Gamification is Coming. Are You Ready?

The debate about the use of game mechanics in digital media — lately known as gamification — hardly started  before being overtaken by tools, workshops and service providers all too willing to use game techniques to tart up your latest digital masterpiece. But many in the gaming world are complaining “Not so fast!” and The [...]

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New Sites and Projects

We’re excited to begin the year with two web site launches and two game projects in development…

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$20 Million in 7 Minutes

Founded in 2004, Games for Change is the leading global advocate for supporting and making games for social impact, including for learning (serious games). The 8th annual Games for Change Festival just wrapped up in New York. Al Gore’s keynote on Monday opened the three-day festival with strong acknowledgement for games and social media’s ability [...]

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App Camp 2011 Videos

App Camp 2011 Videos

If you’ve been reading my posts over the years you know I’ve been a participant, video blogger and fan of Warren Buckleitner’s Dust or Magic — a mini-TED that attracts the top people in children’s entertainment and educational technology. Last year Warren started the Dust or Magic App Camp which just wrapped up its second [...]

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Using Social Media and Game Mechanics Improve Learning

Do you hear what I hear? After reading Social Networking in Schools on the Huffington Post today, I recognized that nearly every project I’ve worked on over the past year has pointed towards a new round of convergence — a mash-up of social media, mobile media, game mechanics, assessment, and various forms of blended or self-directed study in [...]

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iPads in the Classroom

It’s been clear for a while that Apple hit a home run with the iPad — both a new tool for consuming digital media and one with many uses for teaching and learning. Now that reports are trickling in from the classrom we can say that, cost aside, the iPad (and its cousin, the Android [...]

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The Next Big Thing in Digital Education

“The next big thing…” is a big promise and the one being made by McGraw-Hill Higher Education as they begin rolling out the latest version of their Connect online content, now integrated with the Blackboard learning management system (promo video — marketing site). After working on “the next big thing…” in educational technology for Pearson [...]

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Whyville, AMD and PBS Join Forces

It’s gratifying when your clients and friends do well so I’m happy to pass along the news that Whyville, the subversively educational virtual world for tweens launched in 1999, has partnered with AMD Foundation and PBS to offer game development tools. From the press release: AMD today announced that the AMD Foundation, in support of [...]

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Avatars in Whyville.net

The Future of Video Games: The Kids Are Alright

What a long strange trip it’s been. First, video games were seen as nothing more than a waste of time, then they were said to be a scourge that was turning young, impressionable players into zombified serial killers or worse. More recently, thanks to the work of people like Jim Gee, the conversation has shifted [...]

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Using Game Mechanics to Power Your Business

There’s a post by Shane Snow and Phin Barnes on Mashable called How to Use Game Mechanics to Power Your Business that’s an excellent primer on a topic many first-time game design clients struggle to understand. Whether you’re looking to leverage game mechanics to drive business or to make a product more compelling, this is [...]

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Gamestar Mechanic in the South Bronx

[Scroll down for update.]  When I heard about eLine Media‘s planned beta test of Gamestar Mechanic I thought it would be a perfect match for the outreach programs organized by New York based NGO The LAMP to teach media literacy in under-served communities. It took less than an hour to reach a meeting of the [...]

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Brain Meets iPad

Brain Meets iPad

My post of a cat playing with an iPad was a placeholder until the initial hype died down and more reasoned reviews started coming in. Lee Wilson, President of PCI Education, wrote a very cogent post titled iPad for Education Revisited that praises the iPad’s value as a media consumption and media organization tool, with [...]

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