Foneship is a service focusing on ‘Relationship’ and ‘Phone’. It is a self-help tool for smartphone users to build a healthier relationship with their smartphones to ultimately achieve their personal digital wellbeing.
Jiajia Huang
Hi there! My name is Jiajia, a service designer with a product design background. From graphic design, industrial design, to service design, strategic design, I‘m continuously exploring the relationship between users, products and services, and hoping to better implement design works through my studies in business schools. I'm always excited to acquire new knowledge and face different challenges. I’m a fast learner and a team player with an empathetic critical eye and passion for strategic thinking. I'm dedicating to solving complex problems and bringing lasting impact to society.
No more nomophobia..
Nomophobia - a fear of being away from the phone - has become a universal truth affecting people at all ages since it has permeated every single aspect of our lives. Most of us have been experiencing a moment living with our phones from the beginning to the end of a day. This endless social phenomenon is going from strength to strength, especially in the Covid-19 situation that could lead to a more dependency on phones. However, smartphones undoubtedly bring a great benefit to our lives, but also come with the undeniable drawback of suffering from excessive use such as sleep deficit, anxiety, stress, and depression. Before these problems of physical and mental health have been exacerbated, now it’s time to find a healthy balance of a relationship with a phone that could prove to be the right wellbeing for you.
User's voice matters.. — First, it’s realistically impossible to stop using a smartphone as it is a part of our daily lives. Second, achieving a personal wellbeing goal and lifestyle is a key. Reducing time spent on a smartphone is just a quick-fix solution. Lastly, compulsive behavior could cause an unnecessary journey leading to a smartphone addiction. Based on these findings, we came up with.. How might we help smartphone users with nomophobia to achieve their wellbeing through a healthy relationship with their phones.
This is just a beginning.. — Foneship is aimed at helping users achieve their wellbeing of daily activities between on phone and off phone. Our strategy is to provide a tailored support for self-control over the use of applications to tackle compulsive behaviors, by offering a healthy balance that is right for individuals. Next, this idea will be applied to all electronic devices. In the future, we also plan to quantify relationships and make a balance between productivity and intimacy to become a comprehensive platform for wellbeing.
Learn fast fail fast..
We conducted several workshops with end-users and professionals to improve our service. During 3 rounds of prototyping, we proved some ideas and also removed some parts according to users' feedback and technical feasibility. Also, we found that greyscale could help users feel less interested in their screens. To ensure an effective idea of greyscale, we used some metaphors such as paper alarms for the validation. The participants like the grayscale screen since without the color they totally lose their interest and also find the provocative text helpful to help reconsider the usage of smartphones. After all, this is how our final service, Foneship, comes in.
We're here to help..
Foneship is a self-help tool to help users build their digital wellbeing with their phones through only 4 steps – register, onboard, use, get a report and tips. Users need to register when they first access Foneship. Then onboarding will help them set up their preferences and wellbeing goals with two options as a facilitator. For users who are not clear with their goal, they can take a short survey covering their habits and desire. For those who are clear, they can set it up manually. Foneship will then automatically create modes and relative apps according to the survey and users’ previous screen time report. These apps are divided into priority apps standing for users’ priority tasks and optional apps meaning apps of distraction under a certain mode. Users only need to go through registration and onboard, then they could continuously use our service, get reports and tips.
A simple start.. — In the beginning, users will be welcome with the introduction showing the values they will be provided. Next, users will go through the process of account creation using their email, phone no, and password, followed by giving a permission for our service to access their screen phone report.
Ready-to-use modes.. — Once they finish survey, Foneship will auto-create modes and relative apps according to both the goal setup and users’ previous screen time report. If the auto-create is not satisfying, users can always adjust them manually. Speaking of modes, there are priority apps which stand for users’ priority tasks, and optional apps which means apps of distraction under this mode.
A friendlier nudge.. — To help users focus on priority tasks, Foneship constrains the time that could be spent on optional apps. The algorithm behind is based on the users’ willingness from the survey, and the time they spend on priority apps which is users’ behavior. While users are using optional apps, the screen will gradually become greyscale and totally become white. When the time reaches the limit, provocative text and notification will appear to remind users to be more aware of unhealthy behavior.
Greyscale.. — Our core service feature, a strategic tool for friendlier nudge, is scientifically proven to be a quick cure to smartphone addiction by stripping away all the neuron-stimulating colors on smartphones, then users will be less motivated to use their phone.
Self reflection.. — Foneship will record their smartphone behavior in 2 types of reports, first, a multi-dimensional data report where users can check their behavior in diagram format from different perspectives.
Visual animations.. — Second, a status tag showing their behavior with real-time change through a transition of color and shape. The result will be displayed in both our application and a physical globe, aiming to help users to check behavior more conveniently.
HelpGuide
HelpGuide is a small independent nonprofit that runs one of the world’s top 10 mental health websites. Over 50 million people from all around the world turn to HelpGuide each year for trustworthy content they can use to improve their mental health and make healthy changes.