Group Name:
Muze
Group Team Members:
Jeffrey Pak, Michelle Hwang, Anuvind Menon, Sherry Xu, Dheera Prabhakar
Idea Generation:
OrderQueue: a restaurant efficiency app for restaurants to optimize communication between the restaurant front and back kitchen to avoid losing orders or accidentally duplicating orders
Running Buddy: an app for adventurous runners who get bored running the same trails every time, giving users a random trail or running loop based off of the current location
Workout Guru: for the health conscious athletes and bodybuilders who need to stick to a mandated workout per day of the week, this app shows the sets needed per workout on the watch, swipeable as one completes them
TrainMe: for the lazy couchsurfer who needs to get back into shape, this app detects the exercises users make at the gym, detecting motions for bicep curls, squats as well as running and cycling. This app will make sure that one does not cheat when trying to get back into shape.
Nocturnal Eats: Reminders of when to eat and specified foods for night shift workers who have wonky daily habits who wish to maintain healthy eating periods
Muze: For the car commuter who can’t get “shazam” or “soundhound” on their mobile phone while listening to the radio, this app detects the current song playing in the background and displays it below their clock on their watch.
ShopTrack: For the busy shop owners who needs to keep track of their dwindling inventory, this app keeps track of all the items in their inventory, decrementing each purchase and notifying the shop owner when specified products run low for restocking
JamTracks: Displays the top tracks scraped from websites such as HypeMachine and last.fm and plays automatically compiles playlists with them in the music app connected to your phone
FlashQuiz: An app for high school students studying the SAT’s or classes who want to study on the go.
VolunteerMe: An app for organizing volunteer events with stations. This app helps connect volunteers and event organizers to send people where they’re needed, alert them for breaks, and send out important information in real time.
RoadTripz - A mode on your smartwatch that not only helps you navigate, but also alerts you of nearby amenities that might be needed (i.e. gas, food, rest stop) as well as nearby sites on your road trip, geared towards families.
CrowdVote: Town assemblies can use the watch as an impromptu voting new system for a variety of tasks. Say how they stand on a proposition or piece of legislation.
TourGuide: A tourist goes to a new location they can use this app to display the latest attractions and monuments near them.
Distributed Chess: Say a group of adult partygoers wants to organize a game of chess. They can use this app to create a chess game where each person is a chess piece and the watch can display the state of a given piece and the possible actions it can take.
Proxy AdService: Shop owners can set particular advertisements and discounts for products in their store, when a customer walks near that particular product they receive that advertisement on their watch. Utilizes BLE beacons.
Cheapery: A shopper enters a location and this app displays all the deals and discounts for stores near this location.
ShopMap: A mall shopper wants to find a particular shop they open their smartwatch app and we plot a general route to the store from their position, using info from BLE beacons.
Language Translate: Tourists can use this application to communicate with locals in the country they are visiting. They speak into the watch and it displays the sentence translated from their language to the local lingua franca.
HomeBot: A homeowner uses their smartwatch to trigger appliances, lights and air conditioning around their house providing a central location for automation.
MedSchedule: Seniors are able to see what medications they need to take today, at what time, and the dosage information. Displayed on their smartwatch app.
DriveMe: Busy citygoers can locate the nearest taxi using GPS and signal it to come to them. The estimated time of arrival is displayed on the watch.
Game Hub: Waiting in line? Can’t play Candy Crush Saga? Play games like Snake, pinball, pong, and space invaders on your watch!
Bible Daily: Christians set daily verse notifications that show up on their home screen from a reading plan they choose.
Grocer-me: Grocery shoppers can find cheap foods, freshly stocked produce, and grocery recommendations. They can also store grocery lists that they can check off.
Trackster: People who forget things easily can use BLE beacons to detect whether your laptop, keys, wallet, and more are out of range. If they’re out of range, the watch will buzz you.
You’ve got mail: This app buzzes someone expecting to receive mail when it arrives at their place. Allows people working away from home to digitally sign packages as well as know if a package should be at their place.
Grub: Skeptical eaters who are trying out a new restaurant can use this app to find out the best/worst dishes served at the restaurant right now. Users can view the live-feed on their smartwatch coming in from other customers at the restaurants about information regarding good/bad food or service.
PassMeet: High school students are notified when a friend is in close proximity. Great for lunch breaks, going to the mall, and random outings!
Bus Me: Waiting for your food at a crowded restaurant? Get notified when your food’s ready with a buzz on your watch.
Hikr: Hikers who want to try new trails can use this app to guide them appropriately. Notifies time, location, and danger zones.
Scavenger Hunt: Parents want to hold a scavenger hunt for children in a given location. They can place BLE beacons around the area and when a child gets near a beacon they get a message on their watch saying they located an item.
Metronome: Musicians can use this app to keep tempo with their piece. Instead of ticking it vibrates at regular intervals.
Habit Maker: Smokers who want to quit can use this app which buzzes during their smoke breaks to remind to stop smoking a pursue a separate habit.
Sleep Pulse Detector: Allows hospital patients to see when they should be asleep/wake up, detects pulse automatically to determine if a patient is getting enough rest, vibrates wrist to wake user up at appropriate times.
Resume Drop: Recruiters at career fairs can pass their contact information to attendees/job hunters (or the other way around) using their smartwatch and NFC.
Life Alert: The elderly can use this watch app to automatically contact 911. It sends your GPS coordinates and establish a call with them upon a verbal command or the push of a button.
Newsflash!: For concerned commuters can be used to read news highlights from your favorite news station through a ticker that automatically pops up on the home screen.
Attendance Tracker: Schools and universities can track class attendance using this app. For a given event the students can input a special code on their watch as well as send their gps coordinates to signal that they are attending it.
Glow: For young singles the smartwatch app glows different colors based on the proximity of a person to matching profiles in their area.
FreeFoodFinder: People with heavy schedules with no time to cook or pick-up lunch from restaurants can use this app to find free food within a 2 mile range on their smart watches. People who cook often and have a lot leftovers can use this app on their mobile to give away excess food.
ChildTrackr: Parents can use this smartwatch app to be notified with a beep when their kids are not in the vicinity/range. Kids’ smart watches are constantly tracked and their proximity from the parent is reported back to them via bluetooth.
VisitLater: VisitLater is a smartwatch app for bookmarking locations. Forest rangers, botanists, geologists or hikers can use this app to drop a pin on places/spots of interest (maybe a national park?) and store the location on their smartphones datewise. They can use this app to retrieve all the locations and revisit the places using GPS.
EmergencyLight: Watch backlight flashes different patterns based on the situation. This includes a strobe feature and a SOS feature that can be activated with the tap of a button for self defense and help. This would help people who need to walk home later in the evening like late shift workers who are at risk for crime.
eBayTime: Allows users to see their current bids or bids that they are watching and approximately how long until the auction expires, current bid, and other information. Good for the consumers involved in the buy and sell community.
AnimalCall: Turn on the application in a forest and let it pick up different animal sounds, it will analyze the sound and determine what species of animal it belongs to. Great for zoologists and outdoor enthusiasts.
MonitorMe: Allows you to remotely check the temperature/humidity of your pet's enclosure - different pets have specific environmental needs. This device will pull from a thermometer with a probe inside of your pet’s enclosure. Useful for pet store owners, pet owners, and aquarium enthusiasts.
CheaPetrol: Crowdsourced app that shows you gas stations with the cheapest gas prices for the day in the neighborhood on your smartwatch. Great for people who drive to work everyday, to find cheap gas stations as they drive on their watch.
ChargeIncharge: Heavy users of smartphones who commute a lot run out of charge soon and don't have access to a charger can use this app to notify a colleague/family about their whereabouts through their smartwatch. The app detects low charge on the phone and notifies the user on the watch. The user can send a message/notification to a preset contact with the press of a button on the watch.
WhatNext: It’s a simple to-do list app that flashes reminders of incomplete tasks on the smartwatch. Useful for busy people who would like to be reminded of tasks like paying credit card bills on time, picking up weekly groceries, washing the car, watering plants etc.
QRMe: Shoppers can open an account with a retail store using their custom QR code during checkout. The QR code (containing the user name, phone number and emailid) can be scanned with a QR code scanner and the store can fetch customer information instantly saving a lot of paper and time.
Idea Selection
From our list of 50 ideas, we started by each voting on 5 ideas. From the top votes, we each chose to sketch 1-3 ideas of our favorites. Following our sketches, we had a better idea of how the app would look, which allowed us each to choose our favorite idea. Each of us gave a 2 minute pitch of our favorite idea to one another, to which we each followed up by summarizing the project description as a group. This allowed us to quickly summarize each part verifying that our selected apps would answer our questions regarding target users, problem description, why mobile/watch, and its novelty and creativity. This was really great as we got a general sense of the shape of our ideas and could quickly ascertain the validity of each one. After discussing several pro’s and cons, we officially narrowed down our ideas to 5: Grub, Pill-lan-der, FlashQuiz, Muze, and Proxy AdService. We posted these on a poll within our Facebook group and had everyone vote for one idea besides their own.
Project Description
Target User Group:
Commuters who commute via car. Though this app could be used by anyone, we felt that this was most useful for commuters who may be listening to the radio who are unable to pull out their phones. Mobile phones cause nearly 25% of all car accidents and this would be an opportunity to reduce that distraction.
Problem Description & Context
Mobile phone distractions may come from several venues, from texting to checking email, or looking up a contact to call. Another distraction includes pulling up Shazam or Soundhound to detect a song on the radio. Many people listen to music on the radio during their commutes and use these apps to identify the songs they hear. However, we found that the Shazam app takes about 5 seconds to load (travelling at 55mph, this ends up being about the length of a football field) as well as a second to tap the “Shazam” button, followed by another 15-30 seconds where the song is looked up in the database before showing up on the mobile screen. During this time, the driver is distracted as his or her eyes are flickering to check the status, which can be dangerous if not fatal.
By allowing a user to turn on the “Muze” smartwatch app, they will have the ability to save and identify a song just with a tap on their watch. If they are at a stop or in traffic, they’ll be able to glance at their watch and see the song and artist on a ticker at the bottom of their watch display. Commuters will no longer need to pull out their phones, and they’ll also not need to look at their watch as a simple tap will be able to save the song for later. Once they are out of the car and no longer busy, they’ll be able to open up the app on their phone and look at the songs they’ve saved or all the songs that were played while the app was on.
Why is a mobile app a good solution for the problem?
Commuters have limited to no access to a computer while driving, so a mobile app is ideal for identifying music on the go. A mobile app grants the portability necessary to identify songs for an otherwise impossible task. A mobile app also offers a flexible solution that allows commuters to store and save songs that they wouldn’t have the time to write on their own.
Why is a smartwatch a good solution for the problem?
A smartwatch is a good solution for the problem because it’s both safer and more convenient to use compared to a mobile phone. The driver only needs to lift one hand from the wheel to tap the watch and save the song. This entire interaction will ideally take less than a second as opposed to the near minute it takes with a mobile phone app. The interaction also allows commuters to keep their eyes on the road at all times, since they’ll always know where their watch is.
Storyboards For App Ideas:
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