Archive for life
11 November, 2009 at 9:23 am
· Filed under design, game design, life, quote, research ·Tagged rewards
We can easily become slaves to novelty, especially in the form of shiny technological toys that push novelty to us every hour of the day.
“…The brain is built to ignore the old and focus on the new….
Novelty is probably one of the most powerful signals to determine what we pay attention to in the world.”
“Researchers have found that novelty causes a number of brain systems to become activated, and foremost among these is the dopamine system…
…research shows that dopamine is more like the "gimme more" neurotransmitter.”
“…the role of dopamine is not in the pleasure that one may get from the drug, but in establishing the craving that keeps one coming back for more…
When dopamine is released, it is a signal to the brain that is it now time to start learning what is going on.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/russell-poldrack/multitasking-the-brain-se_b_334674.html
http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/multitasking-is-the-brain-seeking-novelty/
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9 November, 2009 at 1:34 pm
· Filed under life, project management, quote
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9 November, 2009 at 1:32 pm
· Filed under life, quote
Are we evolving to absorb the language of marketing in to our ideas about ourselves. Are social networking, and transparent life streams making us more careful about crafting personas and living our unique brand concept?
“…They’re not presenters, yet they’ll hand over serious money to be shown how to “present” better: how to style their clothes, how to style their websites, even, in some cases, how to style their minds. It’s partly the global recession, which makes having a clearly defined public persona more vital in getting, or keeping, a job. Or it may be that the ideas and language of marketing are now so inescapable that people don’t think of themselves as just people any more. They’re concepts.”
http://www.moreintelligentlife.com/content/peter-york/big-sell
For most ordinary people, they follow the trend and do what everyone else is doing. A few set the trends and lead the way.
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18 October, 2009 at 8:23 pm
· Filed under life, quote
"Liquid Modernity" is Bauman’s term for the present condition of the world as contrasted with the "solid" modernity that preceded it.
Individuals have to splice together an unending series of short-term projects and episodes that don’t add up to the kind of sequence to which concepts like "career" and "progress" could be meaningfully applied. Such fragmented lives require individuals to be flexible and adaptable — to be constantly ready and willing to change tactics at short notice, to abandon commitments and loyalties without regret and to pursue opportunities according to their current availability.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zygmunt_Bauman
http://trendwatching.com/briefing/
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15 October, 2009 at 7:16 pm
· Filed under design, game design, life, quote
BMW TV ad, my emphasis.
We are a car company.
But we don’t just make cars.
We make time machines, build Snowploughs, and create works of art.
We inspire fans, and fan clubs.
We are efficient and dynamic.
We even shape the future.
We realized a long time ago that what you make people feel is just as important … as what you make.
And at BMW we make Joy.
http://www.bmw.tv/core-services/view-video.mp4?id=1056&type=itunes&formatType=ipod
BMWs may create joy in their owner, they have a darker side and can also create superiority and arrogance on the road.
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18 September, 2009 at 12:07 pm
· Filed under life, research ·Tagged narcissism
“I” is the most popular word at the start of a tweet, and is the 2nd most popular word used on Twitter.
Only ~10% of tweets contain a question
This compares to general advice on good blogging, which recommends that readers prefer less “I”, and the human brain response well, and better remembers intriguing questions.
Are we becoming more narcissistic?
Source Oxford English Corpus
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12 September, 2009 at 8:36 pm
· Filed under life, quote
“…we also live in a world where every minute is filled with television, computer game and other distractions. There is no time to be bored any more and that means our imaginations are beginning not to work as well as they could. People whose imaginations have withered can be rather dangerous folk, because they cannot understand how other people think or feel, and they tend walk safe and well worn roads, rather than exploring where new ideas might lead them. They miss the magic. Without imagination, the world becomes a very dull place.”
John & Caitlin Matthews in StoryWorld
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1 September, 2009 at 9:04 pm
· Filed under life, publishing, quote
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25 August, 2009 at 7:51 pm
· Filed under life, quote, research
Is multitasking causing a change in people’s capabilities? By multitasking, do you make yourself less capable… of multitasking, and anything else that requires concentration, flow or focus.
"The shocking discovery of this research is that [high multitaskers] are lousy at everything that’s necessary for multitasking," Professor Nass said.
"The irony here is that when you ask the low multitaskers, they all think they’re much worse at multitasking and the high multitaskers think they’re gifted at it."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8219212.stm
“But at the very least, he said, multitaskers should be told that they are bad at multitasking.”
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19 August, 2009 at 7:31 pm
· Filed under life, quote
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11 August, 2009 at 8:26 pm
· Filed under life, quote, research
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28 July, 2009 at 8:16 pm
· Filed under life, quote
Influency
Knowing how to be persuasive and tell compelling stories in multiple social media spaces (each space requires a different persuasive strategy and technique)
Protovation
Fearless innovation in rapid, iterative cycles; the ability to lower the costs and increase the speed of failure
http://www.iftf.org/node/2774
Read the rest of this entry »
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28 July, 2009 at 8:11 pm
· Filed under life
She has the voice of authority. He tells you what to do without being in the slightest bit aware of the real situation around you. The voice grows on you, and becomes engrained friend you trust.
The sat nav voice is carefully constructed to be calm and believable. The Media Equation suggests that we happily suspend our understanding of technology’s limits and treat it like a person. A person we are willing to listen to and a person that we trust.
Sat nav at best can be said to have partial information that has no second to second live updating. Instructions to take turns happen in real time and more & more we will see people driving in to one another because sat nav told them to.
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16 May, 2009 at 11:18 am
· Filed under life, project management, quote
This seems like pretty good advice for all presentations – along with use lots of pictures, no more than 4 bullet points and don’t read out the words on the slides…
“If you had five minutes on stage what would you say? What if you only got 20 slides and they rotated automatically after 15 seconds? Around the world geeks have been putting together Ignite nights to show their answers.”
http://ignite.oreilly.com/
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9 May, 2009 at 10:52 am
· Filed under life, project management, quote
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3 May, 2009 at 10:01 am
· Filed under design, life, project management, quote
“Blank Page Syndrome: when presented with infinite choice, it’s sometimes hard to get started”
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000407.html
Without a boundary it is too easy to drift inefficiently, to strike off in different directions, to take your first idea, to freeze and stare at the blank page or to spend way too much time or money on something.
Cirque Du Soleil : The Spark, Igniting The Creative Fire That Lives Within Us All by Lyn Heward and John U. Bacon
“Oh, we’ve got budgets and deadline, all right,” she said. “Without them, I don’t think we’d be half as creative as we are. They force us to come up with solutions we’d never think of otherwise. Constraints on time, money, and resources can be incredible motivators!. Some of our most inspired ideas have arisen from the most Spartan situations.”
“So how do you turn these random ideas in to an act?” – “Deadlines!” He laughed. “Of course, they always come too fast, but without them, your mind is not focused. With them, on the other hand, your panicked mind starts coming up with crazy ideas it would never otherwise. If you have two days to design a transition from a trapeze act to a trampoline, you will think of something!”
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29 April, 2009 at 8:50 pm
· Filed under game design, life
“Man has been in the hunting game all throughout his existence. Primitive man’s main job was to hunt. Survival depended on it. Early man had to hunt for food and clothing, as well as shelter and protection.”
There are great parallels between hunting and playing games.
Hunting requires skill, knowledge and an investment of time. It demands concentration, effort and an understanding of the environment you are in. It has risk reward choices, offers thrills, fun and is rewarding on a number of different levels.
“…it’s not just the killing that is the thrill, it is the hunt. A hunter has used his/her skills to find or track his prey” … “It’s exciting to find the wild game, but it now finalizes the deal when the prey becomes yours; your trophy, your reward, your meal, your memory, your payoff.”
“…this goes back to early man. It’s inbred in humans.”
http://fishing-hunting-camping.com/hunting/whyhunt.php
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21 April, 2009 at 9:15 pm
· Filed under life, research
Yes. Your sub conscious gut listens to everything you hear, and it takes most things at face value. Your brain has evolved to form snap judgements, using a rule of ‘appearance equals reality’ to speed up reaction times. Very useful when making life or death decisions about predators stalking you through the savannah grasses.
Your inner voice or ego chatterbox, twitters away full of undermining self criticism. Yet your sub conscious gut listens… and believes it just like any other input. (Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway® by Susan Jeffers)
While your sub conscious believes what it hears, your conscious mind will often try to temper and modify your gut’s opinions.
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17 April, 2009 at 5:11 pm
· Filed under game design, life ·Tagged rewards
Game rewards can sit in a structure & have a purpose of generating emotion and loyalty for a game. Loyalty is a slightly different, more conscious and perhaps more positive version of addiction.
Is there a good loyalty encouraging structure for your game’s rewards?
“Finding the right reward model
…loyalty programs provide a good basis for understanding the basic levers of incentives and rewards…
- The frequent flyer model — Participation -> richer experience — …reserve exit row seats in advance, get a United representative on the phone quickly, and — best of all — board before the unwashed masses.
- The credit card points model — Participation -> cash …most, an accrued currency ("miles" or "points") are exchanged for tangible goods…
- The American Express model — Participation -> manufactured exclusivity — "Membership has its privileges." Amex marketing has taught us that simply using the card communicates a sense of status. Invitation-only web services …offer a certain cache to the users as representations of geek cred.”
http://www.cooper.com/journal/2009/04/loyalty.html
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14 April, 2009 at 7:50 am
· Filed under game design, life, project management ·Tagged rewards
“Pavlov was on to something. Ding… Recognition is the bell that drives human behaviour”
The Recognition Microscope: Fuel for Human Acceleration
Recognition or game rewards should be;
- Positive – recognition is not a time for correction or feedback, it is a time to detail the positive
- Immediate – the closer to the event or behaviour the better
- Close – best presented in the same environment as the behaviour
- Specific – recognising specific behaviours have the greatest impact, clear and direct link to an event or behaviour
- Shared – peer feedback is as or more valuable than top down
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