Archive for September, 2013

The app Rationalism in the Province of Como is today available on the App Store.

It’s the result of months of work, together with numerous collaborators, promoted and coordinated by the Culture Department of the Province of Como, the public authority administering the west branch of Lake Como.

It’s a multimedia tour about rationalist architecture in the Lake Como area, from Como to Cernobbio and Tremezzo.
The points of interests include the most renowned buildings designed by the architects Giuseppe Terragni, Cesare Cattaneo and Pietro Lingeri.

Is this yet another info-guide app? Or yet another audio-guide app?
Not at all!
The design concept is probably the most interesting aspect for fellow developers: I wanted to make an app that could be an “holistic” combination between these two different app types, info-guides and audio-guides.
A combination in which the end result were higher than the algebraic sum of the single parts.

Let’s start from the audio, the real core of the app.
After we completed the script, written in a simple and easy to understand language, I hired three professional storytellers who managed to literally “give life” to the contents with their voices.
Luca Grandelis is the italian storyteller, while Garth Kennedy took care of the english language.
Luca is a well-known voice-talent, while Garth is also an artist, an abstract mechanical sculptor.
German language will be soon added in the next update, thanks to the voice-talent from Berlin Birgit Röhricht.

Then there’s the interface, designed keeping in mind the keywords of iOS 7: clarity and transparency.
Experts of mobile technologies applied to education love to repeat the mantra “content is king“.
Well, I agree, but if “content is king“, let me add “software is queen“.
Quality contents are often negatively affected by mediocre software that should manage and present it to the user.
The work made in this direction will have its judge in users’ comments: if they’ll concentrate on the contents, it will mean that the software is actually “transparent” and the result optimal.

The app will be officially presented on sunday 29 september, at the Antiquarium of Ossuccio, in the Tremezzo area of Lake Como, and it will be one of the many events organized for the European Heritage Days 2013.
It will be the chance to shake hands with the people who collaborated on the project.
Although there isn’t a single pixel, word or line of code that didn’t pass under my eyes – and this includes the responsibility for eventual bugs 😉 -, this work wouldn’t have been possible without them.

So, the combination between mobile technologies and cultural heritage could really work?
I believe so, and I think it’s the only way out of the tunnel of the economic and social crisis the Belpaese has fallen into for too many years…

Also, the educational effects of this app can be measured in the medium term.
Many communication experts agree on the fact the we tend to overestimate initiatives like this one in the short term, due to their “novelty” character, while we underestimate the impact in the medium and long term.
A litmus test could be this: let’s count how many people of Como (but not only them!) think today that the Camerlata fountain was inspired by Volta’s battery.
Then let’s count them in a 5 years’ time… and maybe a good chunk of them, thanks to the app, will remember that it’s actually a sort of futuristic monument to the traffic!

The news doesn’t end here, as I’ll reveal during the presentation.
Meanwhile, have a nice listening and vision of the app Rationalism in the Province of Como! 🙂