Ian Bogost’s article about gamification being bullshit led me to think about some of the implications of gamification. Although he described it in a very unforgiving light, gamification is simply a tool. As shown by Chore Wars, this tool can be used to greatly improve people’s lives, relationships, and view of the world. However, Bogost is not wrong that gamification has also become a tool used by corporations and businesses to forcibly capture our attention, devotion, and addiction, in a certain sense a weapon.
To me, an important point in this discussion is that tools and weapons are extremely similar. A tool is designed specifically for a purpose, and helps a person (or people) to achieve that. A weapon is similar, but to the detriment of others’ wellbeing. Although no one can determine the mindset of the person who invented the spear, I can imagine it was first a tool for fishing, hunting, or something similar. Over time, it has become known almost solely as a weapon, rebranded from it’s original purpose. Some tools are designed to be weapons (like missiles), but others (like fireworks) serve another purpose until they are weaponized. So who is responsible for this phenomenon, and what can be done? Are we cursed to continue hurting other people with tools we design, like the way we see gamification used to squeeze money from “whales” or drive people to fund corporate greed?
This all comes down to a simple question: should designers always be afraid of the consequences of their designs? If I design an amazing new tool with the full intention of helping as many people as possible, but it becomes weaponized, how responsible am I and should I have taken steps to prevent that? A great current example, although unrelated to gaming, is a new Stanford-developed AI that tries to identify your sexuality based on facial features. It has a surprisingly high success rate (around 15-20% higher on average than a human being). The minute I read about this algorithm I was shocked, wondering how on Earth the developers could not at least wonder if this could be used for discrimination. But do they have a responsibility to wonder that? Where do we draw this line of responsibility?