THE WORKSHOP IS POSTPONED TO 27 MARCH 2022 - Learn more here.
Sunday 28 November 2021, 14:30 - 17:00 at Studio 1, Kunstquartier Bethanien, part of the conference Whistleblowing for Change: Exposing Systems of Power and Injustice (26-28 November 2021)

To play or to be played? De-gamification workshop

With: Agnese Trocchi (Digital Communications Manager, Educator, IT) and Jacopo Anderlini (Researcher, Systems/Operations Engineer, IT/DE)

A ride through classic video games to today’s socials and apps

We all knew, somewhere in our brains, that social networks such as Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, weren’t good for our social and physical health. Even before the Cambridge Analytical scandal, even before the Facebook Papers disclosures… still we are not really able to stop using these devices. Do you ever scroll the Facebook timeline or the suggested video section of You Tube well past the point where it was fun? Why?

Many video games capture our attention so much that they create forms of addiction, masterfully built on the vulnerabilities common to all humans. In a similar way we are induced to participate and contribute relentlessly to online “communities”, built according to gamification techniques.

Every experience of social interaction becomes a complex race, with lots of points and rankings, levels and champions. We know from direct experience the rules of these “games”: if we behave well we receive many “likes”, like, strikes and notifications, ie sugary for our brains (in the form of dopamine), if we are scarce, we stay dry-mouthed. In any case, it’s never enough to “win”, we always have to work harder, the “game” never ends…

In our experiential workshop, using the Hacker Pedagogy methodology, we will have a chance to reflect on our behaviour and our automatisms in relations to digital mass technologies. We will do a ride through vintage videogames, and trough interface analysis of social networks platforms, we will uncover gamification techniques.

There will be no points to gain and no prize to conquer. We are gathering to play together, to win ourselves back.

Sunday 28 November 2021, 14:30 - 17:00 at Studio 1, Kunstquartier Bethanien, Mariannenplatz 2, 10997 Berlin
Cost: €8 · Language: English · Tickets.

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