The Gamification of Television : is there life beyond badges ?

The television domain is an apt target for gamification given demand for new ways to track, engage and retain viewing audiences. While early applications in social TV show promise, we identify three challenges that need to be addressed. First, television is by nature a lean-back experience; game design must adeptly balance passive attention with active interaction behaviors. Second, a focus on loyalty requires fine-grained interactions to better profile the user; games are ideal for this purpose but are under-utilized in context. Third, badge fatigue is inevitable; we need new ways to evolve experiences to keep viewers interested and challenged. In this paper, we look at how recent trends in companion devices for television viewing provide new tools and opportunities for addressing these concerns. We present some ideas (attention-preserving toolkits, games-with-a-purpose, context-sharing frameworks) that we believe could be a good starting point for related research exploration.