9A- Testing the hypothesis II

From my interviews, those who fell outside the boundary were those with a well-established presence on several social media websites and were not interested in moving to a brand new 'fad' website to rebuild their base. Others were afraid of a smaller community bringing tightly-knit cliques along with it, and had already gotten used to user-unfriendly DeviantArt and did not want to give up its varied selection. Getting stuck in one's ways was by far the biggest reason for lack of interest. Older artists who had already been in the community for a decade or so could feel themselves slowly phasing out, and were therefore not interested in the hustle and bustle of a new community.

Inside the Boundary	Outside the Boundary
Who is in:  Artists looking for one place to do their roleplaying, art-posting, and communicating with other artists.	Who is not: Older and/or well-established Artists
What the need is: One website for artists to keep track of everything related to their original characters, concepts, and collabs.	What the need is not: A place for artist cliques to dominate.
Why the need exists:  There is  no central place for all these things, so artists are forced to jump between 2-4 websites for all their socializing and art-posting needs.	Alternative explanations: Some people have simply become creatures of habit.

8A- Solving the Problem

Disclaimer: I've been set on this idea since assignment 4, so most of this is just a better-worded rehash. My solution is a service- a website.

Background Knowledge for Normies (you)
_______________________________________

Thousands of young artists around the world come together online and participate in role-playing and world development (think Dungeons and Dragons-style character creation, not the kinky stuff). For many, they've been involved in the community for years, and it's their primary hobby. Since it is more of a niche, there currently isn't a website that exists that explicitly provides roleplayers a place for them to both post art and communicate in an effective enough manner that doesn't send them running back to Twitter. Since an option like this does not currently exist, they resort to using more than one site, which contributes to my belief that there is a need for one website to rule them all.


The Service
_______________________________________

My solution to this issue- artists who put so much work into concept art and collaborative work but have no one place to really do so- is to simply make a proper website for artists to post their character, concept, and collaborative artwork. It will be modern and give users several customization options for their posts, allowing full HTML and CSS compatibility.

7A- Testing the hypothesis I

Hypothesis

Western digital artists do not have a preferable social media website to post and share their original character-related art online with other artists, due to outdated and fading websites monopolizing the demographic and promised alternatives failing as a result of unrelated issues (financial reasons, poor management).

This need is basically only possessed by digital artists who create original content related to character design, world-building, and other concept art, ESPECIALLY if this work is collaborative with others.

Many social media websites such as Tumblr and Twitter are useful for an artist via gaining an audience for advertising and networking. However, they are both poor for keeping track of the flow of art and information between groups of artists in one centralized place. Neither of these websites are ideal for posting art in the first place, either, and challenge artists with quality restrictions.

On the primary art-sharing website, DeviantArt, art can easily be shared, though the community has been in decline of both quantity and quality. Groups also exist for different users to add and share their art to, which works fine, but communication methods are outdated and faulty. As a result, artists turn to other social media to communicate with, such as Twitter and Discord. 

Basically, those who work on collaborative storytelling and world-building need something more to help them communicate their ideas in the same place where they share high-quality art. 

For some, the hierarchy of needs between an up-to-date website, a quality place to post art, and a solid social media can vary. My goal is to just make a modern, attractive website with a solid organization and chat function for artists.

________________________________________________

Post-interviews

After interviewing some artists online who partake in collaborative storytelling, I have gathered that most are concerned with a modern website and a place where they can both communicate efficiently and post art in, though there was clear emphasis on the communication and modern aspects. In the past, potential websites just like this that have popped up had hundreds of people flock and move almost immediately, even while still in beta testing. It gives me confidence that there is a definite audience for my idea.

5A- Identifying Local Opportunities

1. PUTNAM WRONGLY CLAIMS TEST DISCUSSION IS ILLEGAL
• http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/166FFAAC14BB8A78?p=WORLDNEWS
• Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam got in trouble for his son telling him about his FSA test.
• People are confused and upset about whether it is illegal for students to disclose how their FSA testing went to their parents
• The people who have this issue are parents with school-age children.
2. 4 LARGO WORKERS LOSE JOBS OVER IRMA
• http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/16714C16668A8FD8?p=WORLDNEWS
• Longtime employees don't report to work due to Hurricane Irma and lose their jobs.
• Is it right to fire people for missing work in order to prepare and be at home with their families for Hurricane Irma?
• All workers in the community.
3. LOBBYING ORDINANCE GETS NO HEARING DUE TO LACK OF SUPPORT
• http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/16715E2109FF5B50?p=WORLDNEWS
• An ordinance for the identities of people who lobby to county officials to be public was rejected.
• Was this the right thing to happen? Would passing it be an invasion of privacy?
•  Lobby-ers
4. STUDENTS TAKE UP CROWDFUNDING
• http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/166FFAAC9AA0E8E8?p=WORLDNEWS
• College is so expensive that many students have turned to crowdfunding campaigns, though they aren't a cure-all for their financial troubles.
• College is so unaffordable that some people have no choice but to beg on the internet for stability.
• College students
5. WHY DO SOME TOURS SKIP US?
• http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/167053796E51DD48?p=WORLDNEWS
• Music artists don't play in Tampa for a variety of reasons: Orlando, geographic location, venues, and misconceptions about Tampa.
• Florida fans are missing popular concerts despite having the resources.
• Florida music fans

4A- Forming an opportunity belief

When people are stuck with the same poorly designed product with no alternatives, a possibility presents itself. For example, communities hosted on outdated websites suffer various inconveniences. Needs that aren't met. A square block in a round hole and all that.

Thousands of young writers and artists around the world come together online and participate in role-playing (think Dungeons and Dragons-style character creation, not the kinky stuff). For many, they've been involved in the community for years, and it's their primary hobby. Since it is more of a niche, there currently isn't a website that exists that provides members a place for them to post art and writing equally. People have made do on multiple social media such as Twitter, Skype, and Tumblr (even MySpace, back in the day). Often, they resort to using more than one site, which contributes to my belief that there is a need for one single website for them.

I easily identified several prototypical customers as those who are role-playing hobbyists online. Most of their answers were very similar to the idea that I already have, probably because I also participate in the community. For background info, my questions were primarily aimed at identifying issues with the most popular website online role-players use, DeviantArt.

My first interviewee complained of there being no good way for her to advertise her role-playing community on DeviantArt (dA for short), so she typically referred to other social media instead, such as Twitter.

My second interviewee mostly discussed how dA is over a decade old and still has many outdated features, making it un-user-friendly. The interface was confusing and ugly, and better-looking options were only available for premium members. While this makes some sort of sense on one hand, it also ends up making the website look ugly to first-time visitors.

My third interviewee explained that since communicating on dA is difficult due to glitchy forums and chatrooms, feedback is hard to gather because locating a community is so difficult. Morale has been lowered, so most are unwilling to give any helpful feedback at this point due to effort required. Again, the outdated and buggy HTML coding was mentioned.

After interviewing these people, my view has changed little beyond making me realize that if I were to take up this project seriously, I would need a coder. Since this idea would be launching a website, half of the trouble would be knowing what is possible- and I am only familiar with HTML and Java. Nevertheless, I am pleased that this seems viable, for any alternatives that have launched in the past have not been successful enough to be considered competitors.

3A- My entrepreneurship story

My birth is actually linked to entrepreneurship! Before my twin brother and I were born, our mother ran her own bridal shop called The Bride's Closet (the sign is actually still in our garage). When she became pregnant with us, she had to make the decision of whether to close her shop, her entrepreneurial baby, or raise us, her biological babies, in the back of the store as she worked. Ultimately, she chose to close the store. As a child, I assumed the right thing to do was obvious, so I never put too much thought into my mother's decision.

The older I get, the more her decision means to me. Starting your own business and then maintaining it is no easy job, as we all know. To close it all down for me and my brother's sake must have taken a lot of strength and love, and for that I am forever grateful.

____________________________________________________________

I enrolled in ENT3003 because I am interested in pursuing an Entrepreneurship minor. I am interested in entrepreneurship because it is a path I have strayed towards all my life thus far. Even though it isn't necessarily as productive or efficient as a more traditional 8 hour work schedule, I always have to be working on something around the clock. Besides going out now and then, most of my social activities revolve around being in friend's company while doing some kind of work. I'm well aware it isn't  #goals, but when I get the creative juices flowing, I believe I am capable of achieving some level of success (as long as I put in the effort to match!) .

2A- The bug list

1. When people drive 15+ mph under the speed limit in the slow lane on Tampa Road.
• They are probably lost, senile, or a mixture of both.
2. When the dishwasher leaves dirty spots on my silverware, so now I have to rewash half of them.
• There were probably too many forks and knives packed in, so they could not be effectively cleaned.
3. My water bottle will leak when it's hanging from my backpack, leaving water unpleasantly dripping down my leg.
• The leak comes from the top, so there's probably a malfunction with the lid. Alternatively, I'm just not screwing the cap on tight enough because I have no game.
4. My marketing seminar class begins promptly at 10:40. The professor locks the door as soon as the clock strikes the eight, so I missed class for being 30 seconds late today.
• The door is locked in order to pay respect to the guest speaker, who may have flown in just to speak with us.
5. My roommate is a darling and made a big batch of muffins, but they've been sitting in a basket in the kitchen and have gone stale after a few days.
• Some of the muffins could have been frozen earlier. We could also toast the stale ones to make them easier to stomach.
6. I love the individual study pods on the second floor of Library West, but they're always full at the times I'm there.
• Students who arrive at the library alone probably plan to stay that way, unless they're meeting up with a study group.
7. I always want Bento delivery, but I can never justify the delivery cost being half the cost of the meal itself. I rarely ever feel like dropping $17 on a meal.
• I don't have the means to live like this.
8. The closest I can get to Heavener Hall at UF by bus is Rawlings, but the 10-15 minute walk is stifling in the afternoon summer heat.
• The cause of this problem is being a business student. There's nothing I can really do about that.
• The other cause is that I have the attention span and responsibility of a goldfish so I drag my sorry butt to live lectures to stay on track.
9. When I sit down to do work on my laptop, 90% of the time I waste the first 30 minutes being distracted by a wide array of things on the internet.
• The internet is a mystical and wondrous place filled with friends, pretty pictures, and memes.
• And as previously stated, I have the attention span of a goldfish.
10. When I play online on my Switch, the battery depletes faster than it charges.
• The handheld form probably wasn't meant to be played online, but on the go with no internet connection. Too bad I never leave my apartment hahaha ha
11. Assembly exams run between 8 and 10 PM, so I have to walk around at night to get to my bus and apartment.
• They are held at night because that is probably the only time when many large lecture halls are available at once.
12. You're supposed to walk behind a bus when crossing the street, but if cars are behind the bus they drive around it, making the road impassable for you.
• No one likes to be kept waiting if they can see an exit route. Those with the ability to run another human being over will take precedence.
13. Even with a support, my plants love to lean to the left.
• They are reaching for the sunlight coming in from the window.
14. I applied for a job as a Starbucks barista over the summer. I sent in my application in May, but didn't get a call back until the end of July. By the time I was interviewed in August, they couldn't hire me because by the time they were done training me, I would be back at school.
• Starbucks has job applications open at all times, but whether a particular location is hiring or not is not stated on their website.
15. I don't get body scrubs you're supposed to leave on your skin for several minutes. When most people apply these, they're in the shower. Who actually has the patience to halt their shower, freeze in their bathroom for 5 minutes, then turn the shower back on?
• For certain oils and masks, they require time to be absorbed by your skin. 
16. Sometimes I'm too lazy to walk to the store and buy candy there, so I go and see if it's available on Amazon. I then discover that only bulk-size amounts of Reese's are available and the cheapest they go for is $10.
• Small, single-serving candies probably aren't economical to sell and ship online, especially when they're extremely common in most drug and grocery stores.
17. When I'm up late but haven't been as productive as desired, I tell myself I'm going to wake up early and do my work then. I always end up sleeping in anyway.
• Rest is vital for human productivity. Our work usually isn't at its best quality when we're exhausted anyway.
18. If I can't find the music I like on Spotify, I listen to it on YouTube. The quality tanks and more importantly, there's no repeat option!
• The sound quality is probably lower for the sake of website constraints, but I'm still not sure why there's no repeat button beyond YouTube not being a music site. Music videos are still some of the most-watched on the site, though.
19. If I want to turn my string lights off and preserve battery, I have to manually pull the plug from the outlet.
• The string lights do not have an on/off switch.
20. Outside is blazing hot in summer, but the RTS buses are freezing cold.
• The AC must be on a low temperature to balance the bus doors constantly opening and closing, letting in both warm air and warm bodies.

Overall, this list took a lot longer than expected to write. As stated in the assignment, we really aren't used to thinking this way- seeing the flaws and improvements to be made in everything is both inspiring and distressing. Perhaps 'seeing potential' is a more optimistic way to put it? Typically, I'm more likely to make do than to complain, so the bug list definitely posed its challenges to me.