Over the Air

We are very pleased that design researcher and user experience design practitioner, Claire Rowland, will be part of our panel for Inspiration / Outspiration: where do ideas come from?

Claire is a Research/Service Design Lead at Fjord and a passionate advocate for user-centred design. She has an academic background in psychology and human-computer interaction and has worked in digital user experience research and interaction design since 1997, for companies such as Razorfish, Flow Interactive and the Press Association.

Her key interest is the role of qualitative research in innovation, to which end she has conducted hundreds of user research sessions, from ethnographic and contextual interviews to photo diary studies, participatory design and user experience/accessibility testing.

We are very pleased that Duncan Arbour will be part of our panel on the sources of innovation; Inspiration / Outspiration: where do ideas come from?

Currently senior consultant at eBusiness consultancy Blue Latitude, Duncan has spent the last decade working at agencies of various sizes on strategy projects spanning multiple sectors.

His present focus is in the global healthcare and pharmaceutical sector, with projects including the development of both patient and professional focused mobile applications.

His approach to design is shaped by past experience of all manner of methodologies ranging from the lithe and agile to the dragged-out and bloated; none of which have ever seemed to successfully guarantee real world success.

We are thrilled to announce that Vodafone is the Party Sponsor of Over the Air!

It is thanks to the financial support of our sponsors, that we are able to make this event completely free to attend.

Vodafone is accelerating the uptake of innovative web and mobile technologies on a mass-market scale through the Joint Innovation Lab. This is a collaboration between Vodafone, China Mobile, Softbank Japan and Verizon Wireless to make development and distribution of widgets quick and easy for up to 1 billion customers.

As a developer, you have easy access to the JIL SDK, emulator, getting started guide, complete API documentation, and more. Don’t forget to raise your questions to other developers, provide your help and expertise, even post your own guides at the JIL Community forums. Go to jil.org now!

We’re excited to announce that Caroline Lewko will deliver a keynote address at this year’s Over the Air!

Caroline has been in the wireless/ telecom industry since 1995, as a coder, funder, business developer and entrepreneur and is known as the ‘connector’. She is sought out by investors, executives and developers alike for insights, contacts and advice; and has advised and funded hundreds of companies. She was named one of the 2009 Top 10 Women in Wireless by Fierce Wireless.

She started WIP to make the path easier for mobile developers, reduce cycle times and increase innovation in the mobile ecosystem, through events like WIPJAM; Go to Market programs and resources like the WIPwiki. Caroline founded the Wireless Innovation Network of BC (WINBC ) in 2001, and Wavefront , a wireless development center, and is Past Chair of both organizations.

One of the key features of Over the Air is the in-event competition, which gives you a chance to show off the clever and fun ideas you’ve been coding and hacking away at over the course of the event.

To enter the competition, we’ll be setting up an online submission form that we’ll make available during the event. You can always check the Competition page on the blog to find out the latest details. There are no limits to how many times you can enter, nor on the size of the team that you enter with. The application, widget, web app, or service idea that you submit doesn’t have to be ‘complete’ but does need to be presentable to the audience in a way that makes it clear how it works.

If you’ve got an idea you’d like to work on, but want to find a few people to work on it with you, just join the conversation on the BackNetwork forums.

The Sponsored Categories for this year’s competition are:
# OMTP – Best BONDI Widget
# Deutsche Telekom – Best BONDIPIM based Widget
# LiMo Foundation – Best user experience on BONDI widget

# Lonely Planet – Best Lonely Planet Hack

# BBC – Best Dr Who Hack
# BBC – Best Top Gear Hack
# BBC – Best bbc.com Hack
# Yahoo – Best use of Yahoo APIs

The General Categories are:
# Best User Experience / Service Design
# Best Visual Design
# Best Use of WebApp / Widget technology (any platform)
# Best Location Aware App / Service
# Best Use of Wireless, Bluetooth, or RFID
# Best Hardware Hack
# Best of Show (Selected by the Judges Panel)
# Audience Favorite (Selected by all attendees)

We may be adding more general competition categories as we get closer to the event – so keep your eyes peeled!

We’ve posted a draft version of the event schedule! Some elements of the schedule are still subject to change but this will give you a good idea of what the two days will be like. Wondering what all these sessions are about? We’ll be filling in the gaps with session detail pages over the coming days so keep coming back for updates.

We are very pleased to have Ben Reason of live|work presenting an Introduction to Service Design, as well as moderating our panel on Service Design in Mobile.

Ben is a co-founder of live|work and over the past eight years has directed his passion for social impact projects into delivering successful change for the public sector.

Ben graduated from Liverpool John Moores University in 1994 with a BA in Fine Arts, following this in 2000 with an MSc in Responsibility and Business Practice from the University of Bath.

Ben has a background in design and innovation in network enabled services with Razorfish and Oyster partners working with Orange, Vodafone, Nokia, Sony, Experian and Oracle. He founded livework to create a dedicated service innovation company.

Ben works closely on Service Innovation for the NHS Innovation Institute, The Design Council and the Cabinet Office.

Ben has written articles for the NHS ‘In View’ magazine and has been featured in the Independent Herald Tribune. In 2009 he was voted one of the Top 20 most influential designers in IKON magazine.

Ben has provided strategic guidance and project delivery management on a range of high profile public sector projects for organisations such as BBC NHS, Home Office, Vodafone, Experian & RSA.

We are thrilled to announce that Microsoft is a Gold Sponsor of Over the Air!

It is thanks to the financial support of our sponsors, that we are able to make this event completely free to attend.

About the Microsoft Developer Network

The Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) is Microsoft’s central resource for developers, but with the launch of Windows phone we have a complimentary resource to help you use the development tools and technologies you are familiar with. Once you have your mobile application Windows® Marketplace for Mobile makes it easy to manage and distribute your applications, and will directly connect you with millions of Windows Mobile users worldwide.

http://developer.windowsmobile.com/

Name an example of service design in mobile… Did you think of Flirtomatic?

Mark Curtis, who will be part of the panel on Service Design in Mobile is CEO of Handmade Mobile, the company behind Flirtomatic. Mark was previously a partner at Fjord, inventing and building cross platform and mobile products for clients such as Nokia & Orange. Prior to that he was a global EVP for Razorfish responsible for 1500 staff. Together with a partner, he set up CHBi in 1994 to develop interactive technology solutions for marketing clients; by 1998 it was one of the top 3 new media agencies in London and was acquired by Razorfish.

He has a track record in media innovation (for clients such as Yell, RAC & Allied Domecq). Prior to becoming involved in digital media, Mark had set up Curtis Hoy, a successful media promotion company which spearheaded the use of radio for sales promotion in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s.

He is also the author of Distraction – Being Human in the Digital Age (Futuretext 2005). He likes cycling and mountains and wine and has five children.

We are very pleased to announce Nico Macdonald as the moderator on a panel on the sources of innovation; Inspiration / Outspiration: where do ideas come from?

Nico is a writer and consultant working around innovation, technology and design, with a focus on media. He writes for publications including BBC News Online, Guardian Technology, and The Register, and has written for most English language design publications. He is author of ‘What is Web Design?’. In 1996 he co-programmed the first UK conference on design and the Internet, and in 2000 founded the Experience Design London group, which informed the development of interaction design thinking and practice around the fixed and mobile Web. His work is documented at Nico Macdonald | Spy .