Starting from the assumption that “Venice is a fish” (look at the italian noveler Tiziano Scarpa), we developed a system metaphor that could have fit well with Venice, the focus of our location. So, we opted to develop the fishing metaphor through out all the system. We finally decided to adopt this metaphor, among other, because it fits the system in many aspects. First of all, it sounds like an echo of the city. Secondly, it was interesting and challenging to give a playful meaning to something which is usually considered a bit blunt.
As we developed the metaphor we wanted an engaging way to play with the phone, trying to push the boundaries of mobile technology. Therefore, the way of interacting with the phone was an experimenting field for us: our aim was to play with technology and then let people get away from it.
The user has to cross other “Piscatores” at least once to see them on the running application. If they are available they are represented by yellow fishes (ex erasmus students are the red ones). The grey fishes are the unavailable (out of range or off line) people. Each fish has a coat: the dots represent an amount of times a user crossed by that fish, the stripes show how many contacts she or he has: the more the contacts, the bigger the stripes. These features are meant to be not logically related with a real element, because of two reasons.
The first one deals with unprediction: it seemed more interesting if not every single element was explicit. That gives the system a more human behaving, and seemed to us more charming to the users.
The second reason deals with our attitude towards our possible users. We wanted to inform them but we espect a bit of curosity from them. Moreover, even if theese kind of information could be interesting, they are not the core one, so it seemed nicer not to give them great relevance.
Other relevant elements within the metaphor are the dock, wich is our menu, and refers to the phisical dock, the spots, which are the zones of the city where an increasing amount of people are probably going to be in a few time (based on GPS statistics); and the acquarium, wich corresponds to the contacts of people the user has already met. Finally, as you have seen, all the icons are related to the fishing enviroment, in a playful and charming way.
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