Outfielders
BACKGROUND Live sporting events bring thousands of people together, which presents an ideal opportunity to discover ways that social computing could enhance the community experience. Sports fans already typically engage in natural cheering, heckling, and betting. I wanted to build upon these natural social behaviors and foster it further by creating a shared platform that encourages more interactions. From super fans to newcomers, I wanted to create a platform where all fans, regardless of age, experience, or loyalties, could engage in friendly competition and create new social connections.
“Social connection can be built through shared values and common ethos, and is rarely more prevalent than in the world of sport where emotive connections are the driving force for interactions, consumption and sharing. Sport provides something to talk about and brag about and for those who attend or watch on TV, sport provides an opportunity to bond over shared experiences.”
— Whitestone International
TIMELINE12 weeks
AREAUI/UX Design
User Research
Mobile UI
Project Goals
OBJECTIVE #1Build a social computing platform that is both co-located and synchronous
Create a space that
fosters social interactions between users with
no barriers to entryFocus on ways to
engage all fans during live sporting events, ranging
from newcomers to experts
1. Understanding the problem
1.1 Field Research
Hands-on involvement was crucial when researching an app that relies on in-person atmosphere and engagement, so we began our field research at actual baseball games, observing the behaviors and patterns of the typical sporting event fan. Surprisingly, I found that the variety of attendees at the games was exceedingly diverse— ranging between die-hard fans, students, friends, family members, newcomers, and season ticket holders.
INSIGHT #1The density of the crowd and layout of the stadium play a significant role in fostering heightened social interactions.Fans seated in the outfield were far from the main action at home plate unless a ball was hit towards them, in which case they readily interacted with each other and sometimes with the player near them. Fans near the home plate were much closer to the action and tended to have higher degrees of interaction with their neighbors as well as the nearby players.
INSIGHT #2Most fans enjoy engaging with the game.The majority of people at the game engaged in cheering, yelling out outcomes, rooting for homeruns, heckling the other team, and discussing their predictions with their neighbors.
INSIGHT #3A smaller subset of fans are typically less engaged.Some fans seem intimidated by louder fans, or disturbed by passionate heckling, yelling, and game-related trash-talking.
INSIGHT #1Most sports fantasy apps are reliant on gambling with real money.
This excludes a large section of underage fans, due to online gambling laws.
Competitors tend to cater to a more experienced audience.
These platforms require users to be well-versed in the gameplay to take part, which scares off newbies, young people, and those who are simply casually interested.
INSIGHT #3
None of the competitors created a co-located and synchronous experience.
While they ranged from being fantasy sports to real live sports commentaries, none of them were a social computing experience in real time, at the game.
2. Specifying user needs
2.1 User Interviews
I interviewed around 30 students to gain a basic understanding of our provisional persona. I focused on asking questions about their game viewing experiences, their skill levels, and their frustrations or struggles with the activity.
INSIGHTUsers enjoy going to games with their friends to have fun, and don’t like the intense yelling or trash-talking parts
INSIGHTUsers often feel bored or disengaged during the multitude of pauses and breaks in action that occur during a game of baseball, and tend to go on their phones during this break
INSIGHTUsers like the competitive aspects of rooting for their teams, and love being right in their predictions
NEEDUsers need a way to have the fun and lighthearted social interactions without having to deal with the loud and unpleasant ones
NEEDUsers need an easy and accessible way to stay engaged in the game play, and continue thinking about the game even during the pauses and passive periods
NEEDUsers need an outlet for friendly competition, with real stakes and incentives to keep it equivalently engaging while also motivating hecklers to participate civilly
3. Designing solutions
Since this project was more a conceptual exercise on social computing, I ended with mid-fidelity prototypes. In the future, I'd love to see how these can be translated into different sporting experiences.
4. Conclusions
Social interactions are a core part of our daily life, and translating that into a digital environment in a way that amplified those connections was an interesting challenge. Iterating through versions in a real world setting and getting valuable feedback helped me visualize how novel connections can be created through a well-designed co-located app.