Learning to Make Your Own Reality - IGDA Education Keynote 2009
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Learning To Make Your Own Reality Jane McGonigal, PhD INSTITUTE FOR THE FUTURE
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What new kinds of games will we play in the future, and what key knowledge and skills will game developers need to invent them? Futurist and game designer Jane McGonigal argues that over the next decade, games will become a powerful interface for managing our real work, organizing society, and optimizing our real lives. Increasingly, she predicts, game developers will be charged with the task of making people happier, smarter, friendlier, greener, and healthier -- and hundreds of millions of new gamers will be playing together at home, at school, at work, and everywhere in between. The result? Game design and development expertise will become a sought-after talent in virtually every industry and field, from Fortune 500 companies to top government agencies. Indeed, the future is brighter for game developers than ever before. But making games that aim to improve our quality of life and to re-invent society as we know it will require a new set of design skills and content expertise beyond what we traditionally teach in game programs. In this keynote, you'll find out the top five design competencies (such as 'technology foresight' and the ability to generate and measure 'participation bandwidth') and the five most important subject areas (such as positive psychology and mass collaboration) for this new class of reality-changing game developers. The key takeaway of this talk: We can live in any world we want but only if we teach the next generation of game developers what they need to know in order to imagine and make new and better realities.
Transcript of Learning to Make Your Own Reality - IGDA Education Keynote 2009
Learning To Make Your Own
Reality
Jane McGonigal, PhDINSTITUTE FOR THE FUTURE
Are you optimistic about
the future?
Jane McGonigal, PhDINSTITUTE FOR THE FUTURE
“Well, it's probably better than inventing the past. but I
wonder…”
“ ‘Invent The Future’, it says….”
“what proportion of people in the world really have the slightest chance of even altering their own futures?”
at least 1 in 2,000*
*not super-scientific
Game industry hotspots
3 million game designers, developers, hackers and counting...
The Great Work of Game Designers
Over the Next Decade will be to
Re-Invent Real Life as we know it.
5 key forces are driving us
toward A Game
Designer’s Future.
2. Persuasive Technology
1. Sustainable happiness
3. The Engagement Economy
4. Programmable Reality
5. SuperStructing
1. Sustainable happiness
1. Sustainable happiness
A measurably higher quality of life that:
• flows from scientific findings about optimal human experience,
and
• requires fewer non-renewable resources to generate well-being
What humans crave:1. satisfying work to do
2. the experience of being good at something
3. time spent with people we like
4. the chance to be a part of something bigger
The Quality of Life IndexThe Happy Planet Index
“Gross National Happiness”Subjective Life Satisfaction
The Canadian Index of Well-BeingWorld’s Most Livable Cities
The Vanderford Riley Well Being Schedule
The Authentic Happiness Inventory
How well do countries use their resources to deliver longer lives, greater physical well-being, and
life satisfaction?
“Happiness consists in activity. It is a running stream, not a stagnant pool.”
- John Mason Good
What humans crave:1. satisfying work to do
2. the experience of being good at something
3. time spent with people we like
4. the chance to be a part of something bigger
Multiplayer games are the
ULTIMATE happiness
engines.
My life is BROKEN.
Dancing together = Happy
“Flower has peace, it has wonder, it has twists, it has despair, and it has a catharsis.” – Jenova Chen
1. Sustainable happiness
FORECAST 2009 – 2019: Game designers become happiness hackers.
They are called upon to help individuals, communities, and entire populations better structure their everyday lives for authentic happiness and sustainable well-being.
1. Sustainable happinessWHAT TO
READ
1. Sustainable happinessWHAT TO
WATCH
1. Sustainable happinessWHAT TO TRY
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE:
If you could:
• make one person measurably happier
Who would it be, and what game would you make for them?
2. Persuasive Technology
Human-computer interaction intentionally designed to change the way someone:
• thinks,
• acts, or
• behaves
Computers in Persuasive RolesTOOL:
Increases capability
SOCIAL ACTOR: Creates dynamics
MEDIUM:Provides
experienceB.J. FOGG
• Google Power…
World Without Oil
FORECAST 2009 - 2019: Game designers become change agents.
They are called upon to create systems that change minds, teach new habits, and transform everyday practices.
WHAT TO READ
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE:
If you could change:
• what one person does every day, or
• how one group thinks about one thing
What would you change, and how would your game do it?
WHAT TO TRY
3. The Engagement Economy
The growing need to compete for and harness:
• crowd resources
and
• participation bandwidth
We must ‘collaborate or perish’—across borders, cultures, disciplines, and firms, and increasingly with masses of people at one time.
—Tapscott & Williamsin Wikinomics
61
Cognitive resources+
Cognitive diversity=
PARTICIPATION RESOURCES
100 million mental hours from a highly diverse knowledge
community WIKIPEDIA
*as calculated by Clay Shirky
100 million mental hours (xref WIKIPEDIA)
= 5 days of World of Warcraft
“The purpose of all video games is to train a player to work harder while still enjoying it …”
– Nick Yee
“… and the success of online games demonstrates how seductive and concealed the work treadmill can be.”
– Nick Yee
FOLD IT
lab.signtific.org
“What will you do when it’s as easy and affordable to launch a personal satellite
as it is to launch a website or social network today?”
• Screenshot of Lab playtest
ETech’s modus operandi
Positive imagination outweighed dark imagination
2:1 (650:312)
ETech’s modus operandi
Highly collaborative: Momentum cards most often played (870)
You are a SUPER-CHALLENGING crowd:
>450 ANTAGONISM (“I disagree!”) >200 ADAPTATION (“a different
take”) >350 INVESTIGATION (“explain
it!”)
ETech’s modus operandi
The start of SPACE MEDICINE?
The start of SOLAR PROSPERITY?
The start of SPACE SOURCING?
Within 24 hours of launch, the site was receiving 70,000 classifications an hour. More than 50 million classifications were received during its first year, from almost 150,000 people.
4 published, peer-reviewed scientific papers and 4 more in progress
1 new solar object discovery – “the Voorwerp” mystery!
FORECAST 2009-2019: Game designers become “fungineers” and “mass collab architects”.
They are asked to invent fun new ways for more people to participate in mass collaboration efforts, and to develop more engaging platforms for crowds to contribute.
WHAT TO READ
WHAT TO WATCH
WHAT TO TRY
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE:
If your game could get:
• 100 people to do one thing online
What would it be, and what would it add up to?
4. Programmable Reality
Our growing ability to embed sensors, micro-controller boards, and networks in:
• physical objects
• built environments
and
• ourselves
The HOW:Location !
Sensing!Bio metrics!
Motion!Crowd- sourcing!Augmented reality!
Nike+ e-crusade
The Lost Ring
JEtSET
Neurosky gaming headset
JUDECCA
107
108
FORECAST 2009 - 2019: Game designers learn to blend realities.
For every screen-based experience, there is a corresponding real-world object, physical environment, or social interaction.
WHAT TO READ
WHAT TO WATCH
WHAT TO TRY
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE:
If your could make a game by:
• embedding 1 micro-controller board or 1 sensor in 1 physical object
What would it be, and how would you play with it?
5. SuperStructing
A method of extreme-scale problem-solving that:
• emphasizes flexibility, transparency, and rapid prototyping
and
• requires a high threshold for frustration, the ability to handle uncertainty
“And wouldn’t it be easier to
innovate if life were more like
a game.”
- Dan Newman, public strategist
“Games are the most elevated form of investigation.”
- Albert Einstein
• Spore -ish
Jill Tarter + Will Wrighta CONVERSATION
“I’m interested in the possibility that learning to be good at a game makes you good at life, makes you good at changing the world, and gives you skills that are going to allow you to reinvent your environment. Because, in the game, you play against an environment that’s been given to you.”
“There’s real value in being pushed toward global awareness and looking long-term. That’s one of the things that I find very useful about games…. I think
these are the timelines we need to be looking — the 100- or 200-year horizons.
Because most of the really bad stuff that’s happening right now is the result
of very short-term thinking.”
GLOBAL SUPERTHREATS
Participation bandwidth harnessed in 6 weeks:
a community of >7000 forecasters > 1000 stories about the future > 500 active strategy forums > 500 collaborative superstructures
OUR SECRET MISSION:
Create a league of
Super-Empowered
Hopeful Individuals
(SEHIs)*Jamais Cascio
RubysBequest.com
FORECAST 2009 - 2019: Game designers are in charge of extreme-scale, global collaboration jams.
They are asked to design games that help diverse massively-multiplayer communities tackle real-world, open-ended problems.
WHAT TO READ
SuperStruct
WHAT TO WATCH
WHAT TO TRY
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE:
If you could make a game that:
• connects two unlikely communities
• to do 1 extraordinary thing together
Who would it be, and what would they collaborate on?
So what’s important?
MAKE YOUR OWN REALITY: Happier, Smarter, More Engaging,
& More Resilient
2. Persuasive Technology
1. Sustainable happiness
3. The Engagement Economy
4. Programmable Reality
5. SuperStructing
Images
Creative Commons IMAGE & PHOTO CREDITS via Flickr“make your own reality” – H. koppdelaney
“making the future” – Jason Tester
“invent the future” – stuant63
“optimistic about” – Jon Young UK
“invent” - Gyongy Laky
“refresh sunrise” - rk.balla
“5 forces” Londongraffiti2
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