There is strong evidence, some presented in the DHL Global Connectedness Index 2012, that a more connected world would be far more prosperous and pass along to future generations a host of cultural and other non-economic benefits.
The World’s Quietest Room
Scientists at Minneapolis’ Orfield Labs created their own soundless room, an anechoic chamber. Their studies have found that when putting subjects within the chamber, they begin to hallucinate within 30 minutes.
With an average quiet room having a sound level of 30 decibels, the anechoic chamber’s sound level is -9 decibels. The ceiling, floor, and walls of the chamber absorb sound rather than have it bounce off as normal objects do. The chamber is so quiet that the subjects can even hear their own organs functioning.
Although extremely interesting, the experience is rather unpleasant. Not one subject has spent more than 45 minutes in the chamber alone. Leaving a person to only their thoughts, the chamber could drive them insane.
(via criminallyincompetent)
Source: news.discovery.com
DRM Chair
Tattoo Shop Challenges Job Applicants To Fill in QR Code - Berrge Tattoo
Where do I begin? I spent the last thirty minutes listening to a group of arrogant and condescending non educators disrespect my colleagues and profession. I listened to a group of disingenuous people whose own self-interests guide their policies rather than the interests of children. I listened to a cabal of people who sit on national education committees that will have a profound impact on classroom teaching practices. And I heard nothing of value.
“I’m thinking about the current health care debate, “I said. “And I am wondering if I will be asked to sit on a national committee charged with the task of creating a core curriculum of medical procedures to be used in hospital emergency rooms.”
The strange little man cocks his head and, suddenly, the fly on the wall has everyone’s attention.
“I realize that most people would think I am unqualified to sit on such a committee because I am not a doctor, I have never worked in an emergency room, and I have never treated a single patient. So what? Today I have listened to people who are not teachers, have never worked in a classroom, and have never taught a single student tell me how to teach.”
2009 National Teacher of the Year Anthony Mullen, describing his experience at a national conference on the future of teaching in his blog post, “Teachers Should Be Seen and Not Heard.” This should be read. (via politicalprof)
(via gruetheboo)
Source: politicalprof
London uses NFC for social media marketing
Just to note
iSignia - Swot analysis
Strengths
- Unique
- Versitility, can be applied to all subject areas and age groups
- Malleable, variation and redesign capable
- both niche and general
- Fits into the communication market, communication being a core of today
- Can build strong relationships with suppliers and buyers
Weaknesses
- Subject to trends
- Makes no sense to the non-digital market
- Not easily produced
- Cost, investments higher risk
Opportunities
- Push the boundary of digital in the physical world
- New connections between supplier, consumer and product
- New Social network potential
- Push development of current social networks
- integration into a huge range of networks
- development for other areas, medical, sport, etc
Threats
- High risk
- Have to dominate the market and continue being on top
- Have to stay on top of trends and fashion as well as digital developments
- Cost
- Maintaining Unique
- State of Economy determining potential customer numbers, disposable income
- Future Competitors, even social networks
- Company tied too closely to product & it’s success
Gameplay - Term Two & Playability Notes
THIRTY THREE SLIDES SIMON WHAT
Evaluation ‘til week six, Development after.
Week Nine - public game release
15th April final deadline (< super scary)
Assessment will be based through a DVD Documented report + Final game submission. The documentation has to include:
- results of eval
- planned improvements
- chosen promo strategies
- success of release
Playability
Playability is a key issue in gameplay, but how do we go about assessing it?
- Pleasureability and satisfaction
- Understandability and Learnability
- Interactivity and controlability
- Efficiency and Immediacy
- Immersion and integration
- Engagement and Motivation
- Emotional Involvement and Empathy
- Socialisation and Community
- Difficulty and Challenge
- Reliability and Availability
Paired up for kicks.
Looking at all of these attributes can help better assess the game you are producing, and analysis of each point individually and in the way that they interact with and balance out another will produce valuable and contextual results, that you can then determine how to better your product.
Usability and playability are closely related, and thus we can take techniques found in assessment of usability and apply them to playability.
“The ease and extent of which a member of the intended user group can utilise an interactive system for its intended purpose, in its intended operational environment”
Definition of Usability, Human Computer Interaction 3rd Ed. by Dix, A., Finlay, J., Abowd, G. D., Beale, R.
Approaches to assessment are easily divideable into two categories - observational and query based. A combination of both usually produces accurate and well rounded results.
Speak Aloud Walkthroughs - like let’s plays but more targeted “what I am doing” descriptions.
Describing what you are doing in the game while you are doing it, inclusive to your thoughts and feelings at the time.
Post Task Walkthroughs - similar to speak aloud, however post-gameplay. This is similar to dvd commentaries where they review what they did and how/why they did it.
Things to look for:
- Hesitation or Slow progress
- Misinterpretation & misunderstanding
- Negative surprise
- Inability to achieve objectives
- Boredom
When dealing with questionnaires, it’s important to make sure your questionnaire is not too long, and does not use leading questions. Be sure that you know specifically what you want to know from the questionnaire and the people you are giving it to, in order to write it better and have more accurate results.
OUR WORK
It’s important that we assess our work from the first term so that we can plan out the improvements that we want to make.
I feel that potentially the best way to get feedback to our game would be through a speak aloud/let’s play style set up. That way we can see the gameplay and the player reaction simultaneously, something which in the Binding of Isaac community is done quite effectively and continued improvements and success of the game has been achieved. I’ve referenced the Binding of Isaac before, and that is because the style of game is a little similar, with the exception of Seadog being a non-violent escape.
I also picked out four key playability points that our game could excel at, being a top down styled game.
- Efficiency and Immediacy
Efficiency is something I think players will strive to achieve with our game, in tandem even with finding the quickest - most immediate - and most efficient route to succeed.
- Difficulty and Challenge
Difficulty can be managed via the number of obstacles during the progression of the escape, and the network of available routes to escape with. Since we intend to have powerups of some variety in our game, picking those up or choosing not to is another way in which the player can manage their own difficulty in play. Alternatively, the player can challenge themselves with greater difficulty or face greater challenge by progressing further through the game.
- Reliability and Availability
This one is harder to describe, or at least describe in a different way than I have with the previous points, as it shares many similarities. Connecting to the simplicity of the game design, the program remains very reliable throughout the gameplay experience, as well as being easily available with neither slow load times or lengthy restart periods.
Travelling through the game and finding routes of access as well as powerups ought to be a relatively congenial experience too, so the player does not find frustration in making progress towards any particular or non-specific goal.
- Understandability and Learnability
Understanding what is going on in the game ought to be very simple due to how much is being communicated via the visual elements. In the original game design, Seadog chases the Navy bad-guy and as the Navy bad-guy stereotype you have to do your best not to get caught. This ties in to learnability as well as to efficiency & immediacy - finding better routes to access the levels ahead and speedier ways of doing so leads to learned success and the ability to attempt repeating both the process and the outcome.
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