ways available, without leaving the page and regardless of unit content type

Timerdepending on the chat

on the right

CoverImage

Following

Tags

ReportingAbuse

SNS Sharing

Social functionsSocial functions

Besides commenting, more actions are associated with each unit:

Following/unfollowing the contributor of the unit. If I follow someone this means he is added to my 'favourite' list. I can see all contributors I follow in certain filtered feed.

Reporting abuse. Works democratically: if a unit gets N reports of authorized citizens, time will stop for it, and it will be hidden from the feed and sent to moderation again.

Tagging. Not only the author, but also other citizens can add tags to any unit. Tags are limited to 12 symbols and can't contain spaces. 'Bad words' should be filtered.

SNS Sharing. Social buttons work in the 'share this item on my wall' mode.

InnovationThere are a lot of people around talking that social networking has reached the plateau of its evolution S-curve, thus creating a niche for the a new product. Vanity Republic is designed to be just enough innovative to bring the difference, and at the same time it should not compete with existing SNS, but co-exist and utilize their viral base.

Following trendsMessages become shorter, computers smaller and information more accessible. We don't only go with this flow, but consciously choose the direction to a more organic, self-disposing multimedia, free from the inertia of thinking and outmoded technical formalities. And we put 'appreciating the efforts' at the forefront, because it is the incentive driving the world of people highly engaged in social networking.

Why we believe this project is doomed to success?Why we believe this project is doomed to success?

Thank you for reading!Thank you for reading!

Contact me: christign@gmail.com, skype — adventurais (Kristina Ignatova)