Gamification

Put up or Shut up and stop moaning about gamification.

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Spiral hypnosis Put up or Shut up and stop moaning about gamification

So, for my final post of the week (as I seem to have subconsciously challenged myself to blog all week), I want to throw a curve ball out there. If I am honest it is a brain dump and a rant. So strap in and enjoy the ride.

I have talked about gamification being a benign form of manipulation in the past.  I don’t think anyone within gamification who has any sense will disagree, gamification is manipulative. It is manipulative in the same way as marketing, or parenting. It is manipulative in the same way that society manipulates you on a day to day basis to go to work every day. Our society has been built on the idea that we should all be doing something. For some that is moving paper around. For others it is making the moving of paper more efficient.  For very few people is it anything truly meaningful. If we are honest, very few jobs are meaningful. We are not all doctors or nurses or fire-fighters or teachers etc. We work to pay tax, to buy food and because that is what we are told to do. Read More ...

First considerations of Gamification

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On thing I am asked more than any question when it comes to gamification, is how do I get started. What is the first thing I should do.

The answer they are hoping for normally is something like “Download this great framework and slap it on your product – job done”. However, this is never my answer (though at times, if it is suitable for their needs it will be part of the answer… but that’s another story!).

What I actually say is “Decide WHY you need gamification and WHAT you are actually using it for / on”. That should be the first days of discussion. Too many times you see gamification applied just because it can be applied. Read More ...

Points and Badges in Gamification – Not totally evil.

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Over the last few days, the conversation about the use of points and badges has come up several times with several different people.

The stock answer in gamification these days is that points and badges are bad gamification. They are meaningless and we should be looking at intrinsic motivation more – yet almost every implementation you see of gamification will have some form of points system and probably badges.  They may be called experience points and achievements, or gami-dollars and pictograms – who knows – but they still seem to be there. Read More ...

Gamify your drive home

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One of the day to day activities that I gamify in my life, is driving. More specifically, driving economically. Best of all, you don’t need to have some expensive gamified car (like the leaf) or any apps.

My car, like most now, has an on-board computer. I have this set to always show me my current miles per gallon (MPG). The game that I play with myself revolves around keeping the MPG number as high as possible. I do this by basically driving sensibly. Not having the air-con on all the time, being in the right gear etc. It is a very simple bit of gamification that revolves around two basic mechanics. Feedback and reward. Read More ...

Gamification Inspiration Cards

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Introduction | About the cards | Want to buy a deck? | More ways to play

Introduction

I don’t know what it is, but I love cards.  I think it stems from my parents, who were avid Bridge players. We always had several decks Bridge cards lying around. I like how they feel in your hand, how they smell, how they sound as you shuffle them. When I first discovered that people had been producing sets of cards for everything from project management to game design and of course gamification, I was a happy man! I own several of these kinds of decks now and love them all. Read More ...

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