The Michaels take a quick diversion to talk about how 3D Printing can change work and gaming. Is this just an excuse for Michael R. to talk about all the fun he’s had playing with his new MakerBot? We propose that it is not the case. For those of you who check out our website we have a great pic of a before and after view of a 3d Scan/Print.
We also discuss the WoW Model Viewer and how it allows you to play with models from within the game World of Warcraft.
Michael M. tells us about TwinKind and an innovative company in Germany doing cool things with 3d Printing of yourself. Can we say Mini-Me?
3D Printing is going to be an incredibly disruptive force in supply chain, we will no longer need to move atoms around the world to create what people need. What’s next – turning 3D printing to gold? Perhaps the guys over at MadeSolid in material science can help us advance that.
We then look at how the Smart Phone has been realized as old technology, loads of funny. Makes us all want to go out and pick up a new Fanny Pack.
Phaedra, Sandy, Michael and Michael are all on deck for this podcast to discuss location based games, review Michael R’s experiences from CES, brainstorm gamifying sports, and much much more. Tune in for some serious discussion on serious games.
Location, Location, Location
Michael M kicks things off to follow on from last week’s blog post on The Tap Labs’ game Tiny Tycoons. Things get really location specific as Sandy suggests that there should be an emerging new game along the lines of SnapChat called SnapTrack, where location information is shared with friends, but only for a limited time. Given that the last entity to have that name was sold for (wait for it) one billion dollars, there could quite well be something to it!
CES
Michael R gives a terrific flyover from his experience at the Consumer Electronics Show, summing things up by saying “the Internet of Things is real. Software and integration is real, and 3D printing is now entering mainstream.” A shoutout to Ian “epredator” Hughes for his early thinking in this area. Exciting developments in robotics, contact lenses (spiders are next, I’m sure) and augmented/interactive television give the team plenty to explore. Michael R had a chance to meet with the SeeSpace team to discuss the InAiR innovation while he was in Las Vegas, and that interview is here:
And for some CES robotics fun —
Gamifying Sports
Phaedra was eager to think about the gamification of sports during this championship season and to kick around other ways of engaging sports fans beyond Fantasy Football. The team discusses players predicting plays (and during the show editing, came across an NFL game exactly in this vein), sports trivia and user interface means of overlaying information on top of the existing game in action via the InAir concept discussed in the CES section. An idea about engaging individuals to play the sport while the sport is played live, using the same players, the same data and analytics is kicked around, and the comparison of player vs player, team vs team and crowd vs crowd is served up.
Comments Off on Good news on a lost episode and intro to Tiny Tycoons
We have some good news for our podcast listeners — while there was not a recording this past Friday, an episode thought to be lost has been found! There needs to be some cleanup, and that will take place over the next few days. So in the meantime, let us remind you that we are interested in your feedback and are eager to hear your suggestions on topics that you would like us to cover.
In the meantime, there is one topic that we’ve been very interested here over at Games At Work, and that deals with location-based computing, coupled with games. The intersection of iBeacons (and other low energy Bluetooth) and gaming has been very promising for some time, and MacRumors posted an interesting story on the game Tiny Tycoons.
Tiny Tycoons is a cross between Foursquare, Monopoly City Streets and Ingress, where you can travel the world, both physically and virtually, to buy and trade properties. I’ve downloaded the game and will be giving it a whirl, and will look forward to sharing my insights on how this could be adapted for business purposes. I’m going to be the mayor, um, owner of a few new properties shortly!
Episode 71, Grinding at Work was recorded Friday the 3rd of January 2014 — Happy New Year!
Phaedra, Michael and Michael start the new year off with a bang, sharing the games that they’ve been playing over the holidays, discussing the Virtuix Omni 360 degree treadmill device, and exploring how grinding gaming experiences may lend themselves to improved customer and employee engagement. A very interesting gamification idea emerges for how Kinect-like devices could provide biofeedback to call center employees to help them stay “in the zone” and be as effective as possible. Have a listen!
