Homo Ludens: Games and Authentic Play

Back in the olden days when I was in college, a professor of mine asked me to read Johan Huizinga's Homo Ludens.


For those who have known me throughout my life as academic, teacher, writer, entrepreneur, technologist, strategist--you have seen me surface and re-surface this text.


I used Home Ludens  in multiple college papers, my master's thesis, the first post of the now defunct Great American Pinup team blog, as a frame for team building...it's power over me for the last 20 or so years has not diminished.


"Let my playing be my learning, and my learning be my playing." has become a core tenet of my thinking.


Currently I am re-using the tenets in how I frame product strategy. 


The gamification of the Web for me is a symptom of this core human need to be "lost in it." This means we aspire to be engrossed, engaged, freed to feel free with the activity of the moment.


Oddly enough games and their rules provide microcosms where the feeling of total immersion, a sense of total freedom, a sense of transformation unbounded by fear, can be possible.


Sometimes games create but a flash of this feeling. But that flash may be rich enough to engage and re-engage its players. The lottery, tic-tac-toe, Go, rewards programs for credit cards, progress bars, all are game elements that displace the reality of the task with a game that compels me to participate. 


Teachers have long sought games that reinforce their learning objectives. This is how teachers have created successful students at many levels. To get the student "playing" is to get them learning.


So why does this matter? The gamification of the Web is happening...and no where is this more important than in learning.


For the Kauffman Foundation I presented with Eric Ries to a group of learning start-ups. One myth I asked them to dispel, that was ripe for opportunity, is that games and video games in particular have negative learning impact. This is false, tremendous learning can be achieved through games, gaming, and video games in particular.


Challenges, points, badges, connections, Farmville, Sims, Kongregate, Scvngr, Gamesville, how it will all manifest, who knows? 


The game-changing play for Learning (and the Web at large) will be the embrace of games and gaming as a wave of engagement that will re-invigorate the Web.