Need & Research

Using social media to get small communities to interact across different age groups. For the thorough ethnographic study, we decided to work on Parsi community.

Secondary study

We started with a Secondary study which suggested that the Parsi community is extremely active with social events where the young meet ups, rich culture of playing board games, food and often community get together. Everyone lives together. Therefore the Parsi communities are defined and known by areas For, e.g., Rustam is from the Bandra Parsi society. (Identified by which part of the city they live and which community). Every town in India has their Parsi compounds. As the community is incredibly generous and wealthy, they are taken care off by the Parsi organization. If anyone wants to move away from the religion, culture, and society by marrying into another community or settling outside ethe community, result in boycotting the community and can no more utilize the comforts provided. Therefore we concluded that Parsi's are well united. We realized that somewhere this might make them as an Orthodox community.

Primary study

We conducted a contextual inquiry with some of the current society generals, writers from Parsi magazine, families and the younger generation in Parsi compounds and outside. To understand how openly can they talk about issues related to communication and networking in the society and is it a real need.

• Identifying key factors which brought people together for, e.g., stories, artifacts, history, religion, sports, games, etc. And how are they communicated currently
• Insight on what would keep the Culture alive without it being too deliberate.
• Making the content engaging across the ages.
• Existing products to stay in touch; what is missing from them.

The definition of who is, and is not a Parsi is a matter of great contention within the Zoroastrian community in India. It is accepted that a Parsi is a person who:

• is directly descended from the original Persian refugees, and
• has been formally admitted into the Zoroastrian religion.

Observation & Finding

User study helped in gathering insights to shape a social media platform for the Parsi community to increase activity and engagement in the community. Community awareness & engagement can happen by the interaction between elders and the younger generation, hence both of them were our target users.

From ethnography, literature review, contextual inquiry, focused interview with a stakeholder from different age groups, I identified habits, culture, way of living, social interaction within the community.

Concept

Web application to build your family trees and link them to each other. An app to understand your roots and greatness of the family and feeling proud about it. A platform to read/share stories and legends about great Parsi leaders, travelers, community contributors, historic events, myriad events, images; help build personal connections within the community.

The idea is to tie a string with a connection (first/second/third/golden etc.)

1. Family Strings
   • Helps build a family lineage/tree
   • Help link different family trees to make more connections.
   • Help discover old or distant family members and build ties with them.
   • Helps build golden strings with Parsi legends.
2. String Assets
   • Everyone populates the platform by adding stories which have been family assets for generation through AV, images. These could be stories, incidents, theories, common proverbs, humor etc. Build strings with people who are associated to these assets. Every profile is linked with many assets.
   • Helps read stories about different families in the family and community. These may not be biographical but more personal information which creates a data base.
3. String interest
   • Help build and find different interests groups.
   • These groups help address personal social queries, problem and suggestions.