The good bits:
- On the bluetooth pairing and location prompts, FireChat leverages the background plane to add further clarity on why these two settings are necessary for the app experience.
- FireChat allows the new user to start off quickly by seeding a list of topical chats, instead of forcing her to organize one of her own.
To be improved:
- FireChat frontloads a 7-panel introductory tour that tries to explain different scenarios in which the app might be useful. Instead, the app might consider focusing on just the content seen on panel 1 and panel 6 (which talks about the “Nearby” setting), and let the new user find her own best-use scenario by getting her to quickly choose a topic of interest.
- This app forces the new user to sign up before she can get a glimpse of sample FireChats. Perhaps the app could consider an anonymous mode to let guests explore topics.
- The initial list of FireChat topics seems randomly distributed across political and entertainment topics.
- The “Nearby” chat often initially opens to an empty screen. The note “You are the only one here” is dwarfed by the broader note “Chat without Internet Works up to 210 feet.” The app might consider switching the prominence of these two lines so that it’s clearer why this content is empty for the new user.