Businessweek recently compiled a “CEO’s Guide to Gamification”. The collection profiles a few companies that have been using gamification to solve problems in business, and gives executives a brief introduction to the topic. The site has put together a few interesting stories, and some highlights are below. Nissan has produced a well know example of gamification in…
True confessions: I love the dentist. Growing up, my uncle was my dentist. He still runs a hugely successful practice in Toronto and is well loved by his patients for his diligence and care. I looked forward to dental visits where I’d get a gum massage (AKA manual scaling), a chance to look at the…
Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Good Game ran a short but informative episode on gamification featuring our own Gabe Zichermann, Bunchball’s Rajat Paharia, and Marigo Raftopoulos. Visit ABC.net.au to view the video.
By 2015, 50% of companies that manage innovation and research will use gamification to drive innovation, according to a press release by Gartner. As gamification is just beginning and few public examples exist today, this finding means that the next four years are going to see rapid changes in management of the enterprise.
“There an estimated one billion homeless people in the world”, states the opening of the film Kicking It, a 2008 documentary by Susan Koch and Jeff Werner. The film documents the 4th Annual Homeless World Cup, massive football (soccer) event that takes place in Cape Town, South Africa. Teams from all over the globe are…
It’s not a secret, and it’s not new – kids hate school. Of course as adults it’s our job to tout the importance of education and how it can build your future, but we can all remember how much we hated school when we were kids. Students often find school, tedious and boring and the…
It’s long been said that the best way to develop the future is to learn from the past. Jane McGonigal’s new collaboration with the New York Public Library, Playmatics and Natron Baxter Applied Gaming does just that by challenging players to complete quests to become one of 500 finalists who will stay overnight in the…
We’ve talked a lot about various gamified check-in sites and apps that allow you to complete chores, do good deeds and lose weight on the Gamification blogs recently. While these apps are fun, engaging and helpful to those who are already motivated, they are all still susceptible to getting “gamed”. In any game or gamified structure you will…
Hopskoch is a new social interaction platform for publishers and marketers looking to attract, cultivate and retain brand enthusiasts. It was released a few weeks ago by the developer, Sifr, a startup out of New York. Hopskoch makes it easy for a mainstream web and mobile audience to interact with each other and the brands they love through a language of fun photo-taking games and storytelling. The platform already has a growing community of players, and I sat down with Sunil Madhu and Marty Monaco, Sifr’s founders, to talk about the motivations behind the play.
A lot of the conversation surrounding gamification tends to focus on how businesses can better engage and relate to customers. While it obviously can increase brand loyalty, gamification can also be used to better motivate and educate employees. In her recent blog post, Lauren Carlson over at Software Advice theorizes how game mechanics can be…
The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) recently launched their Games & Experimental Entertainment Lab (GEElab). During SXSW GEElab director Dr. Steffen P. Walz handed out cards, co-created with Lancaster University’s Dr. Paul Coulton, for Gamification: The Rhetoric Wars. Designed in the style of Magic: The Gathering, these cards depict 5 different guilds that represent…
Remember back in the late ’90’s where meeting people online seemed scary and dangerous? Now online dating is the new norm and it’s meeting people in real life that seems intimidating. How do you approach that cute stranger on the subway, in a coffee shop, the book store…? And what do you say? “Missed Connection”…
UPDATE: Our Workshop Series 2011 is now over. If you are still interested in keeping up with the fast-moving frontier of gamification, we will be offering an in-depth workshop at Gamification Summit New York on September 16, 2011. For information and registration, visit GSummit.com. We’re excited to announce that Gamification Co. has expanded its successful workshops…
As far back as we can remember, video games primarily utilized three senses: visual, auditory and tactile. As innovations continue to push the limit, so goes the number of senses we can activate in a virtual world. Believe it or not, the sense of smell is now being integrated into gameplay. As debuted at GDC…
According to Jen Pahlka, founder and Executive Director of Code for America, trust in government is at an all time low except amongst a single demographic: Millennials. This may seem odd, as our generation is typically seen either in a never ending text conversation, wasting time on Facebook, battling friends on Call of Duty, or clicking on cows in FarmVille. But I see these elements as something different. I believe our “wastes of time” have the ability to make our generation into the most participatory generation in the past two-thousand years. As Pahlka puts it, “it’s not that Millennials think the government works now, it’s that they think they can remake the government in their image”. In line with this idea, collaboration and participation through social media is becoming an integral part of the Government 2.0 movement, and I see games as the next step in the process.
