[pmoriarty]

I've long been a fan of this essay, as something to strive for over the next, say 500 years, assuming that civilization lasts that long, technological "progress" continues, and all the surplus humans that are no longer necessary for work don't get wiped out by the elites who want more of the world to themselves.

However, this essay has always seemed to be heavy on idealism and light on practical or concrete solutions to very obvious problems.

Even if we assume that all work could be gamified, it's not clear that everyone will want to play such games. I love games, and have spent way too much of my life playing them, but I've gone months and years without playing any games at all, and don't see how being forced to play a game would be any better than being forced to work.

Also, its difficult to imagine how the most undesirable of jobs could be gamified. Who's going to want to play the garbageman game? Or the fix the sewage system game?

The products and services of our modern world also requires sustained, multi-year efforts by trained specialists. Something like the mass production of medicine isn't something you can just play with once in a while and still get it made in high enough quantities with serious quality control.

Some believe that robots will eventually do all these things for us. Maybe. That remains to be seen.

Whether the economic whip is really necessary to get people to do the jobs that need to be done today is an open question, but simply telling people to play instead of work doesn't seem to be a very practical solution for many jobs.

[pfalcon]

> Who's going to want to play the garbageman game?

I'm sorry, but that's exactly the kind of "work" which needs sharing and gamification. Look up "plogging" for example. Also, in 3rd-world, signs like "Whoever litters here, thou shalt become an impotent or infertile" (and all the varieties) are quite popular. In more developed countries, gamification is "put each kind of garbage in its own can" (in half of that world, those cans are still emptied to the same trash truck).

> Or the fix the sewage system game?

"Install a smarthome leak protection system. While doing so, learn how to plug that leak in the first place, dammit!"

[notahacker]

In more developed countries, gamification is "put each kind of garbage in its own can" (in half of that world, those cans are still emptied to the same trash truck).

I don't think the recycling schemes (illusory and otherwise) were introduced on the assumption that the public would get so addicted to rubbish separation that we'd eventually be able to eliminate the need for any paid garbage collectors though. Or indeed that many people don't view rubbish separation as 'work' imposed on them, to the extent many local authorities collecting household waste have to threaten fines or at least noncollection of waste to enforce compliance.

As for less developed countries, they usually have an abundance of flytipped waste because they don't pay [enough] garbage collectors and whilst there's the occasional eyecatching 'clean up this beauty spot' activity nobody wants to play the garbageman game all year round...