Gamification Styles On Content Creation Sites

By Author: Kenneth Hall
Total Articles: 38
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Have you come across the term, gamification, before? Maybe you have and found you do not quite understand what it means. Put simply, it is a term used to have a person or group of person's complete tasks to gain a reward. More often, the more tasks one completes then more or larger rewards are gained.
One defining way of this is through computer games, when a player reaches a certain level with say, experience points, each defined level brings a reward. These rewards may be a new or an improved ability, a new skill, or newly added abilities, or improving a proficiency of an item (like a weapon) Gamification of a website or for shopping in a store, can also follow this process both online and offline for consumers as well. This reward system benefits customers for their participation in certain provided offers, reward schemes or specified purchases.
This concept, although to you the reader is possibly a new term, it's not quite new as a process. This process has also been and still is used on content creation sites like, Hubpages, Squidoo, eHow, Associated Content (now Yahoo Network), eZine, Inforbarrel & Wizzley ...
... to name a few. When one writes content, most sites will now allow you to post articles after your first 5 are published after review. Some sites present badges or accolades when you hit certain milestones, like if you reach 100 articles published, have 100 readers, or have 100,000 views on all your work (for that site). The benefits of gamification can be tangible or they can be a 'pat on the back' like accolades.
Some tangible benefits may include, doing some beta performance as requested from the owners of the company. For example I was part of a beta for doing video on HubPages (as were a few hundred others at the time) but was asked to not let the general public know until the beta was finished and video went live after an official announcement.
Some would ask why I would jump through hoops as requested by a website I use to create content. Well it is a case of having fun, and seeing if you can use a gamification of a site to have it match or exceed your own personal goals for using these sites. These sites also provide challenges and may provide ways for you to be challenged that you may not have been aware of or would like to participate in.
Gamification is about fun, it is also about achieving certain tasks to gain rewards, but that's also a little like life anyway.

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