by: Jordan “boyega” Akinlotan

(@ourfrequency)

Meet the Team Behind Frequency, Spotify’s Celebration of Black Culture, Creativity, and Community — Spotify

What purpose would the app serve?

• Hub for uplifting Black artists and discovering new music
• Access to interviews, playlists and exclusive content
• As a companion app for their platform on Spotify, it will also redirect to music on Spotify
• News and Video feed for updates on new/upcoming music and events
• Artist Profile for artists featured on the platform. Would include an “about” section and feature posts/media with artists tagged in it. Would also include a link to their Spotify artist profile.

Platforms used: Figma, Adobe Illustrator

Research Resources I’ll need:

• [x] Mood board

• [x] Apps of interest for competitive analysis/heuristic evaluation

  App References:

  • Instagram: Image-based social media platform. Feed-based. Because of the longevity of the platform, they have the benefit of setting the standard for social media app affordances (i.e. location of icons, structural hierarchy, etc).
  • TikTok: Video-based social media/content creation platform. Feed-based. The explosive popularity during- and post-COVID set new standard for video format, other apps have followed suit. Vertical video content is the new norm. “For You” page and “Following” page for feed filtering.
  • Apple News: News aggregate application. Feed-based. You can follow news sources to tailor your home page feed. Search feature allows you to scroll through different individual news sources.
  • Spotify: Music-based streaming platform. Feed-based. Liking playlists/artists/podcasts etc. will contribute to tailoring your feed. You can follow artists to get updates on their music and live shows. Custom playlist curation is popular feature.

  Conclusion: Each platform offers a unique value proposition with overlaps in some areas with feature offerings. For an app like FREQUENCY (especially being directly tied to Spotify), Spotify-like features, with a focus on news aggregation and artist updates would be the primary goal.

• [x] Secondary research into FREQUENCY as a platform and their goals re: the app’s value proposition

  • FREQUENCY’s mission: To uplift Black artists and put a spotlight on musicians across the diaspora through all media formats: News, Art, Video, etc.

• [x] Identify Design Principles to utilize

  • Aesthetic-Usability Design
  • Progressive Disclosure
  • Color
  • Affordance

• [x] Site Map