Spotify Design and Design Driven Ask What Sound Should Look Like

“Audio is the most honest medium.” That was the message Spotify’s senior artwork director Tina Snow Le had for the viewers at this month’s Design Driven gathering. The month-to-month meetup has constructed a devoted group of designers over the previous couple of years, and this was the primary time Spotify hosted the occasion. Spotify’s director of product design, Jennifer Cullem, kicked off the gathering by welcoming the packed home and introducing the night’s theme. Naturally, the main target of this night’s occasion was how sound and design work together and play off of each other whether or not you’re listening to your favourite observe or attempting to hearken to the day’s information.

Le’s speak centered on the formative position of music in creating connective tissues throughout individuals and tradition. Her household immigrated to the U.S. from Vietnam earlier than she was born; her first musical reminiscence was dancing to M.C. Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This” in entrance of a makeshift inexperienced display at a mall in Portland, the place she grew up. “MC Hammer was the entry point of culture for me as a kid,” she stated. “It ignited my curiosity about culture.”

That curious spirit has served Le effectively in her position at Spotify, the place she’s a part of the workforce that units the platform’s artwork route for markets everywhere in the world. Localizing every playlist from a musical perspective is essential, however Le additionally emphasised the necessity to dive into native aesthetic and graphic traditions to present one thing like a playlist a really real influence. “One cover doesn’t fit all,” Le stated. “A question we constantly have to ask ourselves is how we take a brand like Spotify and translate it to other cultures. Our goal isn’t to make something that’s 100% Spotify all the time. We’re trying to bridge the gap between the brand and the listeners.”

She pointed to the work her workforce had accomplished in Brazil in the course of the improvement of the “Funk Hits” playlist. Before launching the playlist, Shahin Haghjou, a senior artwork director on the editorial design workforce, hung out on the bottom taking within the graphic historical past of Brazil in addition to the road artwork of the nation’s favelas. The research offered the aesthetic counterpart to the work of native music consultants who had created a playlist that mirrored the funkier rhythms of Brazil’s music scene. “Funk Hits” now near 3M subscribers, and mirrors the colourful sights and sounds of Brazil.

Engagement was additionally on the thoughts of Nicola Korzenko, the final supervisor of PodFund. Korzenko is charged with discovering and cultivating the subsequent era of podcast expertise, and she or he mentioned how the booming podcast market is usually a minefield for expertise trying to discover an viewers. “Only 1% of podcasts make more than $100k per year,” Korzenko stated, performing some fast monetary calculus onstage. And even with the rise of different funding fashions like memberships, tipping, licensing, and dwell occasions, many podcasters aren’t in a position to make ends meet simply by creating content material.

Korzenko’s recommendation to these attempting to make waves in podcasting? “Create your own brand and make deeper relationships with your community of listeners,” she stated. “You have to build lasting value and loyalty.” The outdated mannequin of “build it, and they will listen” doesn’t minimize it in a crowded podcast market anymore. You want to search out your viewers, interact with them, and craft moments that make individuals come again for extra.

Audio platforms aren’t nearly music although. And Design Driven additionally welcomed NPR’s VP of design Liz Danzico to the stage to debate how one thing as important because the information wants a particular visible identification. Danzico separated her work at NPR into two separate classes: Finding Problems (reasonably than fixing issues) and Designing for the Public. Those two remits are one thing of a unified concept of design at NPR, the place Danzico is consistently fascinated by how you can make the platform extra informative, accessible, and dynamic.

“Relying on audio-only experiences can make it difficult to get people the stories they want which is why people need to be part of the design conversation from process to execution,” Danzico instructed the viewers.

NPR has the distinctive problem of designing options throughout a federated system of manufacturers and member stations. Each station—from KPCC in Los Angeles to WNYC in New York to KUT in Austin—has a unique feel and appear, and it’s as much as Danzico’s workforce to make sure that consumer expertise doesn’t get misplaced within the shuffle. She’s additionally keenly conscious of NPR’s mission assertion to “create a more informed public” and considers that ethos every time her workforce makes a design resolution. Danzico desires to ensure they “give everyone a voice” in terms of designing for public radio.

Design has turn into such a central part of how NPR builds its product that Danzico’s workforce has taken over the house adjoining to one of many group’s most recognizable packages: the Tiny Desk Concert collection. “Musicians like Questlove have gone around and commented on all the Post-Its we have taped up,” Danzico stated. “And now the official NPR tour goes through the design corridor and talks about how this is how design is done at NPR.” Design drives every part that NPR does now, and it’ll proceed to affect how the American public will get their information.

This iteration of Design Driven noticed industries from the world over of audio, however the message was clear: What your platform seems to be like is simply as essential as what your platform seems like. “Sight and sound is how we connect with each other when we can’t find the words,” Spotify’s Le stated on the shut of her presentation. “We want to bridge the gap between the voices we love and the platforms we use.”

For extra info on future Design Driven occasions, try their group occasions web page right here.