Protest Games & Life Without Interweb

Got a twofer for ya.

This week's BPM is on protest games by taking 3 examples and talking about the pros and cons of their approach. PETA's Mama Kills uses shock and an audience with short attention spans. Global Conflicts discusses sweatshop factories, which is a very complex issue, and finds ways to still keep people chugging through the information. But in the end, the McDonald's Game is still the gold standard. Don't show me these business practices are corrupt, have me run one and realize this for myself.

These games are going to keep getting more prevalent as activist groups realize how many people will play them.

On a totally unrelated note, I did a last minute assignment with The Escapist. They were doing an issue about going without the internet and I volunteered to go five days without it. In a blast of hubris after that whole vapor culture idea of mine, I realized that producing something on the last minute is indeed a skill worth mastering. There may be a deficit of time consuming work and research with blogs, but you've got to learn how to walk before you can run.

Thank God their editors were able to make some sense out of the stuff I sent them.