The game layer: the next step in social networking

Presented by Seth Priebatsch

The recent explosion in social networking is difficult to overlook, no matter how much an individual may want to. The network, almost single handedly defined by facebook, is complete in its construction and connects together thousands of people in what is refereed to as an open graph. The next step will be the building of a `game layer' that uses game dynamics to motivate and influence peoples behaviour. The framework around which this is built will become increasingly important.

The game layer is already well under construction on a global scale. It exists in the form of credit card schemes, air miles, loyalty cards, Tesco club cards etc. They are all designed to change our spending behaviour using game dynamics to benefit the respective companies. But the design of the game layer so far is cluttered with badly designed frameworks.

Game dynamics, when used correctly, can be very powerful forces in peoples lives. Lets look at some examples of game dynamics as they are used today:

1) Appointment dynamics - to succeed a player must do a predefined action at a predefined place\time. By introducing such a dynamic you can control what and when people do certain actions. For example, a happy hour at a bar makes people buy drinks at a predefined time. Or, to take a facebook example, the game Farmville forces users to return at certain times to water crops, otherwise they wilt. This may seem innocent, but the thousands of people who play this game can be summoned at any interval the designers wish, a very powerful force in the online world.

2) Influence and status - the ability of one player to modify another's actions through social pressure. For example, if a friend has the latest iphone it somehow makes them a better person, so i need one too. This is often used in computer gaming whereby a more successful player will have a higher rank and a prettier badge to show it.

3) Progression dynamic - success is granularly displayed and progress is made by completing short, simple, itemised tasks. Often, the desire to fill a progress bar is enough to drive a user to complete tasks. An insane example is World of warcraft, on which an average player will spent 6.5 hours a day to gradually improve his character, and pay for the fun of doing so.

The last decade was the decade of social networking. The next decade will be the decade of games. Game dynamics are a powerful tool for influencing behaviour and they will have much deeper affects on users than social networking alone. We should be conscious of the game layer and help built it well and responsibly.