Sociologist George Ritzer wrote a classic book, The McDonaldization of Society, which deals with how modern rationalization and commercialization has penetrated almost every institution, even into those such as churches and universities that were once thought exempt. I am thinking, however, that finally there is starting to be a turn towards what I’ll call “McGonigalization” (after Jane McGonigal, the game designer involved in such socially-constructive “serious” massive multi-player online games as World Without Oil and SuperStruct. Her motto is “Reality is broken. Game designers can fix it,” which, while perhaps a little arrogant as a sound bite, at least has substantially more meaning to it than, say, “I’m lovin’ it.”
If everyone in tomorrow’s society is going to be a gamer anyway, it might as well involve these types of games rather than Grand Theft Auto IV or Left Behind….
We talked quite a bit about the importance of “learning games” in LIS 5433, and here’s one that I wish I’d found to share during the semester: Akinator. What was especially impressive to me was not only its ability to eventually “guess” the character I had in mind (Jane Austen’s Emma Woodhouse), but how good and close even its wrong guesses were: first, Austen’s Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice and then, Anne Elliott from Persuasion.)
I’d love to see the algorithm this must be using for “learning by doing.” Players can enter unguessed characters into its database, which must help it “learn” for next time, so, the more people play, the smarter Akinator gets!
What I find interesting about this concept of passively multiplayer online games is, of course, that it “names and claims” something that already exists, albeit in a different attention space. For instance…. the global economy?
Although I never did find out exactly what went on in Thom Gillespie’s alternative games workshop “The-Library-Knowledge-Kills” at LITA in Denver this fall (why did nobody blog about that? was everybody sworn to secrecy? the idea sounded absolutely fascinating!), it looks like I’m getting a second chance at achieving gamasutra anyway. Just in time for KM/LIS 5553: How to Write an Adventure Game. I think I may call mine “Google Underground.” Heh.
The “World Without Oil” ARG game launched back at the end of April, while our Competitive Intelligence class was immersed in other things, such as final projects and final exams, so we didn’t get a chance to jump in (although it certainly related to many of the things we were talking about  including how oil companies did competitive intelligence!) Read more…
Thom Gillespie (Indiana-Bloomington) is doing a pre-conference program at the LITA National Forum in Denver this October, which apparently involves a game for session participants called “the-library-knowledge-kills.” Don’t know anything more about it than the provocative title, but if it’s anything like the exercises he does with his game design students using examples like “Grand Theft Auto,” it’s bound to be an amazing experience. Gee is one thing (and a very good thing!), but Gillespie is something else, even though I myself am far more comfortable with Squeakland than with Liberty City….
