Story: Anna Narinen
TechNet is an event organized by Microsoft and it was held on the 15th of November at the Finlandia Hall in Helsinki. The place was crowded with the professionals of the ICT industry and everyone seemed to be excited to learn new things at the seminars as well as meeting both old and new friends! The main theme of the day was, not so surprisingly, Windows Phone as a platform.


In the beginning of the day you could either choose a track to follow for the rest of the day or switch between seminars according to your interests. I followed a track called the Windows Phone UX Tour, and I could not be happier for doing so!

First the lecturer introduced many interesting and useful design principles, brainstorming techniques and ideation methods. Then they were applied to a real Windows Phone application to enhance the user experience of the product. It was amazing to see how much just the design can change the usability experience of an application. And let’s face it; no matter what features your application has, nobody wants to use it if it is badly designed and has a poor user experience. In the afternoon we were also shown the process of creating a Windows Phone application from scratch to finish. Much information to absorb for one day!

Before I headed back Tampere I also visited a consumer event organized by Microsoft, Hello Helsinki! at the Vanha Yliopistotalo. There I met our street team from TTVO and also got to play around with the brand new Nokia Lumia 800! Boy had I been waiting for that moment… I thought I loved Nokia N9 over everything else, but this one really puts down a tough fight! I also got to test the Halo Anniversary Edition which was both epic and beautiful as I had expected.

All in all Microsoft TechNet was an awesome event and I am really happy that I was able to attend it! Special thanks to Juha Ollikainen for providing the tickets to me and other interested students. Now I just cannot wait for Microsoft TechDays which will be held in March 2012…

Links:
http://technet.microsoft.com/
http://microsoft.fi/geeksonwheels

Anna is student of our international Degree Programme in Media
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