Earth Secrets: FAQ and Rules
Posted on 09. Apr, 2009 by Dominique Leca in Visuamobile Blog
We just added a new section to the Earth Secret page on the site. You can now have a look at the Earth Secret FAQ and Rules right here or by clicking the image below.
Don’t hesitate to send us your questions and comments at support@visuamobile.com.
The making of Earth Secrets
Posted on 06. Apr, 2009 by Dominique Leca in Visuamobile Blog
How an iPhone app is born? And how is it made ?
A PostSecret/Ocarina Mash-Up
I always have been a fan of PostSecret.com. And obviously, not the only one. 228,084,571 people have visited the blog and more than 30K follows PS on Twitter since it has been recently added. What really amazed me with PostSecret was that it was the first time a website felt so ‘human’.
And recently, I was also fascinated by the Ocarina app from Smule. Not because you can play music with it, but because of the globe. Because of the idea the world could so easily gather on a phone screen.
That’s how the idea of Earth Secret was born.
Earth
The 3D globe was done first. I wanted it to be brighter than the exising ones. Once it was done, we fine-tunned all the globe prameters: zoom factor, inertia, deceleration, axis and background.
UI
After this OpenGL ES globe interlude, we designed the UI (back to Objective-C). We wanted it to be ‘dead simple’, letting a maximum space to the globe and the secrets. We tried to get nice and bright colors but also avoid any childish stuff as I wanted the app to feel serious.
Animations
Then, we had to decide how to animate the secret, how it would pop-up on the screen. It was a difficult choice as it had to be ‘un-computerish’ and smooth. We finally settled on an animation that is the exact opposite the way your secret flies to your GPS location on Earth when you post one.
The Rules
Finally, we had to set the rules. Obviously, the secrets had to be moderated. It was suggested it could be nice to answer other people secrets or rate them. I felt like secrets didn’t need any answers and that rating was way out of line. So, we created the ‘Hugs’ to allow users to communicate their sympathy and keep track of their favorite secrets.
After many tests and some corrections required by Apple, the app was posted and released on the AppStore. It is available here for free.
This blog is meant for you to point out what could be improved, so don’t hesitate to comment.
A community is born: Earth Secrets
Posted on 03. Apr, 2009 by Dominique Leca in Visuamobile Blog
Earth Secrets has been launched on April, the 1st and more than a 1,800 secrets have already been posted generating more than 150, 000 views.
Sam Gwilym at Apple Insider has just reviewed the app, you can see his post here: ‘Earth Secrets reveals the dark side of iPhone users’.
The community is growing and we are happy to see that most people are posting really touching secrets.
Don’t forget that you can browse the 3D globe with your finger to see the secrets in the area you are interested in (instead of pressing the ‘Next’ button). You can also have a look at your personal stats in the ‘i’ section of the app and see the most read and most hugged secrets.Most importantly, don’t forget to ‘Hug’ other people secrets when you like it and spread the love.
As one of our user said it ‘All those views and so few hugs…send some good Karma, please!‘
*Most hugged secret so far : ‘Hug me. Just do it. Please‘
PS: The ‘I am Batman‘ secret was really funny. Thanks to whoever posted it, it made our day.
Get Earth Secrets on the AppStore while it is still free