Could Gamers Save Our World?

I'm not talking about the virtual worlds found in World of Warcraft or Second Life. I'm talking about Earth, our motherland, la tierra. And I'm wondering if those people who spend 16 billion hours a year tapping keyboards or jiggling joysticks can save the world.

It's not my idea. In this TED Talk video, Jane McGonigal, director of games research and development at the Institute for the Future in Palo Alto, Calif., suggests that if we could harness the power of video games, where players collaborate and are given the incentive to become heroes, we could solve real-world problems.

Right now, people spend 3 billion hours of game playing per week. One of the reasons people spend so much time playing games is that people become the best versions of themselves, they stick with a problem after failure, confront obstacles and achieve greatness in situations that, in a real world setting, they would give up on. Why is that? 

McGonigal says the reason is that games offer the ideal problem-solving environment. That's because:

• When you show up to play a game, there are lots of people willing to trust you, almost immediately, with a very important mission perfectly matched to your current level in the game.
• There are tons of collaborators everywhere you go.
• There's an epic, inspiring story behind why the mission needs to be achieved.

On top of that, millions of kids will play 10,000 hours of games by the time they reach 21 years old, nearly the same among of time they spend in school between 5th grade and high school. That's a lot of time spent getting really good at game-playing.

She calls gamers "Super Empowered Hopeful Individuals," and thinks if society can harness the virtuoso skills gamers hone in game-playing, we could solve some big, big problems. In order to that day, by the way, people would have to log 21 billion hours of game playing per week. Watch the video for more deets and the examples of games she has developed that could save real-world problems.

On a related note, this week the European Space Agency announced the results a study that found that online games are a key future technology because "immersive environments based on these technologies could enhance collaborative working of project scientists and engineers" and that "exciting online games could prove an excellent tool for promoting space and supporting the teaching of science, technology, engineering and maths."

As part of the study, a video of a potential future game environment was produced, showing future human exploration of Jupiter’s ice moon Europa.

As McGonigal says, "Let the online games begin!"