Change of Usage means Changing Interfaces

The internet has become mainstream and today it is used for most different purposes. An interesting case is the change to use the internet for recreation. This might result in new requirements for the user interface, where people can relax or at least browse easier and do so without a lot of clicks. This is not necessarily opposite to the key gains of interactive media, this just might be a step beyond in some way.

Whereas already observed earlier a new search engine gave me reason to write about this trend. This is Oamos calling themselve an inspiration engine, something that usually might be described by information discovery or discovery engine. When searching at Oamos results are coming in by something like flying windows. The whole process is accompanied by audio. It is a meta search engine, which enables to narrow results by something like a tuner. Adjustment to the results may vary from facts to entertainment. There are a couple of advanced search options and the durance of incoming results might be varied. It is limited to 3 minutes at the homepage and up to 20 minutes by using an account. There are personalization functions, widgets and licensing for professional use.

Video seems to be the ideal content for such interfaces. Chime.tv and iDesktop.tv are examples for video discovery. Something that is part of the Flock Browser, too. Chime.tv may become described as something like a personal video discovery board. It is a video search engine with personalization functions and social networking tools. iDesktop.tv has a search function, does show featured videos and enables to connect to friends and to handle videos by an account.

A completely different purpose has jaanix. It is a news aggregator using a tuner to narrow relevant stories.