Block.one | Senior UX Designer

Blockchain lexicon UX study

Block.one is a global leader in blockchain software. They originate, incubate, acquire, and invest in technologies and businesses that build trust in transactions and increase efficiencies. Block.one has invested over $4B globally and is the architect behind EOSIO, a leading open-source platform for blockchain innovation. 

As the Senior Visual Designer at Block.one, I helped lead a UX study that explored a significant challenge in the blockchain technology realm: the prevalent confusion over terminology among developers, designers, marketing teams, and users. This study fundamentally transformed our approach to discussing complex and technical concepts, enhancing our overall communication strategy and improving the UX of our products.

The problem: misaligned terminology

New technologies often spark debates over terminology. For example, when email was first introduced, numerous discussions arose over its usage and even its spelling.

A similar scenario unfolded at Block.one, but with blockchain technology. Frequently, engineers had to pause meetings to explain terms like ‘wallet,’ ‘keys,’ ‘encrypted,’ ‘identity,’ and ‘on-chain.’ 

"I thought 'wallet' was straightforward, until I realized it meant three different things to three people in the same meeting."

Personas and pain points

Personas and quotes underscore the critical need for a standardized blockchain terminology. Clear, consistent language is essential for ensuring that all stakeholders, from engineers and marketers, to UX designers and end-users, can communicate effectively and navigate the blockchain ecosystem with confidence.

We began posting related terms on the office wall and organized workshops to bring together stakeholders to discuss, debate, and refine the categorization. 

"Seeing terms on the wall and being able to physically move them around brought a sense of tangibility to our discussions."

Formalizing the inquiry

We systematized the collection of disputed terms and facilitated rank-ordering sessions for their review with different teams. We then sent a Google Form questionnaire to the whole company and again reviewed and rank-ordered the results.

"I never realized how passionate I could be about the word 'node' until we had to rank-order its definitions."

We documented a comprehensive lexicon and distributed it company-wide. The study dramatically improved internal communication and reduced misunderstandings. It became instrumental in onboarding and served as an essential reference for all team members. Collaboration across departments saw notable enhancements, streamlining project workflows and enhancing productivity.

Marketing outcome

A stark contrast can be see between the way Block.one positioned the EOS Authenticator App versus the Voice Social Media app one year later. Our inquiry resulted in product messaging and UX writing that eschewed jargon and appealed to a wider audience beyond the blockchain developer community. 

This study increased sensitivity to arbitrary terminology, and engineering and marketing teams consulted the research when crafting new features and messaging around new features.

"This project transcended mere terminology alignment; it revolutionized our approach to conveying complex ideas within and beyond our team."

Product outcome

Our blockchain lexicon study also inspired first-principles thinking about the relationships between commonly accepted blockchain terms. In particular, I was struck by the nonsensical relationship between keys and wallets. Traditionally, a key has been the metaphor to identify unlocking an action on a blockchain, and keys are kept in digital wallets. However, in the real world, keys are kept in pockets or purses — not wallets. 

Instead, we now theorized that the concept of a ‘pass’ is a more appropriate metaphor than a key. For users, a pass represents a familiar and tangible means of proving possession of a credential and granting access. Every day we interact with physical passes as part of our daily routines. As a library user, you simply show up and present your library card, which you keep in your wallet.

Pass manager

I explored the concept of passes further, iterating through sketches, paper prototypes, and wireframes with UX and engineering colleagues.

We theorized that the experience of using a digital pass manager should be very similar to the physical analog of pass cards. The user simply arrives at a service (whether it is a web app, a native app, a point of sale system, or a kiosk), and presents a pass to sign in or authorize an action. This is like a college student using their College ID to gain admission to a collegiate sports event, then once inside, using it to buy food at a stand with their campus dining balance, being presented with order confirmations before committing to the transactions.

My design exploration ultimately took the form of a high-fidelity prototype. 

Pass prototype

I created a prototype to illustrate the concept of passes in action. This shows a user selecting and purchasing items in a hypothetical e-commerce experience. Instead of completing the transaction with a credit card, here a simple and familiar flow is implemented that allows the user to securely make their purchase with a pass on a blockchain. 

No fumbling with keys or passwords required. And no need to have any knowledge, or even awareness, of the technical underpinnings.

Improved UX

We believed strongly that users should never have to consider the implications of whether they are using a web service with a database backend or a blockchain system. They should only need to consider their use case. 

Things like…

  • “I’m withdrawing funds from an ATM.”

  • “I’m liking a post on social media.”

  • “I’m buying chips from a vending machine.”

Never things like…

  • “I’m signing a transaction, with an R1 key, authorized for my blockchain11 account, on the example.com dapp, built on the Telos blockchain, built on the EOSIO platform.”

A Passwordless Future

This design exploration inspired by our blockchain lexicon study ultimately led to publishing a whitepaper on the concept of passwordless passes that summarized our findings and recommendations. 

We also released the pass manager as open-source software to the EOSIO developer community for continued experimentation and iteration in the hands of real users.