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It’s All About The Faces
I heard the line “it’s all about the faces” from someone in the past few weeks. The line stuck with me and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. Last night I tried an experiment and changed my twitter avatar to a graphic done by Anthony Dimitre, a really talented local designer. While there was plenty of positive feedback, there was also a lot of “I don’t like it” feedback, including the tweet “i think the avatar makes you seem less accessible than a normal pic” from @joshpayne.
While I like the avatar that Anthony made for me, Josh’s comment rang true and I changed the avatar back to the photo I’ve been using. Now, I might need a new photo (or a new face for that matter), but that’s a different issue. When I think about my experience on the web, there is no question that photos make people feel more real and accessible.
When I got my iPhone, I started taking quick pictures of my friends and family and adding these pictures to their contact record. These photos got synced with Outlook and ended up in the top right corner of my emails from these folks (in addition to showing up on my phone whenever they called me.) This was cool, but it forced me to take pictures of people and go through a convoluted UI experience to get the pictures associated with their contact record.
Even though this was a lot of extra work, the power of the photo matters. I’m happier when I see Amy’s picture pop up on my phone. Or, when my partner Jason calls me, I remember our great dinner at Uchi in Austin a few months ago (his photo was taken in front of the sign late at night.) When I ponder the rise of Facebook and Twitter, and reflect on the early coolness of MyBlogLog, the power of the photo seems very real.
This hit home with me during the most recent two week iteration for Gist. I get the new features between one and two weeks before everyone else (they do a release every two weeks) and there’s been an awesome new one that has appeared. If a contact record appears without a photo (I guess II should call it an avatar), I have a chance to add a new image from a Google search. Suddenly, between the data Gist imports from Facebook, Twitter, and the photos it is finding for me on the web, many of my most recently used contacts have photos that appear whenever I interact with them. I have a real, positive emotional response to this.
Now, this data isn’t yet syncing back with my email contact list, so I’m only seeing it when I either go into Gist or open up the Gist Dossier in Outlook. That just makes it even more noticeable that it’s missing from within my inbox (which is my most actively used form of communication.) But – that’s just a matter of time.
As the social web continues its extraordinary growth, “faces” seem to be a small, but critically important part of it.
it is “all about the faces” brad. At the end of the day, business is all about the people involved and “the faces” help us remember that. Great post.
I totally agree. Having a face not only makes someone seem more real and accessible, it also makes it an easier mental association for me. I personally find that I'm more likely to remember you (and my conversations with you) if I have a picture of you (in particular if I don't already have a mental picture of you). This became even more apparent to me when I wrote a Greasemonkey script to add one's gravatar to Gmail if it exists (available here http://jonefox.com/blog/2009/03/14/gravatar-in-gm... which has also been by far the most popular side project like this I've done.
It really adds a whole new dimension to interaction on the web when you can see a physical picture of someone.
On a related side note, does Gist plan to leverage Gravatar for their image search as well?
I totally agree. Having a face not only makes someone seem more real and accessible, it also makes it an easier mental association for me. I personally find that I'm more likely to remember you (and my conversations with you) if I have a picture of you (in particular if I don't already have a mental picture of you). This became even more apparent to me when I wrote a Greasemonkey script to add one's gravatar to Gmail if it exists (available here http://jonefox.com/blog/2009/03/14/gravatar-in-gm... ) which has also been by far the most popular side project like this I've done.
It really adds a whole new dimension to interaction on the web when you can see a physical picture of someone.
On a related side note, does Gist plan to leverage Gravatar for their image search as well?
I just had a similar experience yesterday on Facebook. While creating a new group, Facebook brought up a list of all my friends' avatars but either due to a browser or Facebook bug, no one's name appeared next to their photo. It was just a list of selectable avatars (small ones at that.)
So many of the avatars were of things that were unrecognizable to me, at least in being able to tell who this was. Pictures of cows in a field, someone's children, a location of some sort, or an avatar picture that wasn't recognizable at that small size. For about 2/3rds of the invites I used the name filter feature to find the folks I needed to invite to the group, and the rest were avatars that were recognizable.
During that process I had this odd feeling of, "who are these people?… they're my friends but I can't recognize their faces". Sounds like something from a bad dream, an Alfred Hitchcock movie or a Night Gallery episode, lol.
Anyway, it caused me to think of something very similar to what you experienced, Brad,… make sure my avatar is not only discernible and recognizable, but lets people feel they are connecting with me. I pretty consistently use one of three avatar photos, a portrait taken for business (used on my http://www.TheConvergingNetwork.com blog site, LinkedIn, etc.), a headshot from a video interview with Network World (used on my http://www.nww.com/community/ashley blog) and then a less formal one of me playing my project Strat guitar (that I use for Facebook and Twitter.)
So if anyone has trouble recognizing one of my avatars, would you please let me know?
Maybe we should start a new social media cultural norm of letting our network of friends, colleagues and connections know when their avatar doesn't help us recognize them. That would be a helpful trend if done in a polite way.
Anyone agree? Disagree?
I think so too and wonder what @fredwilson and @howardlindzon's followers think. They have similar avatars and are both authentically themselves in their tweets – but I wonder what would happen if they subbed in good face pics. My guess is it would add to the experience if they were natural vs. posed pics – e.g. the pic matched how they tweet and who they are. So maybe it's really more about the authentic representation of the person/personality – and so it's not just about adding a picture – like a canned press shot but rather a real, authentic, in the wild shot of who you really are – just like your twitter stream.
There has been extensive research done on the human brain’s capacity for identifying faces.
It engages a specific highly specialized part of the of the temporal lobe called the Fusiform Gyrus. Interestingly although this part of the brain is used for face recognition it also becomes active when specialist individuals are actively looking at the things they have specialized in (curators looking at art for example).
We identify faces much faster than we identify almost anything else. We start identifying and distinguishing between them very early on in our development. We are capable of cataloging and identifying a huge amount of what, essentially, are very similar forms. This ability is also related to our race (hence all Asians appearing the same to Caucasians, and the opposite).
How all this relates to trust?
The Fusiform Gyrus becomes active when viewing faces or PHOTOS of them (not avatars or paintings of them). We formulate an initial emotional response to the face we see within fractions of a second.
The standard recommendation for generating the highest degree of trust possible via this mechanism is to have a good photo of your face with a pleasant smiling expression.
Cheers,
Mike
"i tweet @headup"
http://headup.com
Absolutely! Faces are critical to creating trust across barriers of distance and culture; there's research showing that merely sharing a photo with a remote coworker improves collaboration success.
I've always made sure my face is accessible one way or another, including on my business card. This last is a rare practice, unfortunately…
I completely agree and had come to the same conclusion recently. For the last couple months I have been using Bump for iPhone (full disclosure: I am a cofounder of Bump Technologies) to exchange contact information. As a result I all of a sudden have a lot of pictures associated with my contacts in Outlook. I didn't think this would have a big impact on email for me but it has. Pictures of new acquaintances makes people more accessible and familiar, and pictures of existing relationships makes email more personal. When I receive an email from my brother and his picture is attached it makes me smile.
I started playing with a non-face avatar a few weeks ago (it's a drawing of me that i think evokes me pretty well). i can't seem to find a good real photo of me. i got two "i like that" and no negative ones.
One thing to consider is this: if I follow you on Twitter (or read your blog) based on reputation alone, and you don't have a good picture, how would I recognise you in a crowd? I met several people at Defrag that way – by walking up to them because I had seen their real faces as their avatar. I would be very hesitant to do that based on something that is drawn or animated. At least one of those people recognised me as well, from across the room. And yes, if it were a planned meeting, I would do research to find out what someone looked like, but in a chance meeting it's great to have the real deal.
Gist is currently using Gravatar’s for their image search although I’m not sure how deeply wired it is into things. I’ll connect them up with you.
Nice article, it makes a lot of sense. I was possibly meeting someone at Refresh DC meet-up for the first time. I had to send them a link from Flickr of images of myself because I do not currently use a real photo of myself on Twitter.
Currently I just use a light blue background with my initials (jfc iii). Time to find a good image of myself on Flickr and overlay my initials and maybe even give it a light blue tint to start and slowly bring it around to just a normal photo of me.
This way people that I don't know that follow me will have a better idea of what I look like from here on out.
Enjoyed the post. We need to remember that the consumer Internet is <20 years old. Trust continues to be limiting factor among certain users … not just whether to input medical or financial data, but also to engage and open up our hearts and minds to fellow users. Photos are an attempt to break down those barriers. Seeing my wife's picture when my iPhone rings brings a smile to my face as well … one of life's simple pleasures to get you through the day.
I had been experimenting with various avatars for fun, but have come back to a personal photo. I get grief from friends for my photo since it looks so serious, when in fact my daughter snapped it while I was reading blogs.
[...] Feld reflects on a similar epiphany in a recent blog post: “It’s All About the Faces.” (No, he isn’t talking about Rod Stewarts’ bandmates in the Gasoline Alley / [...]
Avatars may be very appropriate things to use if the context is right. Say if I am part of a Civil War enactment group, then an civil war related Avatar like a famous Union or Conferederate Soldier makes sense. If fact, it may be much cooler and appropriate if you do use it in such circles!
If you are dealing with a person one on one in their VC or Venture/Science Evangelizer role like Brad's, then it makes sense for the Actual Photo to be the Avatar, since in that context that's the one that makes sense!
The Internet provides us the capability of using Anonymity in exciting new ways like Avatars if they are used in context that makes sense!
My 2 Cents!
Interesting post. Faces, whether they are used in the profile picture or within the content of the website are very powerful. This is evidenced by the tagging feature used by Facebook – and now others. The first 30-40 photos in my fb album were uploaded by my friends, and I was tagged. Over a few weeks I had a full album of memories and it brought my profile to life.
The next level is live video, but that's an different topic…
I just wish that my contact list on my iPhone would be smart enough to sync photos with my Twitter and Facebook friends photos .. That's actually one of the biggest things the Palm Pre does that was impressive. A small feature, but I think would totally change my user experience for my phone ..
(not an insightful post, but thought I'd throw it out there)
I totally agree. So obvious, yet so elusive. I hope that Gist will be able to do this soon.
Great post! There is a special place for faces in the human brain. Babies at a specific age start recognizing faces, and doctors are able to diagnose Autism earlier on in children who do not recognize faces a the typical age. What great treatments and business could be made if entrepreneurs explored basic biological anthropology? Even the fashion world could see a huge bump in sales if they took advantage of the well-documented fact that the size and alignment of ears to the face is a major contributing factor to sexual attraction, or beauty. Yes, it's a human-wide, multicultural phenomena!
Hi Brad, I'm a friend of Ilana and Warren's, and I just want to say that I agree! People are looking for human connections and authenticity. A photo that shows the real you will always be more impactful than a cartoon version. Good luck with everything you're doing! Joanna
[...] 1. Brad Feld: It’s All About the Faces [...]
A friend at Facebook mentioned some UX research they did a year ago or so…I don't remember the exact numbers, but they found that commenting increased by double-digit percentages when they displayed a photo next to the name; that people who uploaded a photo of themselves were way more likely to return to the site and become active users; etc. Evidently that's why you started to see the little thumbnail photos *everywhere*.
I think you're right on–I have all my Outlook photos synced from Facebook and it's fantastic.
>>I heard the line “it’s all about the faces” from someone in the past few weeks.
that "someone" would be me:
https://twitter.com/davemcclure/status/1789385359
both profile photos of faces and avatar graphics have their advantages / disadvantages… but for sure, it matters a lot that it's recognizable, high-quality, warm / friendly / sexy / powerful, reasonable level of zoom, smiling, etc.
it's even important which way the face is angled (looking left vs right, up vs down). there are powerful evolutionary & psychology factors that determine this. there was a fascinating presentation by Joseph Carrabis at NextStage Evolution on this topic i saw a few years back… if i can dig up a link to the deck i'll post it back here.
But in your case Dave we get to stare at a Dr. Seuss hat? Seems like an odd choice considering, no?
no not really. all about the "faces" really is more like "all about the warm fuzzy graphics i relate to", which could be both pictures of faces, or avatar icons.
in my case, for twitter i've chosen an icon that's associated with some brand & iimagery that i like, and that seems to resonate with a lot of people. it's fun, and approachable… just like the smiling picture i have on facebook.
they're different, but both fun & approachable.
[...] one post Brad Feld describes his decision to switch back to a normal photo avatar after changing to a cartoon avatar for a while, deciding [...]
This is why we have changed the "dimension" in which one interacts with Twitter.
Instead of the primary dimension being the timeline, it is the "face" – hover over the face for that person's tweets.
In doing so, you are with a group of people, each talking – as opposed to with a bunch of talking, each by a person.
Check it out : http://www.twitterForBusyPeople.com/
In internet we use the avatars. But little bit of us know about real meaning of this word.
Origin of this word is following – In English, the word has come to mean "an embodiment, a bodily manifestation of the Divine." However, the Sanskrit word Avatara means "incarnation." The term is used primarily in Hindu texts. For example, Krishna is the eighth avatar (incarnation) of Vishnu the Preserver, whom many Hindus worship as The Supreme Personality of Godhead. The Dasavatara are ten chosen incarnations of Lord Vishnu by the devotee, to glorify the Lord.
I remember when a ringtone for a specific caller was cool! lol It was not that long ago. It's so much nicer to associate faces and images with callers, those on IM chat apps, etc. It takes an impersonal mode of communication and makes it more friendly.
[...] talks about the importance of real photos in Twitter, rather than a graphic or cartoon. He then discusses tying photos to people’s contact details [...]