{"id":7620,"date":"2019-01-21T09:36:32","date_gmt":"2019-01-21T15:36:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/?p=7620"},"modified":"2019-01-21T09:38:31","modified_gmt":"2019-01-21T15:38:31","slug":"the-australian-open-app","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/?p=7620","title":{"rendered":"The Australian Open “App”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once a tennis parent, always a tennis parent.<\/p>\n

We’ve enjoyed watching bits and pieces of the Australian Open Professional Tennis Tournament (1).<\/p>\n

As ever, in 2019, watching the event via the ESPN+ app and\/or Directv App is easy, particularly when complemented by tournament app updates and of course ongoing Twitter commentary.<\/p>\n

However, I have been greatly disappointed in the Australian Open’s App. They have essentially stuck their website inside an “app”, with all of the challenges that entails.<\/p>\n

I am further amazed that this course was chosen given the budget and profile that the Open enjoys.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

“This website uses cookies to enhance…”<\/p>\n

One can draw a number of conclusions from this non-effort:<\/p>\n

A. Elegance and a great user experience don’t matter. <\/p>\n

B. Only a small percentage of users care; see “A”.<\/p>\n

C. Website (cookie) data collection is so pervasive that we are willing to sacrifice an elegant experience for advertising and profiling (therefore monetary) reasons.<\/p>\n

D. Top management is unaware.<\/p>\n

E. Elegant and fast iOS app development is too expensive for this event.<\/p>\n

F. The Open has sold digital experience rights to a 3rd party who monetizes in other ways and therefore does not value a great user experience.<\/p>\n

G. ?<\/p>\n

(1) Navigating the live video rights is a hassle. Some events are widely available in the United States, others difficult if not impossible to find. I tapped to view the Kerber vs Collins match and received this message: <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

We have tried to do better with amuz on iOS and Android (amuzapp.com<\/a>). There are some bugs, but it is generally elegant, easy and fast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once a tennis parent, always a tennis parent. We’ve enjoyed watching bits and pieces of the Australian Open Professional Tennis Tournament (1). As ever, in 2019, watching the event via the ESPN+ app and\/or Directv App is easy, particularly when complemented by tournament app updates and of course ongoing Twitter commentary. However, I have been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7620"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7620"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7620\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7623,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7620\/revisions\/7623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.zmetro.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}