“Talk about experiences, not features. Technology is there to enable an experience, and as long as it doesn’t get in the way, most consumers would rather not worry about it.”
http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671910/the-12-trends-that-will-rule-products-in-2013
“…the research concluded that you’re not doing yourself any favors by responding to rude people or people who make you angry.
…researchers note that it can be difficult to overcome our natural impulse to engage when someone converses with us or says something that triggers us, but shunning is a more powerful weapon against jerks than argument.”
“Humility leads to an earnest and perpetual desire to understand the people who want your app, and thus better understand what they enjoy. You should be hungry to support and understand them.”
http://www.fastcompany.com/3004045/4-ego-traps-sink-rockstar-developers
We know that people often have rather wide screens and suffer reading disruptions as a side effect of trying to read lines that are 10 inches wide (that is, between 20-50 words wide). While most people feel that’s uncomfortable, what they don’t realize is that they can easily resize the window to make the (word) wrapping much better for them.
“Clay explained it in a way that I’ve never heard before and I’ll never forget again. Paraphrased slightly, he said: “Questions are places in your mind where answers fit. If you haven’t asked the question, the answer has nowhere to go. It hits your mind and bounces right off. You have to ask the question – you have to want to know – in order to open up the space for the answer to fit.”
What an insight. He continued to talk about the power of questions. Questions are your mind’s receptors for answers. If you aren’t curious enough to want to know why, to want to ask questions, then you’re not making the room in your mind for answers. If you stop asking questions, your mind can’t grow.”
http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3225-what-are-questions
Ask good questions;
* Don’t ramble on–terminate the sentence at the question mark.
* Get comfortable with silence.
* Start with "who, what, when, where, how, or why" for more meaningful answers.
* Don’t fish for the answer you want.
* Stop nodding if you don’t understand–ask a follow-up instead.
* If you get a non-answer, approach it again from a different angle.
* Rephrase the answer in your own words.
Don’t be afraid to ask dumb questions.
Ask questions to evaluate the validity of the other person’s information. Ask questions to gather data, to help formulate data in to information. Ask questions to help reach conclusions. Ask questions to make decisions and direct action.
"When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand."
A concise but evocative piece of advice for writers who have somehow painted themselves into a corner, plotwise. The addition of a new opponent or complication, usually amidst a burst of violence, can free a protagonist from where he has become mired in the current plot.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ChandlersLaw
via http://www.roleplayingtips.com/gm-techniques/how-to-think-faster-on-your-feet-while-you-gm/
“The first month is crucial to paying; if a player hasn’t paid in that time, they are unlikely to spend money later on.”
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-12-12-monetizing-games-crucial-advice-from-key-players
Presumer = consumer involvement with products and services pre-launch.
2012 data suggests that presumers have the same kind of profile as gamers
* Kickstarter users are predominantly (62%) male.
* 50% are between 18 and 34, and 20% are between 34 to 44.
* Almost half (48%) are college educated. That’s against 30.4% of Americans aged over 25 having a college degree (Source: US Census Bureau, February 2012).
* 45% earn more than USD 50,000 a year.
“People don’t share commercials, they share emotions”
“Success leads to complacency. “Your job is to create paranoia about what is coming around the corner. You’ve got scare the bejeezus out of everyone.”
http://www.fastcompany.com/3002406/jack-welch-leadership-crash-course
As a leader, compliment the vision with a little fear to spice it up, and keep a sense of urgency.
“Simple ideas are easier to understand. Ideas that are easier to understand are repeated. Ideas that are repeated change the world. “
“People don’t share commercials, they share emotions”
“Cooperation is our species’ signature adaptation”
Headline quote from a Fast Company article inspired by Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson’s book The Social Conquest of Earth.
http://www.fastcompany.com/1843210/your-startup-is-a-tribe-and-your-customers-are-members
One of the unexpected consequences of social gaming has been a softening of the gamer’s expectations of tutorials, structure and rewards.
“Part of the opportunity for all of us over the next five years is how do we package those up in a way that can fit in this form factor [Pincus points to smartphone] of a very small screen, small attention span, and someone who’s not going to read instructions, not going to do tutorials, and it’s got to have a very, very light, soft on-ramp but have a lot of depth of where that experience can go. I think the opportunity is to continue to innovate – it’s a new kind of innovation.”
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-07-16-zynga-ceo-mark-pincus-in-depth
Think about the fantasy that a game is fulfilling for the play, this establishes a baseline set of expectations. Then think about the ways that the game delivers, manages or challenges a player’s psychological reaction to the game’s experience.
Q: What’ something you’ve learned about game development that has remained true over the years?
Sid Meier: Gaming is a psychological experience. I base my games on things like railroads, pirates, and history, and I try to make the games I design true and real. The more historical, the more realistic, and the more factual, the better. During the early days of my career, I hadn’t taken into account what was in the player’s head. By acknowledging that simple concept-that gameplay is a psychological experience-it can make your games better.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-06-13-the-sid-meier-advantage
Aligning a player’s gaming journey of success and how this is represented to a social audience – an important consideration for western design applicable to emerging markets.
“WHAT THE MIDDLE CLASS WANTS
Broadly speaking, the Chinese middle classes believe that with the right competitive tools, they will find an opportunity to transform their lives, in contrast to a blue-collar laborer, who sees his social and economic status as more or less fixed. It’s the difference between basic needs of survival and physical safety and a need to satisfy social status requirements. The middle class engages with society to get recognition for financial success. It’s important to note, though, that this is not about arrival, it’s about being on the right journey…
“A brand’s success is rooted in an appreciation of people’s fundamental motivations—and in China this means that a premium-priced product must be a tool for social advancement.
“THE JOURNEY OF SUCCESS;
Acceptance. Young college graduates are unproven, in search of acceptance. They need acknowledgment of their potential, not admiration for their achievement.
Recognition. Once strivers are in mid-career, they must be recognized for both their past achievements and their capacity for further advancement.
Admiration and iconization. Toward the top of the hierarchy, the laoban, or boss, requires unanimous respect and deference.
Ideas are cheap, doing it is hard
“Simple ideas like this will naturally occur to many people. A small percentage of those will have the ability to execute on them. A small percentage of those will then actually do so. And an even smaller group will combine it with an otherwise interesting product, thus making it into something.”
http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2012/03/29/simple_ideas/
http://mrgan.tumblr.com/post/20123992987/prior-art-for-pull-to-refresh
“Follow the rule of threes. Have three main points. But no more than three main points; no more than three topics; no more than three examples per topic. Group thoughts in threes; words in threes; actions in threes.”
http://www.fastcompany.com/1836569/hijacking-emotion-is-the-key-to-engaging-your-audience
“Where TV and video games diverge dramatically is in the way they work as a medium. TV has three core features – it’s scheduled, it’s broadcast and it’s passive. Video games do none of these things.”
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-05-09-tv-is-better-than-games
Appointment mechanics bring an element of schedule to social games, which in turn creates greater engagement. This parallel’s some of the benefits of TV’s more rigid schedule. DVR’s and on demand delivery start to erode TV’s fixed schedule, and perhaps reduce the benefits of simultaneous revelation and social opportunities.
“In much the same way, we can tweet about TV and everyone else who is watching the same thing at the same time can GET INVOLVED IN THE CONVERSATION. This is social proof, and social proof on a grand scale. This, again, is behavioral economics.”
There has never been more things competing for our attention than there are today. The time investment required is a boon and a bane to video games.
Jenova Chen says, "A lot of adults stop playing games because they think the game takes too long. People are afraid of getting into MMOs just because how much time it takes. But people are not afraid of walking into a theater, walking into a movie theater, walking into a concert, walking into a soccer match. They are not afraid to sit down and play a board game together."
http://m.ign.com/articles/2012/04/19/why-the-two-hour-game-is-the-future-4
