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User created contentJune 20th, 2006 |
David Edery has a nice list of reasons why user generated content works.
The big rap against user-generated content, of course, is that it’s directionless. It leads to a hodgepodge, and users who enter an environment built from it quickly feel that there’s nothing to do, because a rather small fraction of user content is actually finished. (Which just goes to show that the most needed attribute for a creator in any field is persistence!)
Will Wright, back in the Sims 1 days, used to show off a User Content Pyramid, displaying the fact that a very tiny percentage of users made good content tools, a somewhat larger amount made content, a fair amount distributed it, a largish amount — a plurality as I recall — downloaded content that was user-generated, and the broadest base didn’t so anything with it. Because of this, Sims 2 pursued certain types of user content even more — namely, the movies and screenshot stories that were the big surprise in terms of Sims 1 content.
Damion Schubert wrote a blog entry about this pyramid, adapting it to MMO play specifically, and when looked at through squinted eyes, it has a lot in common with Randy Farmer’s Path to Ascension. The interesting thing about these models is that they assume that participation, that creation, that contribution, are in some way more to be valued. This is a deeply held assumption that I happen to share, but that often gets overlooked and not carefully examined. Why is “consuming” content such a dirty word?
One could make the case (and many media theorists have) that any interaction with media is a joint act of creation, that the work of the consumer is to reify the work of the original creator, melding it with their own interpretations and thus creating a new, third work that exists in the space between the consumer and the producer.
In games, this is made explicit. While it’s nice to talk theoretically about how your experience of a movie is different from mine, in a game we can see that difference. It is displayed for anyone who cares to watch. Our interactions with the system are demonstrably different and observable, leading any casual observer to undestand the gap between the experiences of different users. With a movie, we have to rely on a viewer providing their impressions to us in the form of a review, verbal or in print. Watching someone playing a game is its own review: we understand how that person relates to the work.
Indeed, in his recent book, Why Video Games are Good for Your Soul, James Paul Gee, states,
So when I play Castlevania, not only do I freely generate story elements and not only do I co-produce a visual-motoric-auditory symphony, I also generate a unique story — this second story, the virtual-real story. It is the story of my own unique trajectory through the game world. This story is the tale of Alucard-Jim, and I can lard it up with all the fantasies, values, and morals I want to — no permissions needed, no critics allowed.
No critics allowed except your kids on the couch telling you how you’re being stupid, you should go left instead of right.
Let’s compare to a different industry for a second. 
A similar pyramid created by Bradley Horowitz of Yahoo! was the subject of some controversy a couple of months ago. The stats literally match the way Yahoo! Groups seem to work:
- 1% of the user population might start a group (or a thread within a group)
- 10% of the user population might participate actively, and actually author content whether starting a thread or responding to a thread-in-progress
- 100% of the user population benefits from the activities of the above groups (lurkers)
However, this pyramid was challenged based on some of the recent Web 2.0 hits, such as del.icio.us and Flickr — in these services, the passive consumer is a rare beast. Instead, almost everyone spends some time creating.
Creativity is hard, and requires determination. But some forms of creation are easier than others. Playing a game is an expression of really easy creativity. In most games, it is akin to coloring within the lines. We are told “get to this place over here, without dying. How you do it is up to you, but we won’t let you go off course anyway.” Making a game, by contrast, is really hard creativity: there’s no guardrails on that particular road, and lots of cliffs taken at high speeds. It’s easy to veer off and crash, and never finish the race.
One can see Will Wright’s pyramid, then, as mostly scaled by difficulty. Flickr’s success in driving nearly all its userbase to creativity is inherent in the fact that taking a picture is something everyone does. Sharing pictures is something everyone does. Collecting pictures is something everyone does. The mental hurdle that Flickr had to overcome was the upload, not the activity.
Recently, the Pew Internet & American Life project reported that 35% of Americans contribute web content in some fashion. That’s 50 million people. We’re not talking just a review on Amazon, either:
It considers blogging, Web site creation, contribution of work on Web pages or blogs and submissions of artwork, photos, stories or videos as user-generated online content.
If we consider easier forms of content creation, such as Amazon reviews or even seller ratings on eBay, I am sure the percentage goes up.
The lesson here is that everyone is a creator. The question is “of what.” Everyone has a sphere where they feel comfortable exerting agency — maybe it’s their work, maybe it’s raising their children, maybe it’s collecting stamps. Outside of that sphere, most people are creators only within carefully limited circumstances; most people cannot draw, but anyone can color inside lines, or trace. If the games require serious commitment and challenging creation tasks equivalent to drawing from scratch, they will have smaller audiences.
This is, of course, the argument that some in the comment threads were making against complex ecologies, cool NPC AI, and so on. The logic goes that too much complexity will overwhelm the casual user. We must not forget that casual users aren’t stupid users, they’re just not adept at, or willing to invest in, that that particular system. They are likely heavily invested in creativity in some other aspect of their lives.
The answer that Flickr and to a lesser degree, The Sims, provide is that you must broaden the base of the pyramid. This does not mean that the overall depth of the system must be sacrificed, but that the user contributions that are immediately available must be guided, obvious, and most importantly, something that users can and probably already do anyway.
In games, the real user content pyramid is this one: a broad base of creators of easy content, leading up to a peak of creators of hard content. That broad base may look a lot like consumption, but consumption isn’t a dirty word. It’s not so much indicative of a lack of engagement, as of the nature of the engagement; if a user’s playing, they have chosen to engage. The question is whether we’re offering the users the tools to engage on the level they prefer.
Mapping this pyramid to the Web 2.0 services is instructive. MySpace thrives on asking people to fill in the blanks, and to do easy content creation like linking and commenting. Flickr leverages an activity that everyone already finds to be at the easy end of the scale because it’s become so via our culture of the last few decades. And del.icio.us is as simple as “have you read…?” The question is whether there is an aspect of games that is as easy, as obvious, and as permissive of contribution. And the answer is “of course,” it’s called play. This is why features like character customization, pets, fishing, and gardening are more not going to go away — they are fundamentally more accessible, easier, and familiar than dragonslaying. They are fill in the blank or even totally passive experiences.
The core of the current market, dragonslaying, is certainly where the money is today (engagement level drives price sensitivity). But it’s not the mass market, because it’s so darn complicated and unfamiliar to most folks. Much as the hardcore decry the lack of creativity in playing the hack n slash games, they require a much higher level of engagement. A virtual worlds built solely on creation — well, that’s way up at the top end of the scale too. You know what lives at the bottom? Chat.
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New chess opponents are only really created by mentors who are so or so common among chess players.
It made item icons stay on the action bar when you used up your last instance of an item (and appear disabled). I think thats the way they should have done it in the first place, of course. Slouken tried it and liked it and decided to put it into the standard UI.
[IMG Visit Raph’s Website » User created content] Raph’s Website » User created content http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/
[...] What great timing! Following shortly on the heels of my latest musings on user content, Raph Koster has posted some great insight. I thought I’d said some similar things, but I may not have made it clear. [...]
[...] Comments [...]
[...] Raph Koster’s post, User Created Content, is an insightful take on user created content and the 1% rule. He does a great job of wrapping up some of the lessons of Web 2.0 and applying them to games (and by extension virtual worlds). Mapping this pyramid to the Web 2.0 services is instructive. MySpace thrives on asking people to fill in the blanks, and to do easy content creation like linking and commenting. Flickr leverages an activity that everyone already finds to be at the easy end of the scale because it’s become so via our culture of the last few decades. And del.icio.us is as simple as “have you read…?” The question is whether there is an aspect of games that is as easy, as obvious, and as permissive of contribution. And the answer is “of course,” it’s called play. This is why features like character customization, pets, fishing, and gardening are more not going to go away — they are fundamentally more accessible, easier, and familiar than dragonslaying. They are fill in the blank or even totally passive experiences. [...]
[...] Fascinating little post from Ralph Koster about user created content at http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/ A short excerpt… [...]
[...] The big rap against user-generated content, of course, is that its directionless. It leads to a hodgepodge, and users whoWarhammer Online von Mythic Entertainment. enter an environment built from it quickly feel that theres nothing to do, because a rather small fraction of user content is actually finished. (Which just goes to show that the most needed attribute for a creator in any field is persistence!) Will Wright, back in the Sims 1 days, used to show off a User Content Pyramid, displaying the fact that a very tiny percentage of users made good content tools, a somewhat larger amount made content, a fair amount distributed it, a largish amount a plurality as I recall downloaded content that was user-generated, and the broadest base didnt so anything with it. Because of this, Sims 2 pursued certain types of user content even more namely, the movies and screenshot stories that were the big surprise in terms of Sims 1 content. Link: User Created Content 150)?150:this.scrollHeight)”> __________________ The tools suck! — Raph Koster [...]
[...] Degrees of Creation Raph Koster’s website has a great post on user created content.”The lesson here is that everyone is a creator. The question is “of what.” Everyone has a sphere where they feel comfortable exerting agency — maybe it’s their work, maybe it’s raising their children, maybe it’s collecting stamps. Outside of that sphere, most people are creators only within carefully limited circumstances; most people cannot draw, but anyone can color inside lines, or trace. If the games require serious commitment and challenging creation tasks equivalent to drawing from scratch, they will have smaller audiences.”Player creativity and user created content are some of my favourite subjects, and this post gives a pretty good picture of what is going on there. [...]
Raph’s Website » User created content
[...] The big rap against user-generated content, of course, is that its directionless. It leads to a hodgepodge, and users whoWarhammer Online von Mythic Entertainment. enter an environment built from it quickly feel that theres nothing to do, because a rather small fraction of user content is actually finished. (Which just goes to show that the most needed attribute for a creator in any field is persistence!) Will Wright, back in the Sims 1 days, used to show off a User Content Pyramid, displaying the fact that a very tiny percentage of users made good content tools, a somewhat larger amount made content, a fair amount distributed it, a largish amount a plurality as I recall downloaded content that was user-generated, and the broadest base didnt so anything with it. Because of this, Sims 2 pursued certain types of user content even more namely, the movies and screenshot stories that were the big surprise in terms of Sims 1 content. Link: User Created ContentWeitere News zum Thema: WAR: Preview auf Warhammer Online WHO: GOA bernimmt europischen Support WHO: Screenshots vom 28.5.2006 WHO: Paul Barnett und warum man Game Designern kein Kaffee geben sollte WHO: Screenshots 22.05.2006 Diskussion im Forum:Theorien ber User Created ContentBisher 5 Kommentare im Forum. [...]
[...] Raph%u2019s Website � User created content [...]
User Created Contents
[...] Raph Koster: everyone is a creator, the question is, “of what”? [...]
[...] Raph Koster: everyone is a creator, the question is, “of what”? [...]
[...] Shattering the Self-Promotion Taboo Learn More (Advertise for free!) Logged in as demo. Login Feedback Discussion - Register (no email required) - CleverCS - Web 2.0 All Links My Targeted Links My Targeting Links My Liked Links My Disliked Links My Submitted Links Link Targeting Raph’s Website » User created content - http://www.raphkoster.com/... 0 points, 0 liked, 0 disliked, del.icio.us import, 2 bookmarks, 40 days ago design, videogames, user, games, game, fourthwall, creativity, content, blog more like this / fewer like this - reply - targeting - surf The link above is currently targeted to 0 people based on the targeting rules below.Resubmit the link above to improve its targeting rules, description, etc. Link targeting determines who will receive the link as a targeted link. For example, you might recommend reddit.com to people who like digg.com or slashdot.org. In this case, digg.com and slashdot.org would be targeting links for the targeted link reddit.com. A targeted link’s score determines its ranking among people’s personalized recommendations. Spam too many people with poor targeting link rules and most of them will just vote your link down, thus reducing its rank among people’s personalized recommendations. Learn more: Shattering the Self-Promotion Taboo. resubmit link above (so you can improve its targeting, description, etc.) No targeting link rules found. For quick and easy link submission, drag and drop this bookmarklet to your browser’s bookmarks toolbar: Target Your News Submit [...]
[...] Hey Jonas, a few links that relates to this: http://www.elatable.com/blog/?p=5 http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/ [...]
[...] Jenkins somewhat ignores the massive disparity in participation among collective intelligences. While he does cite Survivor producer Mark Burnett’s claim that the show’s 20 million viewers massively dwarfs the community of online spoilers, Jenkins seems to assume that this disparity is a temporary one. In the future, as convergence culture takes hold, participation will become universal. Unfortunately, participation seems to take place more naturally in levels. Raph Koster points to a User Content Pyramid Will Wright used to use when talking about The Sims. A small number of tool makers supplies a slightly larger number of content creators, who publish content on a slightly larger number of web sites, for a slightly larger number of content downloaders, compared to the even larger number of ordinary players. Koster also cites a similar pyramid for Yahoo! Groups, in which 1% of the population starts a group or posts a new thread, 10% participates in the discussion, and the rest benefit from lurking. Koster convincingly argues that flattening the difficulty of content creation also flattens the pyramid–Raph’s example is Flickr, where creating a photo is a low-effort process. But Jenkins clearly sees high-effort, low-volume activities as much more indicative of convergence culture, or perhaps just more desirable (it’s hard to disagree). This kind of participation or “collective intelligence” still demands a very large base of ordinary mass-market consumers–20 million Survivor viewers are needed to generate 5,000 messageboard spoilers. While it is possible that the increased exposure to participation and convergence may naturally flatten the pyramid over time, it’s unclear how long it might take. In any event, Jenkins paints a picture of media participation that may imply greater flattening than actually exists. [...]
[...] URI ×1 http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/ メモする http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/ [...]
typically revolves around a single point of interest, i.e. ‘UGC makes games more interesting’ or ‘UGC can help drive sales.’ So I thought I’d compile a (by no means exhaustive) list of the good business-y things about UGC in the context of games…” User created content: “The lesson here is that everyone is a creator. The question is ‘of what.’ Everyone has a sphere where they feel comfortable exerting agency — maybe it’s their work, maybe it’s raising their children, maybe it’s collecting stamps. Outside of that
[...] [...]
[...] User created contentCreating Content [...]
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[...] All of this is, of course, an expression of the user content pyramid, which is usually expressed as “10% create, and 1% of it is any good.” But I’d like to propose an alternate extended definition: [...]
[...] All of this is, of course, an expression of the user content pyramid, which is usually expressed as ‘10% create, and 1% of it is any good.’ But I’d like to propose an alternate extended definition: [...]
[...] http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20/user-created-content/ [...]
[...] allow users to make instances, and am trying to find it… In my search, I came across this stuff: http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/06/20…eated-content/ ————— [...]
[...] Will Wright, the creator of The Sims, represents this chart after the release of The Sims: [...]
[...] user-created-content/ [...]
[...] (About Results) Are you looking for? No Suggestions Found. 1. Raph’s Website " User created content … of a movie is different from mine, in a game we can see that difference. … but the guild [...]
[...] up illustrating these engagement levels. Will Wright once produced one showing the Sims ecosystem, Raph Koster made one mapping the levels to easy and hard fun and in web circles Bradley Horowitz’s 1% [...]
Willの資料アーカイヴからGDC2001のぶんをダウンロードしていただきたいのですが、このプレゼン資料の72番目から、『The Sims』のMOD戦略についての説明が始まっています。これをルドロジー研究者のRaph KosterがWebサービスにまで拡張して論じたページを踏まえて、新・濱野両氏の「CGMマーケティング戦略論」が出発しているわけですね。