“You just Earned 10 Points!” : Gaming and Grinding in Academia
(2023) In Organization- Abstract
- This short paper explores the gamification of an online academic conference. At the conference, digital gamification was meant to stimulate increased levels of participation among attendees. Instead, it resulted in a series of unintended consequences. Precisely because it was all too easy to score points and ascend the virtual leaderboard by means of machine-like grinding, the “Conference Challenge” posed a moral dilemma for its players: each participant had to determine for themselves where the border lay between playing the game and gaming the system. We use this case to raise questions about the ethics of game-playing in an academic context. In particular, we suggest that the Conference Challenge is a distorted reflection of what’s... (More)
- This short paper explores the gamification of an online academic conference. At the conference, digital gamification was meant to stimulate increased levels of participation among attendees. Instead, it resulted in a series of unintended consequences. Precisely because it was all too easy to score points and ascend the virtual leaderboard by means of machine-like grinding, the “Conference Challenge” posed a moral dilemma for its players: each participant had to determine for themselves where the border lay between playing the game and gaming the system. We use this case to raise questions about the ethics of game-playing in an academic context. In particular, we suggest that the Conference Challenge is a distorted reflection of what’s already happening in the broader “publication game” in the university. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/f27247e5-24ab-4e30-9d5d-2af45790b773
- author
- Butler, Nick LU and Spoelstra, Sverre LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2023
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- epub
- subject
- keywords
- Academic conference, game-playing, gamification, publishing ethics
- in
- Organization
- publisher
- SAGE Publications
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85145926313
- ISSN
- 1350-5084
- DOI
- 10.1177/13505084221145589
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- f27247e5-24ab-4e30-9d5d-2af45790b773
- date added to LUP
- 2023-06-18 22:36:40
- date last changed
- 2023-06-19 08:27:46
@article{f27247e5-24ab-4e30-9d5d-2af45790b773, abstract = {{This short paper explores the gamification of an online academic conference. At the conference, digital gamification was meant to stimulate increased levels of participation among attendees. Instead, it resulted in a series of unintended consequences. Precisely because it was all too easy to score points and ascend the virtual leaderboard by means of machine-like grinding, the “Conference Challenge” posed a moral dilemma for its players: each participant had to determine for themselves where the border lay between playing the game and gaming the system. We use this case to raise questions about the ethics of game-playing in an academic context. In particular, we suggest that the Conference Challenge is a distorted reflection of what’s already happening in the broader “publication game” in the university.}}, author = {{Butler, Nick and Spoelstra, Sverre}}, issn = {{1350-5084}}, keywords = {{Academic conference; game-playing; gamification; publishing ethics}}, language = {{eng}}, publisher = {{SAGE Publications}}, series = {{Organization}}, title = {{“You just Earned 10 Points!” : Gaming and Grinding in Academia}}, url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/13505084221145589}}, doi = {{10.1177/13505084221145589}}, year = {{2023}}, }