interaction design

Gamification at WordPress December 18, 2011

As a professor, but also in my practical work, I have been looking quite a lot into the potentials of gamification.

The other day I stumbled on an example for gamification, which did not really convince me: Here at WordPress, after each post one writes, a sidebar opens and displays the number of posts one has written so far:

Firstly, I find it strange to think that the number of posts is a motivation for people writing their blogs.

But then – to use one of the core gamification elements, the progression dynamics, to motivate people to write 5 more blog posts, seems even stranger to me.

So, when I finally reached the 190st post, then I will get motivated to write more by another progress bar helping me to reach my “Next Posting Goal” of 195 posts?

The typography in this sidebar is also quite interesting: in the sentence “You published your 188th post.” it is not “You”, who is highlightes, also not “188″ or “post”, but “published” – and who is the publisher? Yes, it is WordPress!

I think that WordPress should rethink their gamification strategy and have a close look at what motivates their users…