Introducing Google News Badges
google.com
google.com
NOTE: I realize this has probably been going on since the dawn of time, I am not suggesting I was working on something no one else had thought of, we are just starting to see it take-shape really specifically now in online services as they play bigger and bigger roles where it was previously absent.
It looks silly and insulting, but it works (on most people).
Look at Stack Exchange, I love when I login and see a new badge alert across the top... I have no idea why, but I suddenly feel like I care about that site about 15% more than I do other equivalent resources. I feel like my contributions matter so I care to contribute there as opposed to someplace else.
Look at the concept of Achievements on XBox and Trophies on PSN... the idea works, it creates this false sense of accomplishment and while 10% of the population might not care and might ignore it, I imagine 50%-60% are effected by it in some subtle positive way (like me) and the remaining 30% are actually motivated by it to do more of whatever caused them to "win".
I think this is an unexpectedly playful way for Google to dabble in incentives inside their products. If Google News traffic goes up, I imagine we'll see badges as part of our core Google profiles within the next year or two unified across all their properties (especially Google+)
My guess is that like our identities, the "badges" on your public profile (Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc.) will become something the big social networks move into; trying to keep you "building" on their network as opposed to another.
It works somewhat for Xbox 360/PS3, it was bound to bleed over into other arenas.
ASIDE: There was a startup about a year ago that specialized in exactly this: badges for your website. Golden Door, Red Door... something like that. I wonder if they'll see a big upswing in business as people get more interested in the idea.
That was a brilliant talk, thanks for linking that.
I don't see much utility in reading the news though. I'd much rather see this on a video lecture site.
That there is the reason why I'm happy about it. At least it's for a good cause. Making reading news more fun for a large fraction of people isn't a bad idea...
You can sometimes obtain very unexpected results if you provide an incentive for something which is almost (but not quite) the thing that you want to favor.
While it is an interesting idea, it seems more likely that the badges will just encourage people to click on random links in order to game the system and level up, rather than actually spending time and reading. Google needs to find a way to encourage depth and not breadth.
Chore Wars was funny and original, but foursquare et al. just treat their customers like a bunch of five year-olds earning gold stars for being a good boy.
And you don't even get chocolate once you get ten of them.
It works better in things like Chore Wars where you get the sense of "DONE" and "WIN" when you get the chore done AND when you get the positive reinforcement.
For FourSquare, it just doesn't give you the same dopamine release. In fact, the concept of 4Square works more because it lets you see who else also checked in. They didnt have to do the badges concept.. could've saved it for others. greedy bastards
Google likes to encourage people to do all navigation through the Googles, not through the navigation bar, because this gives them more product (i.e. you) to sell to their customers. It also makes the rest of the world even more dependent on the good graces of Google, which is an unalloyed Good Thing for them.
I even went hunting to find out if this was an old April Fools' Joke getting some new publicity.
In the end I never played, first because of privacy concerns, then because it didn't work with my browser.
I suppose those news badges are kind of the same thing, just not presented in an equally appealing way. So instead of making me think "yay, they made reading news even more fun", I think "they are trying to exploit a weakness of my stone age brain to make me do even more work for them for free". Yuk.
I wish it worked off Google Reader, though, rather than News.
http://www.google.com/googlereader/reader-advantage.html
I keep meaning to sew my gold patch on my backpack...
If the badges result in significantly higher usage of Google News, some large news organizations will feel threatened. Making an aggregator more attractive means fewer people starting their search for news on CNN, BBC, Fox, nytimes.com and large local news sites like Boston.com. On the other hand, smaller/niche publishers that are featured on Google News will welcome more traffic.