i++ Issue #4: The next Zapier or IFTTT will use Game Design

Four elements of successful game design: - Frequent Feedback Loops- Variable Outcomes - Sense of Control- Connection to a Meta-Game

Many concepts that sound good on paper are infeasible to implement, or simply don’t produce the expected results. It’s frustrating when that happens, of course, but the pace of experimentation and learning at a startup is unparalleled. I think this is an especially important form of rigor for theorycels like me. Building product forces a different ... See more

0.1% Ideas: Turning Life Into A Video Game

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​What idea do you think is true AND underpriced?

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Here’s mine: The most productive people design life like a video game.

I had this red pill moment when I saw the following:

The laziest person I’ve ever met play a video game for 16 hours straight, 7 days per week.

My brain began to hurt: The laziest person I k... See more

But the thing is, more and more of life is structured like a game. Increasingly, corporations, institutions, governments have begun to understand how powerful this way of transforming and shaping our agency, our behavior is. And so social media is structured like a game. Our school and work lives are structured around points, ratings, grades, metri... See more

Principles for growable tools

There are three critical pieces to building a tool that can grow around its users over time.

1. Design around play . Sometimes I call this design around experimentation . Using the tool for day-to-day work should involve playing and experimenting with what’s possible with the tool. Whether that’s writing small programs to

... See more