In a government bureaucracy, any innovation can take years to come to fruition. But that can change, says Tom Kalil, deputy director for policy for the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the White House. Kalil recently participated in a two-day conference at Wharton titled, "For the Win: Serious Gamification," which looked at the application of gaming techniques in business, education, government and other scenarios. Before the conference, Kalil spoke with Kevin Werbach, a conference organizer and a professor of legal studies and business ethics at Wharton, about why gamification has become a hot topic at the White House.
"World Without Oil was a serious alternate reality game in
2007, a massively collaborative simulation of a global oil crisis. Here's the
411. Peak oil people, checkit! More at www.worldwithoutoil.org. Video by Kiyash
Monsef!"
This article examines the foundations of gaming and related concepts, such as policy exercises and serious gaming, in a public policy making context. Examining the relevant publications in Simulation & Gaming since 1969, the author looks back at the development of gaming simulation for purposes such as public policy analysis and planning, and reviews the underlying theories and empirical evidence. The author highlights the recognition that the success of gaming for policy making derives largely from the unique power of that gaming to capture and integrate both the technical-physical and the social-political complexities of policy problems.
Summer 2012 Game Development Conferences Compiled by Ben Sawyer "Recently I saw several friends say there were a number of game conferences coming up so I put together the following schedule and links to make sure everyone knows where to go, when, and what for."
PING is an online game made for secondary schools, forming a starting point to discuss the subject 'poverty' and what it means to be poor. Ping is aimed at the students of the secondary and third degree. The students become the main characters in the game. They can choose between Jim or Sofia, who, due to certain circumstances, end up on the street and need to find their own path.
PING shows that games can help to introduce complex social subjects like poverty in the class room. The partners of the PING project want to contribute to the social debate encouraging the use of games at school as a tool to open the difficult discussion about poverty
Forio simulations improve public policy development and implementation by allowing you to:
*Model sophisticated behaviors by importing data and formulas from Excel, AnyLogic, and other programs.
*Have global access to your Sim via popular web browsers.
*Control access with secure user privileges.
*Implement updates centrally, ensuring users have the most up-to-date information (preventing old or obselete info from being reused).
*Operate worry-free, with dependable security and design measures.
Customized simulations apps are easily accessible via standard web browsers, allowing users to easily make adjustments, share and compare results. With Forio's public policy simulations, users can create interactive online tools to generate, manipulate and illustrate "what if" scenarios that are ideal for long-term policy models.With Forio's public policy simulations, users can create interactive online tools to generate, manipulate and illustrate "what if" scenarios that are ideal for long-term policy models.