Building a Music Experience for Everyone

This project was developed during my time at OCAD for a Systems Thinking class, where we were given the design challenge: How might we apply systems thinking to address issues surrounding an everyday product? I chose Spotify as they have “Truly separated themselves through leveraging data for personalizing the experience of listening to and discovering new music.”

I proposed a problem statement: How can the experience of music be inclusive to any person? This led to my curiosity to learn about deaf people’s musical experience and how we can reimagine a new, fulfilling music experience for them.

After dissecting Spotify as a system, I asked follow-up questions: 1. How can everyone experience music to the fullest? 2. How can we create a fulfilling music experience for hard-of-hearing users? 3. How can we elevate their existing experience? 4. Why is there a misconception that music is only experienced through the ears? 5. How can we implement other forms of sensations (visual, physical, emotional) aspects of music for hard-of-hearing users?

After conducting 1-1 interviews with a few stakeholders, I directly connected with the hard-of-hearing community on Reddit to gain deeper insights into what their hearing loss condition is, what their current music experience is like, and what they would like to see in music tech to help them. These insights I gathered helped me generate three distinct personas and what the main features the Spotify integration should have.

Mid-fidelity mockups highlighting features: Lyrics + Visualizers, Vibrations.

High-fidelity mockups highlighting features: Colour, Equalizer, Lyrics, Visualizers, Vibrations.