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Re: Ethical reasons I deleted We Rule for iPhone

benjohnbarnes — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 08:32:51 -0000

I got a bit carried away thinking about this. Sorry if the following is pompous! …

There are two points of discussion here, and they can be considered independently: the addictiveness of a game, and the system of payment for a game. Clearly, if we agree that certain games might exist that are addictive, this has considerable baring on consideration of payment models for that game.

First then, addiction:

To make clear my position, I believe in a balance of personal and societal responsibility. I suggest that most people will tend to have a similar outlook, and some people will polarise to one end of this continuum.

Society currently legislates in many areas where there are dangers of addiction. You may or may not agree with that; personally, I think there could be a case for increasing personal responsibility with drugs, for example. It is the case that society deems many things to be too compulsive for people, and so imposes regulation on those things. Given this, it seems entirely reasonable to at least think about whether games might be too addictive, or addictive in the wrong way. If nothing else, thinking about it ought to help us build more addictive games ;-)

It seems to me that if "We Rule" provided a way to freeze your game, and drop out of real time, then it would essentially loose the addictive hook that W.H.G. has raised? This could be an explicit action, rather than the default suspend behaviour.

For the ongoing discussion, I think it's reasonable to assume that there exist people who may become addicted to a game. As an individual, you may or may not agree with providing support for such people, and you may have many ideas about the form any such support should take. It's worth considering that in general, society provides various forms of protection against addictions, thus there is a prior standard we could be guided by. For balance, note that some well established addictions are not protected against however.

Now to look at payment:

Many games charge in some way for playing the game, or for enhancing the game. I also think there is a strong case for looking at this a little more closely; people have valid concerns here.

I would begin by thinking about these factors:

* Is there an absolute upper limit on what can be spent on the game (or indeed, application in general), or is this spending unbounded? This is probably down to whether the game only includes payments for durable and permanent items / extensions; or whether it also includes payments for ephemeral / transitory / items, like a shield recharge, or speeding up how quickly a game event happens, credits to play a game, etc.

* If there is no upper limit given unbounded time, is there an upper limit within a bounded time frame? For example, in a game, I might pay to speed up time, but I could be restricted in how many times I can do this each month, so the payment is bounded. Or perhaps, if I buy 5 speed ups in a month, then I get the ability (for that month) to speed up time as many times as I like. This is similar to the model used by the integrated transport in London. If you spend more than about £5 in one day, you are automatically given a travel card, and all travel from then on in the day is free.

Given this, you can then tell people as they choose the original game (or application, or indeed arbitrary service, such as: messaging, where there are parallels to be drawn to mobile phone tariffs; or transport in a city), what further associated expenditure they might make:

A) no possibility to spend further,
B) a fixed upper limit for further spending,
C) a fixed upper limit on spending per period (hour, day, week, month, etc),
D) arbitrary spending possibilities.

I think these are in order of the danger they present to someone who has become hooked (regardless of who's fault it is that they are hooked). Class D clearly has the danger of being much worse than the others, being the only one allowing unlimited spending in any time frame.

I think what I've said up to here is mostly factual, and not just my feelings on the matter. The rest of this is very much my personal feelings.

Believing as I do that games might be addictive to at least some people, I would be happy to see class D payment strongly discouraged in all cases where no real-world resources are being bought.

It's reasonable to charge for petrol by the litre: real-world resources are being consumed when you use petrol, or eat cheese, or take a cab. But in a game, where it's unlikely real-world resources are consumed if you speed up time, for example (this might not be the case – perhaps they need to run simulations on a server farm for time dilation, but that's not the case here), it seems highly opportunistic to charge people in an unlimited way for such a service.

The obvious counter to my thought is that game development and ongoing enhancements require real-wold resources in the form of the game studio's employee's time, and perhaps how that gets paid for is a personal choice (or the studio's choice, and your choice as a player or not). I guess I just don't like it though.

[Quick note – providing a subscription per month doesn't stop you being in class D if you still allow unlimited pay-as-you-go spending. You must be _automatically_ prevented unlimited spending, ideally by automatically rolling over from pay as you go to having the service during that time period. An example of this is pay-as-you-go phones where you can end up consistently paying far more than you would on a monthly tariff.]

Re: My Couch to 5k: the beginnening

benjohnbarnes — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 17:58:09 -0000

Hi Natalie,

It's absolutely brilliant that you've started to run! :-) Running is definitely for everyone, not just the super healthy, marathon running elite!

I think you're running with an iPhone? You might be interested in another Couch to 5K application called "Get Running". I wrote it last summer to get myself running, and I think it's quite a bit better. For starters – Get Running _does_ let you lock your iPhone while you're running, if you want to. It's also got a few hundred studio recorded prompts that it coaches you with as you run, giving you encouragement and letting you know where you've got to.

If you'd like to give it a try, there's a free version (Get Running Lite). It's complete except that it only has the audio coaching for week one.

Very good luck within your running, and keep on going – it was a few weeks after I finished (the 30 minute runs) that I got to the point of really enjoying every run, rather than just doing it out of commitment, but it really is worth it.

Re: Getting Started with the Couch to 5K iPhone App

benjohnbarnes — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 16:59:00 -0000

Hi Rob,

Glad to hear you're going for being healthy :-)

… Not sure if it'll interest you, but there are a couple of other C25K apps for the iPod / iPhone. One is "Get Running", and the other is "C25K". I'm the author of "Get Running", and I'd love it if you'd consider giving it a try!

The major advantage of Get Running is the high quality of the audio coaching. I think it looks a lot nicer too, and the update that's about to hit review is going to bring some very cool new features. It also helps you to plan your rest days and see when you're going to be finished.

You can pick a free demo, (Get Running Lite), and if you're using the US app store, I'd be very happy to give you a code to get the full app (Apple's promo codes are US only, sorry).

A friend of mine blogged his experience of going from nothing here: http://mattgetsrunning.com/– he's currently running 10k pretty happily (though it's snowing a bit too much for that here ATM).

All the best – and you're going to love it in nine weeks, which ever app you use!

Best regards,
Benjohn

Re: Couch to 5K

benjohnbarnes — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 16:56:35 -0000

Hi Edward,

:-) You sound like me a few weeks ago! Actually, a few months ago, because I lapsed and started again and got injured and started again and … this morning I did the first run of week 5. I'm in a slight dread about Monday when I'm supposed to do that first 20 minutes without a walk monster, but maybe it'll just be fine when I try it!

Here are a couple of other iPhone applications for following the c25k plan that might interest you:

http://splendid-things.co.u...
http://felttip.com/c25k/

The first of those two is developed by myself with the support of some other smashing people. The big things setting it apart are that:

● it's got hundreds of really nicely recorded prompts and cues to encourage you on,
● it's got a lovely log of your runs that includes the dates for future runs.
● it looks really nice.
● it's got a rather gorgeous "clock" for each run.
● it works properly when your phone sleeps or is locked, and works with or without iPhone music playing in the background.

Is the Windsor you mention is in the UK? Beautiful place, but that probably means you don't use the American iTunes store, so if I give you a promo code for a free copy of Get Running, it wont be any use for you (they're US iTunes store only). Just in case you do use the US store, here're some promo codes for it:

NKH4TNEENMY7
XLEYR6PFNL3X
KYLAE7H9F63M
AYFLTNFLXWE9
PNL6LH9RRKAN

Do you know there's a #c25k tag on twitter, and a couch to 5k group on facebook, by the way? Also, the website runnersworld.com has a beginner forum and is loaded with really good advice.

Good luck!
Benjohn