Voice

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Voice: Blockchain Social Media

During my time at Block.one, not only did I grow the Product Design team in size and recognition within the company, but I lead the initiative of buidling a social media application on the blockchain. At it's inception, Voice was born to be a different take on social media - free of bots and full of real, authentic content. All of this packaged on the blockchain, substantiating new and unique revenue streams for content creators and viewers.

While the revenue model of how users and creators could generate income on Voice changed each week during development, the heart of Voice never did. My team and I dug deeply into where social media has struggled to protect it's community - and researched how social communities could be incentivied to interact constructively, even exhausting how content could be moderated by the community itself.

Voice wasn't just another typical social media platform either. It needed to standout and celebrate it's content as the hero. Again, the content itself shapeshifted throughout the creation and development of Voice. Ultimately we decided to empower users to share content they wanted - whether it was a shorter, more succinct thought or a long-form article. The App also needed to provide ways for users to appreciate content, participate in lively discussions and create content easily - especially in a mobile experience.

My Role: Design Manager + Lead, UX Design, IA Architect, Art Direction, Usability Expert

The feed on Voice

The feed

The feed of Voice attempted to stay bright and modern, letting the content shine uncompetitively with the app itself. As a more stripped down MVP experience, users could still easily jump into several categories of content, later to be replaced by a robust search. Users also had quick highlights of article-performance and opportunities to participate in "Voice it" - our in-app incentivization model.

From here the user had quick access to their rewards wallet, notifications and search. Most importantly, a create content ability was sticky and prominent while scrolling across the feed with an easy tap of the thumb.

Voice it - the incentivization model in Voice

The incentive

The Voice It game was both an appreciative model for readers to acknowledge certain articles and also a fun layer of competition around active content and comments.

As another aspect of Voice that morphed regularly, the goal of this game ultimately was to foster engagement around content and spur an in-game economy for Blockchain savvy users.

Collecting rewards within Voice

Collecting rewards

With an active rewards system based on activity and engagement, users could easily find their pending balance from nearly anywhere within the app.

Creating content in Voice

Creating content

Creating content within Voice had to be powerful yet simple. I lead the team into deep investigations around what makes a content creation experience feeling easy on mobile.

We landed on a content-focused experience, where elements and tools exposed themselves at the time of need, in a natural, organic feeling flow.

Voice profile

The profile

Whether keeping up with your own activity and history or connecting with others, the profile within Voice needed to highlight authentic individuals and offer straightforward ways to find and "listen" to your friends.

Notification system in Voice

Notifications

Software should always be teaching and educating it's users, and Voice was no exception. We created a notification system that would alert users of activity related to them and keep them engaged with the platform.

Sign up and Identity in Voice

Identity

Perhaps one of the most important facets of Voice was identity. To live up to it's claim as an authentic place for social media, Voice needed to vet its users through a somewhat laborious onboarding process.

Desptie the security layer of Voice, we still worked extensively to keep sign-up and onboarding feeling as simple as possible.

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