Andrew Powell

Every once in a while, something happens that, for better or worse, changes your perspective on some preconceived notion that you once held. It is something so profound and momentous that it shakes you to your very core. Other events in your life can be traced back, like touchpoints, to these events, so important that you never forget when and where you were when they happen. These moments can range from something globally significant, like the Berlin Wall coming down, to something intensely personal as your child being born. Irrevocably you are changed and your preconceived notions are nothing if not shattered.

These moments are professional as well as personal. You may well remember the first time the light shined on you when you realized how much you could do with your favorite programming language, or had that first professional breakthrough moment and realized what you wanted to do with your career. The first such of these moments for me was when I was in school and realized that I could create something with a computer just by writing some code and running it. It wasn't something tangible like a vase or carving, but it was my expression of creativity. It came from my head and I was able to express in a way that I could relate to others. It sparked a passion for me to create something that only existed in my mind on the computer. With just a few lines of code, I could solve problems, transform data into real and meaningful information, and really feel like I was being challenged every day. I had a passion for the technology and what could be done with it.

Over the years, the fire inside me has been reignited with things like Java, ColdFusion, and Flex. I still have a passion for the technologies, but I have come to see that as intense and passionate as I have been about the technology, I had lost sight of the overall story I was trying to tell. I had lost a compelling way to express the passion that I had burning within myself.

A few conversations with colleagues over the past few days have illuminated the need and requirements for telling a great story with the applications we build. It has been a few days that have, to say the least, become another touchpoint.

Most of us have been focused on delivering high-end technology centric solutions. We are able to use the great techologies available to us to build the next generation of high-end rich internet applications. However though, there is a question we need to ask ourselves: Are we helping the users for whom we are building these applications tell their story in a compelling way, or are we just focusing on the technology?

I used to regard the "user experience" aspect of application development as just the graphic design. I was looking at the phrase itself. User experience is all about enabling someone to tell their story in a compelling way. It can range from simple print and digital design to application development, with the user experience at the epicenter, to industrial design (there's a reason we love the iPod). Regardless of the medium, a good UX helps us tell the compelling stories. If you do it right, you don't get mindshare, you get evoke an emotional response and you pass your passion through to the end user.

There are applications developed that are some of the most basic and rudimentary technology, relatively speaking, but they provide the user with an emotional, psychological connection that keeps them coming back for more. Take Twitter as an example. Twitter is far from the sexiest technology out there, but despite numerous fail whales, we keep coming back to it. Why? We want to know what the people we're following are doing. We want that connection with others that applications like Twitter readily provide. It may not be a great technological application, but Twitter is a great user experience.

My colleague Christian Saylor has published a document that discusses the marriage of a great brand experience and the latest cutting edge technologies. He contends that a great user experience is "a thoughtful relationship between art and science". This document is a great starting point for those who want to explore and start to get involved with the next generation of user experiences. (Read The Document Here)

I have come to realize that going forward from this day, we will not be building applications that are solely based on high-end technology. We will have to be focused on the total package. Our applications will define brands and fight for more than mindshare. We are developing applications that are contending for valuable time within our users' lives. Only by developing applications with a purpose and a total brand experience will we be able to deliver the true next generation of RIAs.