Happy Action Theater (HAT) is my favorite kind of media: not quite classifiable. It utilizes Microsoft’s Kinect device, allowing users to interact with a variety of environments on screen. Destructoid describes:

Double Fine Happy Action Theater has more in common with an augmented-reality playground than what many of you would likely define as a strict “game.” It’s made up of 18 activities, which range from lava you can roll around in (YES!) to a Breakout-style level to a black-and-white scene that could be straight out of Godzilla.

HAT just lets you move around on screen and mess with things until you get bored, or decide to switch to a new activity. In a post-iPhone world where casual games revolve around points and achievements, can we accept a game with no clear goals nor reward system of any kind? A better question might be: can we afford not to?

As “gamification” becomes more widespread, game-makers and marketers are falling into the trap of points for points’ sake. Instead of adding points to a compelling game, games are made compelling by their point system, exploiting the human desire to be rewarded for correct behavior. This has always been true to some degree (Tetris and Pac-Man have points), but as developers compete for audience attention, rewards are replacing the fun factor that should be inherent in any game. Points are the nicotine of the masses.

It’s said that HAT is a game for children (one IGN writer used his children to voice his video review). But in the same sense, so are Pixar movies (and who doesn’t love those?). I’m 24. I’ve seen video footage, and I want to play. There’s an enormous amount to be said for a game that’s limited not by its list of obtainable goals, but by the collective imagination of the players (Minecraft is another testament to this).

There is a beautiful simplicity to HAT. Our daily lives are full of goals and ‘To Do’ lists – do we need them in our games? I’m not saying we should rid every app store of points, but it’s nice to know we can have fun without them.

150 Years of Atlantic Cod Stocks

This unfortunate incident has often been cited as a model example of the tragedy of the commons. First codified by a prominent ecologist in the sixties, the tragedy of the commons describes the dilemma that ensues when individuals use communal resources for personal means. In the example above, fishing was enormously profitable as individual businesses sold unprecedented quantities of cod. However, when every fishery adopted the same practice, the result was over-exploitation. Instead of sharing a mutual profit from fish farming, the cod population was depleted, diminishing everyone’s return. In this particular case, the resource became exhausted.

At the heart of this dilemma lies a very simple notion: sharing. The tragedy of the commons provides some insight into why we are generally inclined to share things. The theory of ‘inclusive fitness,’ suggests that altruism may benefit an individual more than selfishness (imagine two children breaking a toy as they fight over it). Perhaps this is why sharing is one of the first principles we teach our children.

Since the rise of social media in the past few years, our impulse to share has been eagerly exploited by marketers, and with good reason. More sharing means more impressions, which means good business. However, there is a fine line between engagement and noise. As an isolated tactic, outbound messaging helps spread awareness and keeps a brand top-of-mind. In the wider pool of outbound messages, it only creates clutter, diminishing the effectiveness of all consumer-facing communication. Sounds a lot like the tragedy of the commons.

Consumer attention is a finite resource, and individuals can only tolerate so many calls to action. Every day, we are inundated with requests to “share.” The label on your orange juice tells you to ‘Like’ the brand on Facebook. Halfway through a news article, you’re asked to post the link on Twitter. Ten minutes into an iPad game, you get a message: “Like this game? Share it on Facebook!”

Marketers have a tendency to treat social media as check box. Slapping a ‘Like’ and ‘Follow’ button on something does not make it social, and only diminishes the return on other social promotions. One of the oldest methods of digital sharing – copying and pasting a link into an email – is still the preferred method among consumers. In fact, links are copied and pasted ten times more often than any other form of sharing.

Social strategy needs to move beyond the status quo. Instead of going “social,” we should strive to be “prosocial.” Rather than selfishly pushing our own message, we should ask how our campaign can contribute to the social ecosystem and for the benefit of all. It’s a lofty goal, but as consumers become inundated with social calls to action, effective campaigns will depend on it. People are not cod, but the attention of consumers will always be a finite resource.

One of the contributing factors to over-exploitation (as we saw with the Northern Cod fishery) is uncertainty. No one really knew how much cod was out there, or how much fishing the population could sustain. As a result, the industry kept expanding to its heart’s content…until the whole ship sank. Social media is still a relatively new frontier, and marketers haven’t quite identified that tipping point. Based on my own experience, and conversations with peers, it seems consumer tolerance is already being stretched toward exhaustion. Will we sink, or swim?

Building an online community of fans or followers is really gratifying. It’s hard work at first, figuring out how to communicate with your audience and developing a sense of shared values. Once you reach that tipping point, the work pays off in spades. There’s nothing quite like watching a Twitter feed cascade with tweets, or a lively conversation pop up on your Facebook Wall. But what if you could watch a digital community come to life in the real world? How cool would that be? Well, look no farther than L.A., to a video game-inspired wonderland called Call of Duty XP.

Activision, publisher of famed video game franchise Call of Duty, organized a gaming event of epic proportions called COD XP 2011. The main purpose of the event was to generate buzz around the release of their most ambitious title yet: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. Activision rented a huge warehouse that they decked out with hundreds of LCDs, projection screens and Xbox consoles. In addition to demoing the brand new title, attendees could play paintball in an arena modeled after the game, explore an armory complete with replica weaponry, and compete in a massive $400,000 grand prize tournament. In short, this event was no joke.

The community I mentioned isn’t the Call of Duty community. It’s the Mountain Dew gaming community. DEW has always been a favorite of gamers, so COD XP was the perfect time for the brand to announce their new Game Fuel flavors, which offer under-the-cap rewards to COD players. Our mission as Mtn Dew’s agency was to spread awareness about the “Double XP” promotion onsite at COD XP. Three of us from RFI holed up in the “DEW Bunker,” where we manned Twitter, Facebook and amplified event activity to fans and followers in absentia. We set up a dedicated handle (@dewxp), built a mobile app just for gamers, and even designed a limited edition Mtn Dew can to catch the attention of fans virtually and in person. As a result, we saw was the emergence of a living community with one foot in the digital space and one foot offline.

Consider @ApologizeLater, a DEW fan and seasoned Call of Duty player. While in the midst of a lengthy COD match, he tweeted:”@DewXP can you hook me up with a can? I’m handling the King of the Hill challenge. I need refreshed.” We responded in kind wishing him luck on his challenge, and promised him an ice cold drink when he finished. He found us soon after, introduced himself with a handshake, and we chatted about his performance over some DEW. He followed up on Twitter, broadcasting a “Thanks, DEW!” to over 800 followers.

I couldn’t help feel a real sense of community after the interchange, and now I’m asking myself — was that a digital experience, or a personal one? It was sort of a digital introduction with a personal followup. For me, situations like these (and there were many) really substantiate the effort we put into building online communities. It’s not just about collecting ‘Likes’ and blasting updates to thousands of followers. I’ve had plenty of genuine interactions as a community manager, but seeing the DEW community represented at COD XP really reinforced that payoff I mentioned earlier. Looking around the Bunker, one thought kept popping into my head: This is why we build.