Rethinking Gamification

Dr. Sonia Fizek is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Digital Cultures at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany, where she joined the Gamification Lab. She completed her PhD in 2012 at the School of Creative Studies and Media at Bangor University, UK. In her doctoral thesis she developed a method for the study of the player character in offline computer role-playing games. Her current academic interests include: gamification, games for change, and playful interfaces, with an emphasis on the audio game genre.

Paolo Ruffino is a Research Associate at the Gamification Lab, Centre for Digital Cultures (Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany). He is also completing a PhD at Goldsmiths, University of London and works as Lecturer at the Game Cultures programme at London South Bank University. His PhD research involves a study of the concepts of consumer and producer in video games, the history of the medium of the video game and phenomena such as “modding”, independent gaming, open engines and game art. He is a member of the art collective IOCOSE. Paolo lives and works in London, UK. paoloruffino.com/.

Dr. Niklas Schrape is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Digital Cultures at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany. He holds a double position at the Gamification Lab and at the Institute for Advanced Study in Media Cultures of Computer Simulation (MECS). Between 2007 and 2011, Niklas finished his PhD thesis in Media Studies at Film and Television University Potsdam-Babelsberg (HFF). His current research interests encompass the consequences of gamification on our understanding of social reality and the relationship between simulation and gamification.

Dr. Sebastian Deterding is a researcher and designer working on gameful and playful experiences and their wider social ramifications. He is currently a visiting Assistant Professor at Rochester Institute of Technology’s School for Interactive Games and Media and Laboratory for Media, Arts, Games, Interaction and Creativity (MAGIC) in New York, USA. He is an independent designer and associate of the international design studio Hubbub. He lives online at codingconduct.cc.

Daphne Dragona is a media arts curator and researcher living and working in Athens and Berlin. Her interest lies in the fields of network-based art, game-based art, commons based peer production and emerging forms of collaborative creativity embracing critical awareness and resistance. She is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies of the University of Athens, Greece.

Dr. Gabriele Ferri, Postdoctoral Researcher at Indiana University, holds a PhD in Semiotics from the University of Bologna, Italy. He is currently involved in the Intel ISTC Social initiative, where his research focuses on the interaction between digital media and narrative, critical, satirical, and political discourses. He is an editor for G|A|M|E Journal and an independent urban game designer. He can be reached at gabferri@indiana.edu and gabrieleferri.com.

Dr. Sonia Fizek is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Digital Cultures at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany, where she joined the Gamification Lab. She completed her PhD in 2012 at the School of Creative Studies and Media at Bangor University, UK. In her doctoral thesis she developed a method for the study of the player character in offline computer role-playing games. Her current academic interests include: gamification, games for change, and playful interfaces, with an emphasis on the audio game genre.

Maxwell Foxman is a second year PhD candidate in Communications at Columbia University in New York, USA. His research interests include gamification, internet culture and the effects of digital media on everyday life and memory.

Dr. Scott Nicholson is Associate Professor at Syracuse University School of Information Studies in New York, USA and Director of the Because Play Matters game lab.

Thibault Philippette is a researcher at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL) in Belgium within the Research Center in Communication Sciences. He is member of the “Groupe de Recherche en Médiation des Savoirs” (GReMS) and the “Observatoire des Mondes Numériques en Sciences Humaines” (Omnsh).

Dr. Fabrizio Augusto Poltronieri holds a PhD in Semiotics from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo (PUC-SP), Brazil, with a thesis on the role of chance in computer art. Currently, his research efforts are engaged in understanding how the post-historical codes founded in video games could be used in the production of knowledge.

Felix Raczkowski is currently working on his PhD thesis on the instrumentalisation of games with a special focus on serious games and gamification. He is an affiliated scholarship holder at the Institute for Media Studies at Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. Among his other research interests are transmedia phenomena, convergence- and fan-cultures as well as theories on games, play, and toys. He can be reached at felix.raczkowski@rub.de.

Prof. Dr. Joost Raessens holds the chair of Media Theory at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. He was the conference chair of the first Digital Games Research Association (DiGRA) conference Level Up in Utrecht (2003), and is on the editorial board of Games and Culture (SAGE). Raessens’ current research concerns the “ludification of culture” focusing in particular on the playful construction of identities, on applied, serious and persuasive gaming, and on the notion of play as a conceptual framework for the analysis of media use. Raessens is the scientific director of GAP: the Center for the Study of Digital Games and Play (gamesandplay.nl).

Paolo Ruffino is a Research Associate at the Gamification Lab, Centre for Digital Cultures (Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany). He is also completing a PhD at Goldsmiths, University of London and works as Lecturer at the Game Cultures programme at London South Bank University. His PhD research involves a study of the concepts of consumer and producer in video games, the history of the medium of the video game and phenomena such as “modding”, independent gaming, open engines and game art. He is a member of the art collective IOCOSE. Paolo lives and works in London, UK. paoloruffino.com/.

Dr. Niklas Schrape is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Digital Cultures at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany. He holds a double position at the Gamification Lab and at the Institute for Advanced Study in Media Cultures of Computer Simulation (MECS). Between 2007 and 2011, Niklas finished his PhD thesis in Media Studies at Film and Television University Potsdam-Babelsberg (HFF). His current research interests encompass the consequences of gamification on our understanding of social reality and the relationship between simulation and gamification.

Dr. Matthew Tiessen is an Assistant Professor in the School of Professional Communication (ProCom) and a Research Associate at the Infoscape Research Lab in the Faculty of Communication and Design (FCAD) at Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada. His research and teaching focuses on digital and visual communication and culture and is supported by a Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) Insight Development Grant.