Project Overview
Sometimes, reading about something that just happened is not enough. You need to see it to believe and be able to share that information with others, engaging in a wider conversation to validate and process what’s happening around you.
The ABC iPad app does all that, providing up to the minute information that you can read, listen to and watch while stories unfold - or a little after that, via catch up services. It encourages users to engage in conversation with others, sharing what they’ve learnt via social networks and email.
Accumulated downloads to date: 315,000+
Organisation
Team
ABC:
Abigail E Thomas
David Noney
Gabrielle Banks
Gabrielle Shaw
Hamish Dobbs
Justin Sinclair
Manuela Davidson
Matt Eckhaus
Sarah Fawcett
Trevor Gillespie
Warren Armstrong
MOBILE EXPERIENCE:
Oliver Weidlich
Rod Farmer
2ERGO:
Adam Ward
Amit Vaghela
Ranjeet Elkunchwar
Richard Mcilvenna
Project Brief
The ABC’s a trusted and innovative media organisation, enriching the lives of all Australians and presenting Australian perspectives to the world.
Our brief was to create an ABC experience that was unique to iPad users and as rich, compelling and relevant to as we can be. Apple was yet to release its new mobile device in Australia and we were already planning interactions for multi-touch and multiple orientations in a brand new size.
Major risks for the project involved the need to offer a first class application, which had to be developed in a very limited time and using technology that no one in the project team had ever experienced before.
The original proposal was to merge services from the ABC mobile site (http://m.abc.net.au) and the ABC iPhone app, upgrading quality on existent video services, without interfering with ABC Commercial’s content licensing activities and still remaining relevant to our users.
The ABC iPad app was not the first Austrlaian app to hit the Australian iTunes App Store but it was certainly the most ambitious information service launched at the time.
With this app, the ABC secured a position of leadership in the Australian mobile market, offering premium content at no charge to its audiences. In addition, the national public broadcaster has provoked the competition to do more for mobile audiences in Australia, helping to shape the industry landscape in the country.
Project Innovation / Need
The ABC was the first broadcaster in Australia to simulcast live television (ABC News 24) on TVs and mobile devices. One year later, the ABC iPhone and iPad apps are still the only in their genre delivering this sort of service to Australian audiences 24/7.
While other broadcasters are now beginning to release similar apps, most are still focused on catch up and none seem to have the comprehensive rights ensured by the ABC to stream live television 24/7 on mobile devices.
In addition, users of this app can listen to 7 live radio stations (this number will grow to 26 on the upcoming release of the app) and catch up with a number of radio and TV podcasts, while reading the latest stories from ABC News, movie reviews from At The Movies and Movietime and music reviews from triple j and ABC Dig Music.
You don’t see many multipurpose apps like that in any of the Australian app stores.
User Experience
The iPad offered a whole new frontier of interactive elements and challenged all we knew about user experience, presenting us with new opportunities and guidelines to inform our steps.
ABC Innovation worked in close collaboration with Mobile Experience to understand how to best approach content and UX strategies on the development of the ABC iPad app.
Most of our initial design decisions were based on assumptions that couldn’t be tested until we had a couple of devices in hands - half way through the project (and were adjusted after that).
We used prototypes and foam replicas to understand how audiences would be interacting with the device at hands and in different scenarios: leaning forward to read, leaning backwards to watch a TV show, leaving it somewhere near to listen to radio... This helped inform some of the gestural interface decisions that reflected on design, such as the use of filmstrips on an article or player page or the different specs of images required for a landing page (i.e. News) and a player page (i.e. Good Game).
Through user testing we confirmed that our target audiences had a natural understanding of “swiping” to scroll through content and “tapping” to open items – perhaps because of the familiarity with other iOS devices such as iPhone and iPod Touch.
Project Marketing
The ABC launched the ABC iPad app under the existing ABC Mobile proposition, ‘Your ABC on the Move’, focussing on the ABC’s ability to deliver leading, independent Australian content to audiences when ever and where ever they want it.
The ABC used its existing television, radio and online platforms to tell audiences about the app via a series of engaging TV, radio and online cross promotions. The campaign was aimed at educating the audience on the fact that the free app was now available and was an easy and elegant way to keep up to date with news, information and entertainment from across the ABC.
These marketing and cross promotional opportunities were supported via a successful publicity campaign aimed at ensuring consumer and mainstream media coverage of the app. The ABC undertook a research and fact-finding mission to the US when the iPad was launched there, but before it was available in the Australian market. This enabled us to offer Australian journalists previews of the ABC app on and iPad before the actual device and the ABC app were released to the public. This created great enthusiasm for the forthcoming app and excellent media coverage.
News
This category recognises applications that broadcast or diffuse news and current affairs.
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