Description

Book Synopsis

How games are being harnessed as instruments of exploitation and what we can do about it

Warehouse workers pack boxes while a virtual dragon races across their screen. If they beat their colleagues, they get an award. If not, they can be fired. Uber presents exhausted drivers with challenges to keep them driving. China scores its citizens so they behave well, and games with in-app purchases use achievements to empty your wallet.

Points, badges and leaderboards are creeping into every aspect of modern life. In You've Been Played, game designer Adrian Hon delivers a blistering takedown of how corporations, schools and governments use games and gamification as tools for profit and coercion. These are games that we often have no choice but to play, where losing has heavy penalties. You've Been Played is a scathing indictment of a tech-driven world that wants to convince us that misery is fun, and a call to arms for anyone who hopes to preserve their dignity and autonomy.

You'Ve Been Played: How Corporations, Governments

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    Order before 4pm today for delivery by Tue 21 Jul 2026.

    A Paperback / softback by Adrian Hon

    2 in stock

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      View other formats and editions of You'Ve Been Played: How Corporations, Governments by Adrian Hon

      Publisher: Swift Press
      Publication Date: Publication Date: 21/09/2023
      ISBN13: 9781800751996, 978-1800751996
      ISBN10: 1800751990
      Also in:
      Business, Finance & Law Media, entertainment, information

      Description

      Book Synopsis

      How games are being harnessed as instruments of exploitation and what we can do about it

      Warehouse workers pack boxes while a virtual dragon races across their screen. If they beat their colleagues, they get an award. If not, they can be fired. Uber presents exhausted drivers with challenges to keep them driving. China scores its citizens so they behave well, and games with in-app purchases use achievements to empty your wallet.

      Points, badges and leaderboards are creeping into every aspect of modern life. In You've Been Played, game designer Adrian Hon delivers a blistering takedown of how corporations, schools and governments use games and gamification as tools for profit and coercion. These are games that we often have no choice but to play, where losing has heavy penalties. You've Been Played is a scathing indictment of a tech-driven world that wants to convince us that misery is fun, and a call to arms for anyone who hopes to preserve their dignity and autonomy.

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