Gabe on Games and what it means for broadcasters

This is an update on a post from July 2011. I've added the video from TNW 2013.

I am in an intensive research mode at the moment, while it is pouring with rain outside in the Netherlands. I am learning such a lot from Gabe Zichermann who is a born marketeer, gamification specialist but also engaging speaker and storyteller. He runs the Gamification Summit and Workshops.






He is one of the authors of "Game-Based Marketing", where he makes a compelling case for the use of games and game mechanics in everyday life, the web and business. Gabe is also a board member of StartOut.org and facilitator for the New York city chapter of the Founder Institute. Originally found him as part of the Googletalks series in the video above. I see that he has since spoken at TEDx in Brussels (different, interesting examples towards the end)



But I still think his best presentation so far has been in Denmark to a group of people who are busy re-branding the country after the cartoon fiasco a few years back. This talk really sums up the challenges for marketeers who want to understand what game designers do to engage their audience, pulling them in instead of shutting them out.

Gamification - The New Loyalty from Gamification Co on Vimeo.

I see a lot of what he is talking about having a direct application to the broadcasting business which is struggling to engage with the public (often because the journalists and producers don't really want to). So I am working on workshops to bring the two world's together, cherry-picking from the best of both worlds. The challenge is not to discover the new ideas. It's to get rid of the old routines and integrate new thinking.