Book Review

Reality is Broken Book Review

        People have been playing games for thousands of years. However, 21^st century is probably the era that people can have the wonderful experiences that digital games brought to us. Unlike traditional games such as chess, poker, etc., digital game changes many people’s life styles and our societies. In the book “Reality is Broken: Why games makes us better and how they can change the world” Jane McGonigal argues about how games makes our world different and what it can do to us. This book gives us a unique perspective to look at the culture of games and gamers.

        “What exactly is a game?” This is the first question Jane asked about in her book and probably one of the most important questions we should think about. I believe that most of people must play some sort of game in their life just like me. However, the question like “what is a game?” or “why is game interesting?” rarely occurs to me. In her book Jane addressed the defining traits of a game which are: goal, rules, feedback system, and voluntary participation. She also defines playing game as “voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles.” Indeed, when game designers are creating a game they set up the tasks and rules for players to overcome before they achieve the goal. Most players seemed to solving these tasks willingly even though sometimes the process is painful. For example, players can experience hundreds even thousands of failure in the video game “Dark soul” before they even finished the first chapter. Yet, the game is still very popular and known for its difficulties.

        It makes me wonder why people enjoy failure and willing to overcome those “unnecessary obstacles” while playing games since people normally hates obstacles and failures in real lives. I believe the reason is the “feedback system” Jane mentioned about in her book. The wonderful part of gaming is that it gives players instance feedback such as levels, points, scores, etc. Game visualizes our achievement and allows players to see their progress instantly. Unlike science research, scientists have to wait for years even decades before the feedback comes. That’s why people don’t see science research as “playing games” even though they also “voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles.” The other fact that people won’t feel frustrating about failure in game is because we can redo it. Unlike real lives, the failure in game won’t do any actual harm to players except wasting of time and efforts and we can keep trying until we succeed. In chapter 4 Jane suggested that sometimes the “hope of success” is more exciting than actual success because if we mastered a game it will makes it boring.

However, failure is not the point why people enjoy playing games. We always like the feelings of success. In “Reality is broken” Jane indicated that the moment when players achieve a task the positive feedback gives them strong emotion impact. Furthermore, the achievement in game sometimes gives players the motivation to do something in real life. For example, the study shows that players of musical games are increasingly driven to paly real instrument. Thus, the achievement in game allows players feel something great about themselves which gives them passions and motivations.

Since game gives people motivation, by combining or turning our daily tasks into a game makes people tend to do it more willingly. For example, Jane mentioned a game called “chore wars” which she and her husband played together. No one likes to do chores. However, when playing this game payers earn experience point for household chores. By making our daily tasks into a game makes it become more interesting and gives people the motivation to do it. Moreover, it also gives us a chance to really think about the problems we might have in real life and actually do something about it. Jane suggests that the game “world without oil” changes many players’ life styles. Even teaches uses games to help children learn better. By playing this kind of games inspired people to think and solve the problems we have in reality and might help us to make a better world.

        On the other hand, sometimes the achievement we get in games is not just belongs to ourselves. Game provides a system which allows players the share their success to the community. Jane suggests that games brought strong social connectivity. With the development of internet players are able to play games with their friends or even strangers across the world. The system connects the gamers and creates a communities allows us the share our enjoyment. For example, Facebook games allow us to invite our friends to play together. Sometimes people also invite strangers and make new friend in games. It also provides people a chance to compare their achievement. Jane suggests that by beating others in games make players feel better. Thus, it became a competition between players, or maybe even the countries. Nowadays, many popular games such as “League of Legends” and “StarCraft” have many competitions and even hold world championships every year which select the best teams from the world. The Olympic or World Cup is not the only event the world can enjoy together anymore. Somehow games allow players all over the world to share the pleasure together and probably even brought stronger connections than before.

Game not only provide us a chance to gain achievement, but also allows players to be part of something great. Jane McGonigal indicates the idea of “epic scale” in her book. Game designers create epic plots, heroic stories, amazing soundtracks, etc., for gamers to enjoy. In the world of game ordinary people get a chance to be a hero and become an important part in the story. Unlike epic movies, such as “Lord of the Rings” or “Harry Potter”, which we can only be audiences; video games like “World of Warcraft” gives as a chance to play the important role in that fantasy world. It makes gamers to interact with the characters in the story and even able to influence how the story goes. Therefore, game provides us a wonderful experience which we couldn’t have in our ordinary lives. Game gives people a chance to forget all the problems we have in reality and be someone better than ourselves.

        It has been 10 years since “World of Warcraft” released. Until nowadays it is probably still the most popular game in the world. It has more than 10 million players worldwide and forms one of the biggest communications every year.  Many people even met their lovers in the world of this game. The company Blizzard holds an activity called Blizzcon which attract thousands of people every year. Not only online games like WoW, but also many other video games attract thousands of people and influence our life significantly. Each year thousands of gamer attend the trade fair like “E3” and “Tokyo Game Show”. In 21^st century, people spend more time and efforts in games than ever. To many people, game became part of their lives and helps them to interact with world. Game cultures not only provide entertainment but also one of the biggest community and economy system in the world. Indeed, nowadays many people are addicted to games, but it also provides a way for people to release and enjoy their life. Just like Jane McGonigal suggested it also provide many positive feedback and might help us solve many problems in reality. In the end, game might be one way for people to make a better world.

Digitized Lives Response

After reading the book "Digitized Lives" by Reed, I was quite interest about one of the topic he addressed: Is there a virtual world/ real-world divide? With the development of digital technologies we created thousands of cyberspaces. Nowadays, people with access to the virtual world can have the wonderful experiences with it. I believe that it is because of these online and offline experiences caused us to have the idea that there is a boundary between the two world, and many people even consider the virtual world is "not real".

I am not quite sure about the idea the we should consider virtual world and real world as two completely different and separate worlds since our body can't tell the differences. For example, people who played video games can experience excitement, raising of the blood-pressure, fear, etc. Apparently that human bodies cannot tell the difference of a virtual reality from real-world even though our brain knows that it is not actually "real". That's why military uses simulator to train soldiers. The virtual reality technology allows its uses to immersed into the computer generated 3D environment and interact with it. The experience of a virtual reality can be just like interact with the real-environment. An Japanese anime called "Sword Art Online" described a devised that take over user's brain signal allows its users to immerse into a virtual world without feeling anything from the real-world.If that technology came true one day people might not even be able to tell which world are we actually live in.  Based on players' experiences there isn't much differences between virtual world and real-world. As I was doing my research, I found a interesting theory called "Reality–virtuality continuum". According to the theory, there is no clear boundary between the two realities. As the real environment and virtual environment are the two opposite extremes on the continuum they forms a area called mixed reality between them.

Virtual world is deeply connected to our life. Online community like Facebook and Twitter even become one of the most important part in out society. All these digital technologies, devices, and internet are influencing the way we live. In my opinion, the virtual world is overlapping with real worlds nowadays. Therefor, I think it is quite impossible divide them into completely separated world.

However, even though human bodies can't tell the differences between virtual world and real-world, we still consider them as two different worlds. I think one of the big issues is the access to the virtual world. digital devices are just like portals to the virtual world. With the improvement of technology there are more and more digital devices and it's quality also became better. However, the access to the well functional digital device and internet is still a big problem. As Reed mentioned in his book, one of the geography of the Internet is "the place user is accessing". Yet, as I learned most of these places is at the developed country. Most of the world nowadays doesn't have the ability to interact with the virtual world. According to the chart the author provided there is only 11.4% of the population in India have the access to Internet. Even country like China have more than half of the population don't get the access to internet. The film " Virtual Revolution" made by BBC addressed that about 80% of the people on this planet do not have the access to internet and Africa is just starting to interact with the internet. Furthermore, I believe many of the internet users are not interact with virtual world as frequently as young generations like us. Therefore, since people still see the world without connection to the virtual world a lot it gives us the feelings that the two world is different and we should view them differently.

In a nutshell, there is still a long way that digital technology need to go. I believe that with the development of the digital technologies the boundary between virtual world and real-world became blurry. Maybe one day we will reach 80% of internet users in the world and I believe that world will be very different.

Grown up digital part 3

Since years ago I started to hear complains about how people in my generation live in their own world, spent too much time online, don't care about anything around us. As soon as internet, social media, video games, gets popular parents started to worried about the influences it can did to their children.  Many of the elders even reject to accept the new technologies. For example, when I was in high school in Taiwan we were basically prohibit  to bring and use cell phones in school. However, I do not think that technologies are making us ignorance. In contrary, I believe that through the technologies Net generations can see a bigger world than before and do something great about it.

Indeed, technologies changed the way we interact with people. We now spending more time texting and tweeting than we actually talking to others. Yet, I don't think this is all bad about this. Take myself as an example, because I am an international student the only way I communicate with my parents and friends back in my home country is through digital technologies like Facebook, Skype, or Line. The digital technologies allows us to interact with people through a long distance and even different time. It doesn't mean that we should abandon the old face-to-face communication and social skills, but it also doesn't mean that we shouldn't accept the new ways of interaction and communication.

Another thing I heard a lot is that young people nowadays doesn't care about their societies or politics. I completely disagree with that. Many of the young generations now actually do care about their country. Take Hong Kong for example, thousands of student went to the street and fight against their government for democracy. Same thing happened in Taiwan in March, 2014.  Many of the social events now are actually done by young people through the power of social networks. I believe that it is the digital technologies and internet makes us see a bigger world which makes us started to care about the problems we never realized before. Just like Tapscott suggest net generation are using  the power of technologies to make us a better world. For example, the ALS ice bucket challenge spread all over the that which raise people's attention to help the people who suffering in this disease. I believe that many people include myself don't quite understand what this disease is before this events happened. The only way this event can raise so many attention and became so successful is through the social networks like Facebook, YouTube, and the contribution of the Net generations. With the technologies young people realized social problems, political problems, environmental problems, etc, and many of us are willing to help with those problems. With the digital technology people nowadays can even work with each other across countries. It allows us to collaborate with the people all over the world in order to make our planet a better place. Although it does change the way Net generation interact with other people and might have some disadvantages, I think we are still doing great by using the benefits that digital technology brought us to make as a beautiful world.

A better pencil: Reading Response

Writing is truly a great technology. After the development of the written form of languages, human developed more technologies, such as printing press, pencil, etc., to enhance the way we write. Dennis Baron, who wrote A Better Pencil, even consider computer as a technology that enhance writing. Indeed, computer is probably the most wonderful invention in history that totally changes the way we use our language. 

When writing first came out, Plato argues that it only weakens human memories. However, Plato probably didn't know that there are too much stuff which is impossible to memorize all of them. That's why human needs a written form of language to help us keep things which we couldn't memorized. Baron argues that people write down those things that we "want it in writing."  Maybe just like Plato says writing weakens our memories since we don't have to memorize something we already wrote down. However, writing as a technology actually allows us to store more knowledge than before.

It is always wonderful that human can develop new technologies upon the old ones in order to improve the way we uses old technologies. Writing is a great example that we use new technology to improve the old ones. When the writing first came out people used to write on tablets, stones, walls, etc. After the invention of paper we could keep the writings more easily. The printing press allows us to produce more books and spread the writings more quickly. The invention of the pencil helps as to write more easily. Through thousands of years we have developed so many different technologies to improve the way we write. 

Yet, the process that we improve the way we uses text hasn't stooped. As Baron suggest, computer is also a new technology that enhance the way people uses writings and even changes the way we use it.  Nowadays authors can write their books with laptops instead of pen and  papers while readers read from screens instead of books. Computer also brought us many new types of writing such as email, blog, etc. Moreover, computer allows us to put text on the internet and spread the words more quickly than printing press and its databases can store information thousands times more than a library can. Thus, computer really is a powerful technology that totally changes our writings.

In a nutshell, technology is a wonderful thing that improves human civilization; and with the improvement of out knowledge and civilization we can develop mote technologies. So maybe next time when new technology came out, instead of complaining about its weakness and problems we should also think about what benefits it and bring to us.

Orality and Literacy Reading Response Part 2

Writing, as Walter J. Ong mentioned, serves human as a technology just like computers. Perhaps very few of us noticed that because writing is so common in 21^st century which most of us understand it. However, the situation is very different thousands years ago there are only very few people know how to write and read. Indeed, writing should be treated as a technology, and whenever a new technology come out it usually brought lots of critiques. According to the book, Plato argues that “writing destroys memory,” which I believe many people lives in 21^st century would disagree with his opinion. In my opinion, I even believe that writing helps people to memory stuffs. Maybe Plato had that kind of opinion because he didn’t fully understand about writing since writing is a new and rare technology back in his time; just like many people in 21^st century do not fully understand what computers and digital technologies can do.


A new technology which people don’t fully understand always brings problems and critiques. Thus, as a technology writing also faced the same issues hundreds ago. It is wonderful that human beings developed so many writing systems through hundreds and thousands of years. To me, I believe writing is not only a technology, but also a cultural products which represent certain civilizations. 


As the author mentioned, before Yi Dynasty Korea uses Chinese characters as their writing system. Nowadays, there are still many languages or Chinese dialect that uses Chinese characters as their writing system. A writing system with a powerful culture is likely to spread and influence other cultures. Before Qin Dynasty, there were seven different kingdoms uses seven different writing systems in China. After Qin conquered the other six kingdoms the emperor implement a new writing system and wipe out all the other writing systems in China. Therefore, I believe that writing is not only a technology, but also a cultural products that represent a civilization and its power. 

Orality and Literacy Reading Response

In the book "Orality and Literacy", Walter point out how "writing" serves as a technology, how it transformed through times, and how it interact with oral speech. I strongly agree with his opinion that "writing never without orality." When ever people read text we always connect it with oral speech in our mind or speak out loud. The appearance of writing indeed enhance the way we use our language. Furthermore, Walter also mentioned that writing really helps humans to spread knowledge. Unlike ancient times before a written form of language people can get knowledge through reading instead of listen to the old men and women about their experience.

However, I am a little bit disagree with  Ferdinand de Saussure and Henry Sweet's opinion that Walter mentioned in his book. Saussure thought that "writing as a kind of complement to oral speech, not as a transformer of verbalization"; while Henry insisted that " words are made up not of letters but functional sound units or phonemes. Maybe their opinion might be true based on English or some other languages, but I don't think it applies to all the other languages in the world. At least their opinion won't applied to Chinese language. Foe example, sometimes a Chinese words can represent more than two different pronunciation. Unless we know the meaning of the word in the certain context we probably won't pronounce it correctly. Moreover, Many Chinese dialect such as Cantonese sounds just like a completely different language while we still use the same writing system (Maybe a little bit different.) Yet, the writing form of Chinese language still based on oral speech.

In my opinion, the reason that writing form of a language always exist with oral form is that people always learned how to speak before we learned how to write and read. Further, when we learn how to read and write we always connect to  the word with the way we speak. Therefore, writing will always connect with a oral form of language.