A question that I have considered for our plugin for itunes is “will nonusers of Pandora be able to easily use this plugin?” Our initial research showed that people that have not used Pandora had some trouble getting started to the point where they can turn on the music they want to hear and let it run. What I want to know is if users can find iPandora and start quickly.
Our group had several people partake in our paper prototyping some of which had never used Pandora before. To begin, the subjects had a hard time starting the task which was to create a station. Our prototype had a large ‘P’ at the top for Pandora which if the users had not used Pandora before, they might not know what it does. Another problem was the sidebar. Users saw the drop-down arrow which did not bring down any stations since this was the initial setup. Also, the add playlist button at the bottom of the itunes window was thought to be a possible station creator.
Looking back, I realize that once the user knows where to start to create a station, it was smooth sailing from there besides a few word changes. Some how we need to create an obvious way to start iPandora and eliminate confusion. Another thing to think about is that when a user sees the sidebar, their mindset is in that of a playlist and not a station.
