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August 27, 2013

nicole lazzaro

Nicole Lazzaro Explains The 4 Keys to Fun and Gamification

Ivan Kuo02 mins

The Gamification Revolution is the only live gamification webcast featuring Gabe Zichermann and fellow gamification experts every week. Join us and have all of your gamification questions answered by these experts. Today we’ll be looking at our last week’s guest: Nicole Lazzaro, President of XEODesign.

Be sure to catch our next episode this Thursday, August 29 at 1PM ET/1800 GMT, where we will feature Karl Kapp, Assistant Director of Bloomsburg University’s Institute for Interactive Technologies and prominent eLearning/gamification expert.

Remember you can participate in the show if you sign-in and RSVP! Signing in will allow you to receive show reminders, ask questions, and even join Gabe and our guest for a live question.

In last week’s episode, we explored the idea of fun. Would anybody even care about gamification if it didn’t produce something that was fun to do? Gamification practitioners have a responsibility of understanding how a fun system plays into their overall design and Nicole Lazzaro, came on the show to explain the psychology of fun and her theory on the 4 keys to all the types of fun that exist. Watch the video below to get the full scoop on what it means to have fun!



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NSA Gamifies Surveillance Training: Ethical or Questionable?

Heong Weng Mak117 mins

There is a recent Der Spiegel report on the NSA gamifying its infamous international surveillance program, XKEYSCORE. Gleaned from a secret report entitled, “Tales from the Land of Brothers Grimm”, it detailed training procedures that were used to motivate NSA agents who are new to the program. Gamification mechanics were used such as how agents could earn “skilz” points and “unlock achievements” as they effectively use the training program. What was startling was that the report indicated the training procedure changed the perception of its users opinion on surveillance after a certain period of time.

Here at Gamification Co, we have covered numerous examples where gamified systems have been used for good in solving problems across industries. Nonetheless, there is a need to address the elephant in the living room where gamification is used for questionable means.

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