The Betfair Quiz application used Flash and PHP to create a quiz related to the World Series of Poker Championship. In the game, the user is presented with a number of questions and five playing cards to choose from. If the user answers the question correctly, they can choose a card to add to their ‘hand’, if they get the answer wrong, a random card is chosen instead.
After the user collects five cards, they receive a score based on their poker hand. The score is entered into the application’s leaderboard. The aim of the application was to be the player on top of the leaderboard. The leaderboard was split into three sizes: the users friends, the user’s Facebook network, and all application users.
For this application I coded the entire application except for the Flash component used in the actual game. I created a API for use in the backend to handle the communication between the Flash game and the databases. The API was used to pass the user’s high score back to the server so it could be stored on the leaderboard. The questions were passed into the application using XML so they could easily be updated.
One of the challenges with this application was optimizing the SQL query used to generate the leaderboard. During testing we found that the query used to be slow when the user’s friends list or network was quite large. To overcome the issue we used the Facebook API to return only friends who had installed the application, and then use this sub-list in the SQL query.
In order to promote The Economist Fan Page, I build a set of applications to engage users and update them with the latest Economist content. I create a set of widgets that live on the “Boxes” tab of the Fan Page. The widgets include a Welcome Message, Editor’s Highlight, and a Search box.
The Editor’s Highlight and Features widget uses RSS feeds to pull in real-time content from the Economist website. The search widget lets users search for articles on the Economist website. The Covers widget shows the latest issue of Economist in the US, UK, Europe and Asia.
I also built a custom tab called “Articles“, which include a larger version of the widgets on the Boxes tab. These again use RSS to pull in real-time content from The Economist. A excerpt of the articles are shown on the tab, with a link to the full article on The Economist. The user can also share the articles straight to their newsfeed.
Visit the Economist Fan Page.
The Samsung CYFR Application was created to promote the new Samsung Genio Touch mobile phone – a budget touch screen mobile phone, available in a selection of colours. The application focused on the mobile phone’s slogan of ‘What colour is your life?’, allowing users to send colourful messages to their friends.
The application was build using PHP and MySQL, allowing users to encode plain-text messages as colour encoded blocks. The colour coded message used image manipulation using PHP and the GD2 library to create each colour block on a large image canvas. The image was then sent to users and published to the user’s newsfeed for friends to see.
The application also included a inbox, allowing users to receive personal messages encoded in the same way. The colour coding algorithm converted each letter and number into a unique (non-sequential) colour block. This application was the first app I created that used this kind of image manipulation. A lot of consideration was taken to make sure blocks would automatically wrap to a new line, and the image was then sliced into 5 blocks to publish to the news feed (this was a facebook restriction for images on the newsfeed).
The application gained over 7,000 users, with little media spend, thanks to the virality of the application. One of the main reasons for the app succeeding was because it made user’s Facebook Wall colourful and vibrant. Facebook later changed the Newsfeed policy (due to abuse of this feature), stopping application from posting multiple images to the Wall.
The Tropic Thunder Facebook Game was created to promote Ben Stiller’s Tropic Thunder movie for Paramount. The game allows users to play five levels of a top-down shooter, created specifically for Tropic Thunder, using various assets. Each level is unique in its own way, and each level contains its own “boss”. The aim of the game is to collect as many “Crying Monkey” awards as possible and racking up points.
If the user is still alive after completing the five levels, the game starts again, but the score continues. However, the game gets harder with each level. On completing the game, the player’s score is added to the Leaderboard and the user received a “Acting” rank and “Action” rank.
After the US launch of the movie, the application was updated and localized to four additional languages for the European launch. Towards the end of the campaign, the application had over 70,000 users.
The game itself was developed in Flash. The remainder of the application, flash integration and leaderboard components were build in PHP. There were some technical challenges in connecting PHP and Flash within Facebook, as there was no Facebook API available in Flash during the development phase.
The Comedy UK application was built for MySpace UK, in order to promote their Comedy Channel. The application was built entirely in JavaScript, making use of OpenSocial and MyOpenSpace (MySpace’s OpenSocial implementation). The application lets users watch comedy clips using a custom built Flash video player.
Video content, images and information are pulled in through a XML feed managed by MySpace UK. The application was originally built using PHP and MySpace’s REST API but was later rewritten to use JavaScript.
The application can be found here.
For MediaGuardian’s Facebook Fanpage, I build several applications to bring in information from the official website. We build a photo application called “Top 100 Movers and Schmoozers” which read in photo tags from photos uploaded on the fan page. People tagged in the photos are then shown on the leaderboard.
Three RSS applications were also build to bring in official content. This included the latest jobs and new articles from the MediaMonkey and OrganGrinder blogs. You can see all the application on MediaGuardian’s Facebook Fan Page.
The HSBC Premier iGoogle Gadget was built using Facebook Connect to link to the complete application within Facebook. The facebook application was intended to be a professional network of friends within Facebook’s platform, similar to LinkedIn. Users could ask for introductions to other users, add their professional skills and connect to other professionals.
The iGoogle Gadget for HSBC Premier was the first implementation of Facebook Connect within iGoogle. The Facebook Connect functionality was only a few weeks old when I worked on integrating it into the application. Unfortunately, the application never went live.
Of course this happens with some other applications I worked on, for example another Facebook applications, an online casino site (www.casino.com), and a microsites. Although the sites and applications never went live, I did gain experience in using new technologies.
The F400Share application was a cross-platform application developed for Facebook and Bebo, to promote the new Samsung F400 mobile phone. The aim of the campaign was to get users to upload a audio clip of themselves singing a song, for a chance to be features in Samsung’s nation-wide advertising campaign.
The application was launched in Jone 2008 and allowed users to listen to the uploaded tracks and vote for their favourite ones. Four winners were chosen at the end of the campaign. The application used a flash based music player. I did the PHP/MySQL coding to handle file upload and recording of statistics. The top tracks received over 10,00 votes each.
After the campaign, the applications on both Facebook and Bebo were taken offline.
The Pundit was a Twitter-like application build in Facebook for Vodafone. The application allowed users to post 140-character comments on Football, whether is commenting on transfers, match results, or upcoming matches. A ‘celebrity pundit’ (a football player) would also use the application to interact with the Facebook users.
The application worked much like twitter and a microsite was also built integrating Facebook Connect. Users could login using either the microsite or facebook application. Users were able to vote on comments, awarding ‘goals’ or ‘red cards’. Users could also reply to comments and follow users they find interesting.
The winner for the competition would be someone with many ‘goals’, a low number of ‘red cards’, and someone with lots of followers. Unfortunately, the application never launched due to the client pulling out due to UEFA regulations.
Bandwars was a Facebook Application developed for Babelgum to celebrate the Babelgum Music Festival. The application allows users to form a band with five members, assign instruments, dress the members in clothes and challenge other bands. Challenging bands and winning would earn the band money, which can be used to purchase better costumes and instruments.
Bands were rated in five areas, which was used to determine which of the two bands win in challenges. These were:
- Rock
- Rhythm
- Cool
- Romance
- Sex Appeal
Winning challenges also allowed the winner to swap gear with one member from the losing band. The animations and shop were implemented in flash. The remainder of the application was built in PHP. A complex algorithm was written using PHP and MySQL to determine the winner of a challenge.
PHP was also used to communicate with the flash widget, acting as a intermediate layer between the interface and the database.
The application is now running unsupported since the original campaign began. You can access it here.