Episode 62 – Gamification Carrots & Sticks

Phaedra and Michael M hold down the fort for the podcast, discussing the treatment of video games in the media in the wake of the tragic Navy Yard shootings and drawing some interesting thoughts on the nature of serious games to assist with mental health. Gamifying Travel They continue with a discussion on gamifying travel, and explore an idea where the game is to crowdsource the best travel options & prices between city pairs, setting up a competition to find the best solution using humans instead of algorithms.  The suggestion for how to monetize this game brings up the experiment … Continue reading

Episode 60 – Bubbly Bubblers in Gamified Buildings

Phaedra, Michael and Michael were delighted to be accompanied by Ross Smith, Director of Test in the Skype division of Microsoft for this show, centered around games for employee engagement. Ross described the recent work that he and his team have done with giving personality to buildings and using the building itself as the ‘game master’, to orchestrate and facilitate employee engagement. Games for health One of the intriguing examples (also discussed in Episode 58, but without the benefit of Ross’s first hand experience) uses a water cooler with personality as the mechanism for gamifying health.  While drinking eight glasses … Continue reading

Episode 56 – The Shame Game

Do you want to overlay the world or replace it? This is the question that your friendly co-hosts discuss as we learn that Oculus Rift has gotten a new CTO. Do you want to augment your face with constant data and insights? What layer of the world are you watching? Were the Vapors prescient in the their lyrics for “Turning Japanese?” Phaedra then gives us insights in the minds of finding a good sale. Is this the ultimate game for some? How viscerally do you play your savings game? Is it fun to save your business money by playing the … Continue reading

Episode 43 – Snakes on a Game

Michael M and Phaedra discuss San Francisco Gamification Summit, the ModSim conference in Virginia and touch on gamification, loyalty, collaboration, wearable computing, ethics and much more. Rajat Paharia’s keynote from the Gamification Summit sparks some interesting thoughts on Loyalty 3.0 — not just to products and services, but also to missions and organizations.  Harley Davidson is often cited as an example of customer loyalty and the ecosystem/community that surrounds a product, service, or in the case of HD, the lifestyle.  It will be interesting to see how games build loyalty. Michael and Phadera riff on the idea for how gamification … Continue reading