To some degree I earned it I guess. The badge was a combination of virtual and physical accomplishment. I certainly walked many miles aimlessly through San Francisco “exploring” the city yesterday. But really?
Welcome to the world of Social Objects, an ever-growing playground of online visual toys created to illustrate or add feeling to our interactions. Facebook has gifts, a socially recognizable form that a friend is willing to buy to represent attention, thought, and friendship. On twitter, the act of retweeting has become a sort of socially recognized “kudos” to the original tweeter. Flickr, and YouTube have a favorite or “thumbs up” to add to your favorite video or image, a way of distinguishing success to both parties. Remember Mafia Wars on Facebook? Who thought a text-based mafia game would become a 100 million dollar phenomenon? The game builds from actual friends and is completely badge-based. And of course Foursquare, the first truly successful geo-tagging game that awards people for checking-in and physically moving a lot. The list goes on.
These objects aren’t unique, but rather infinitely abundant to anyone willing to earn them. So who cares? Well it’s the interaction these icons represent, the interaction of an actual person who thought and spent time to accomplish the badge. The emotional quality these images, badges, or tokens bring to the virtual space. It seems we, as “real” people are always finding subtle ways to gain achievement and to reward one another in a socially recognizable way. We are emotional creatures after all.
Michel,
Yes, of course, glad you enjoyed. I encourage growing and exploring ideas:)
It’s always great to get a shout out or link to this entry, but up to you mate.
n