engagement
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Netflix’s first engagement report reveals its most popular shows and movies
Netflix published the first of a new twice-a-year engagement report called What We Watched. The first installment, launched Tuesday as a Microsoft Excel file, lists the hours viewed for every title, original and licensed, tallying more than 50,000 viewing hours.
Twitter bought a company to make notifications more relevant
If it can make notifications better, Twitter could increase engagement and improve its bottom line.
Stop pretending to be in Singapore on Instagram
If you were looking to juice your Instagram metrics, then changing your (digital) location as Singapore was a nifty shortcut. According to the Telegraph, the photo-sharing network's algorithm was more likely to put you on the Explore page if you were in the country. Unfortunately, the Facebook-owned company has now spotted the problem and squashed it, so you'll have to stop trying to pretend your bathroom selfies were taken on the island.
Speedrunners get engaged on Awesome Games Done Quick
They met on Twitch, so getting engaged on Twitch is wonderfully romantic. While blasting through a cutscene in the Nintendo 64 game Mischief Makers, Awesome Games Done Quick speedrunner Jackafur took a moment to thank his friends for their support over the years, and then he turned his attention to Kittyrawr, his girlfriend seated right next to him. He said he would love her forever, pulled out a ring, got on one knee and popped the question – and she said yes, all live on Twitch. Onions, guys. Onions. Awesome Games Done Quick has so far raised more than $500,000 for the Prevent Cancer Foundation, and last year the group raised more than $1 million for Prevent Cancer. They're streaming through January 10 – watch it live right here. [Image: Awesome Games Done Quick]
You only use 20% of your apps one time according to a new study
Localytics recently examined how people use their apps. The study, based on data from 1.5 billion devices and 25,000 apps, reports that 20% of downloaded apps are used only once, which is a 6% improvement over a four-year-old identical study. During the same period, which covers apps used during the third quarter of multiple years, the percentage of apps used 11 or more times increased 13% and now comprises nearly 40% of all apps. Which apps are the most engaging? Weather and social apps. Meanwhile, sports and game apps have the highest abandonment rate. That's probably because of the competition in the sports and games category, while most of us settle in pretty quickly on our favorite weather or messaging/social apps. For games in particular, those apps have a nearly 50% chance of never being opened again if a user doesn't return to the app within 12 hours. The report also notes that Android users are slightly ahead of iOS users in engagement, which may be a result of the greater number of apps available to iOS users. With the relatively larger number of apps installed on iOS devices, competition for an iOs user's time increases and can weaken retention. For an app developer, the best of all possible worlds is for people to use your app over and over. It makes for a very competitive environment which is good for the industry and good for end users. Does this study seem to track with your own experiences? In my case it seems to. I'm a heavy consumer of weather and messaging on my iPhone. I'm always willing to try a new game, but if it doesn't grab me I never go back. Meanwhile, I've had a large turn-over in sports apps, never finding the right app that truly fills my needs. Your comments are welcome.
Zynga's website removes Facebook login requirement
Zynga has redesigned its website, no longer requiring gamers to log into the site using the Facebook credentials.Once upon a time, Facebook and Zynga were the best of pals, with Zynga's titles driving engagement on the big blue social network and Facebook providing a steady stream of new users to play Zynga's offerings. Last year, however, Facebook and Zynga decided to start parting ways, and that's led us to this current situation, where Zynga is pushing its platform beyond the walls of the Facebook system.Not completely outside, however: Zynga players can still log into Facebook on Zynga.com if they like, and as you can see on the site, the Facebook logo and login box are still prominently displayed. But players are no longer forced to use that process to partake in Zynga's library of games.
Report: Customer retention is a major factor for the App Store
Yes, the conclusion of this report might be a little obvious to anyone who's been following the App Store closely, but it's true: Flurry's latest writeup of App Store stats suggests that keeping users playing a game or using an app can be a major factor in that app's success. Flurry filed the apps it follows into a set of four categories, based on star systems. Black Holes feature low amounts of monthly users, and low amounts of retention over a couple 30-day periods. Shooting Stars have put a lot of users together quickly, with high user numbers, but relatively low retention. Red Dwarfs have lots of user retention, but low numbers overall -- these are cult favorites, used by a smaller amount of very loyal people. And finally, Supernovas have it all, in Flurry's estimation: Lots of users that stay with the app for quite a while. When you take those categories over to the average number of minutes of usage per month (in the chart above), then things get really interesting: As you can see, the more retention an app has, the more engaged its users are (and whether you're talking about premium apps or apps that use in-app purchases, more engagement usually means more money made). So this is where Flurry gets its conclusion: User retention is extremely important. Even if an app doesn't take off right away in terms of user numbers (if it's not a Shooting Star, with a lot of users who don't stick around), keeping those users over a longer period grows the user base and that user base stays loyal over time. In the past, a lot of developers have aimed for that Shooting Star status -- they push on big launches, and try to put a huge number of users together very quickly after an app's release. But this report shows that there's another market on the App Store, one that moves a little more slowly (and doesn't collect as many users as quickly), but that can become very large and engaged indeed, sometimes over a matter of months or even years.
Flurry details app retention by app category, users love weather apps
Flurry has looked at app engagement and retention with its great series of reports on app usage, and the company has now returned to the subject in a new release. This time, the mobile advertising firm looks at app retention within certain categories to see which kinds of apps users are able to find easily, keep and engage with them. The results are pretty much what you'd expect: Weather and news apps are able to keep users for a long period of time, because most users choose one they trust and then stick with it. In terms of frequency, I'm not surprised to see streaming music apps listed high: Lately, the Slacker Radio app is probably the most used on my iPhone 5. Social games and social messaging apps are also used frequently, showing that people are most engaged when their friends are as well. On the other side of the spectrum, you can see that music apps tend not to keep users around for long. I'd guess that's because Apple's own music apps are probably what most people end up going back to. Health and fitness apps are also down there, and retail and deals apps are also in that lower quadrant. That's also not too shocking. Most people interested in retail apps or deals probably use them until they buy what they need, and then move on. These are just general comparisons of categories. Not all weather apps command high retention, and there are some health apps that get used all the time. But it is interesting to have a big picture of which categories are being used more often on iOS.
75% of MapleStory's marriages suffer the heartbreak of divorce
Monogamy isn't in the cards for most MapleStory players, and neither are faithfulness, silver anniversaries or alimony-free lifestyles. You see, MapleStory boasts an incredibly high rate of divorces with its marriage system, as a whopping 75% of players who get married in-game end up getting those unions annulled. MapleStory's marriage system is fairly popular, with 26,982 such events occurring last year in North America alone. Each marriage costs $25 for the couple, but it seems that the initial investment wasn't enough to keep a majority of the players together for long. Within a year, over 20,000 of those marriages broke up. Due to the high divorce rate -- much higher than the real-world version by far -- Nexon investigated individual stories of in-game divorce trying to figure out why these virtual marriages aren't sticking. One player named Seth realized that his "Maple spouse" was merely using their relationship to bum free items off of him, which led to their break-up. Marriage in MapleStory is a detailed process involving an official engagement, two rings, real-world cash, and a spiffy in-game item that gives the happy pair a big boost to stats. However, if a marriage is annulled, each partner has a 10-day cooling off period before he or she can remarry. [Source: Nexon press release]
A new use for Find My iPhone: Popping the question, Apple style
If you're a regular TUAW reader, you know we do a live show on Sunday evenings called the Talkcast. If you are a regular listener to the Talkcast, you know that I almost always give a shout out to our regular listeners, and I have been known to get up on a soapbox about how important our community is to us and that your tips and contributions are a very big part of our site. This is a wonderful example of how our regulars helped out one of our own. In case you missed it: on the episode recorded the Sunday before Christmas, we had Andrew (aka Macfan64) on with a very important question for us. He was going to propose to his girlfriend on Christmas, and he wanted to see if there was a way he could use his iPad to do it. After discussing a few ideas, it was suggested that a good way to start off would be to hand her the iPad (she was always taking off with it anyway to play -- what else? -- Angry Birds), and after loading a web page built specially for the occasion, she'd be off on a treasure hunt through the house. She was sent around to find things throughout the house by messages sent to the iPad using the Find My iPhone app (controlled by a family member). Eventually, she was led to the living room where the last item she found was a DVD to play. On the DVD was a slideshow of photos of the two of them together, and when the slideshow was over, Andrew offered the ring and popped the question. Luckily I didn't have to wait too long to find out how this turned out; I got a note on Christmas Day that she had accepted! It was wonderful to hear that Andrew was successful, not to mention that some of our Talkcast regulars were directly involved in making it happen. You can see highlights from the evening in Andrew's video on YouTube. If you keep an eye out for the end credits, you'll see that TUAW got a shout out for helping Andrew come up with the idea, in a nice Star Wars style crawl, no less. On behalf of all the folks here at TUAW, I am pleased to offer Andrew and Amy congratulations on their engagement and the best of wishes on their upcoming wedding.
City of Heroes players get engaged in-game and in style
The City of Heroes team loves its community. There's no real doubt about that -- whether or not you care for the design principles the team has embraced, any given member will happily engage with players about the reason behind same. So it's probably not surprising to learn that the team backed up an in-game proposal with more than just GM support. It might be a little more surprising, however, to find out that it included a Giant Monster and the intervention of War Witch herself. The New York Post has the full details in comic form as well as a brief interview with several members of the Paragon Studios team about what it was like helping to make the proposal one to remember. And really, when your engagement starts off by destroying Rularuu, what can you say but yes? Read the full details over in the article, sure to bring a smile to the faces of any City of Heroes players of a romantic bent... or any romantics, period.
Found Footage: Using an iPhone and a movie theatre to propose marriage
Wow! These days, it seems, if you're going to propose, popping the question needs to be done in a super creative, ultra romantic fashion. Gone are the days of proposing to your love after a few drinks at the local pub or after a few too many at a New Years Eve party (Both proposals I know of, both ladies said yes)! Apparently, If you're going to do it right in this day and age, you need to do it akin to the stratosphere that B.B Bling did it in. This guy took his girlfriend to the cinema where they watched their first movie together (OK, nothing too special there), but after a few commercials, what appeared to be an iPhone commercial came on the screen. However, it turned out to be a full blown music video proposal, written and performed by the groom to be. Using apps from his iPhone, the song declared Bling's undying love for his stunned girlfriend, culminating in an on screen proposal. Thankfully, she said yes, and the rest of the cinema goers burst into applause. To to top it all off, the track is now available for purchase on the iTunes store to finance the wedding. From all of us here at TUAW, we say well done to you, sir! And congratulations to the happy couple. Now, why didn't I think of that? For all the juicy details, click here.
TUAW interviews OpenFeint's Peter Relan, Net Jacobsson, and Jason Citron
Danielle Cassley and Jason Citron are the folks with their names on Aurora Feint, but as Danielle told us in an interview a while ago, Peter Relan is the real mastermind behind the growing Feint empire. Not only did he put the two together in an idea lab, but he's one of the driving forces behind the OpenFeint enterprise. Under his oversight, the Feint folks have swelled to become one of the major forces behind iPhone gaming (and thus, behind the iPhone's app ecosystem itself).Netanel "Net" Jacobsson is a newer addition -- he's previously worked with Sony Ericsson on their mobile devices and Facebook on their own growing app empire, and now he's arrived at OpenFeint to help them use the lessons he's learned at the biggest online social networks around on their social software. Get the sense of how big this is yet? Relan, Jacobsen, and Citron all have pretty big ideas about where iPhone gaming is going, and as 3.0 comes down the pike and introduces a whole set of new features from Apple, they're in the best seat they can be in to do exactly what they want to do.TUAW sat down with the three last week, and chatted about iPhone 3.0 and why it's such a big deal for developers, how they're going to approach microtransactions (carefully), and what's coming next for OpenFeint now that they've rounded up a whole stable full of developers implementing their backbone. Click "read more" to continue.
Forum post of the day: Dueling debate
Like any other form of PvP, you either love dueling or you hate it. Dueling is a great way to learn how to maximize abilities and test combos and macros. There are very few established guidelines for how to appropriate ly duel. Borkovic of Caelestraz asked in the official forums if it is acceptable to heal in a duel. Fliara of Terenas stated that protocols vary depending on server and faction, and suggested that rules should be established beforehand. The first response, by Mlcho of Kirin Tor who takes an "all's fair in love and Warcraft" approach, was met with considerable agreement throughout the thread: Use everything in your power to produce a win. Who cares if you use a pot? Who cares if you bandage? If they whine, it's because they weren't prepared.
World of Kung Fu grants married characters double experience for combat
World of Kung Fu gets more and more interesting every time we hear about it. It recently went into open beta, then started up a new webcomic, and now they've just announced the ability for characters to marry! According to the press release, the engagement begins with matching rings, then a trip to the matchmaker. The actual wedding itself can be celebrated with decorations, guests, and fireworks, after which time each character receives a title identifying them as married.But wait, here's the best part: the 'Couple Cultivation Skill' lets couples receive double experience for team combat! There is probably more to it than we might glean on the surface, and we'll do our best to find out what that might be. WoKF is in open beta, kids. Check it out now![Thanks, Andrea!]
Man proposes using homebrew Bejeweled
Hey, casual games don't have to be cynical exercises in making loadsamoney. In fact, our inner romantic dork almost swooned after recently reading the tale of Bernie and Tammy, who tied the knot thanks to the mother of all casual titles: Bejeweled.Okay, so strictly speaking, it wasn't the Bejeweled, but a DS homebrew version of Popcap's wildly popular creation, as developed from scratch by Bernie. The game is a favorite of his partner Tammy, so the young Casanova wrote her a special version, and gave it her to play.The reason why Bernie's Bejeweled was special? Well, when Tammy reached a certain score, the screen cleared and a ring scrolled down in its place. Apparently, it was at this point that Bernie got down on one knee and popped the question. A no doubt thrilled Tammy said "yes." Awwww.Congrats, you two! We're off to buy new hats![Via Game|Life]
