Through my research experiences thus far, I have discovered that employing a playful attitude contributes to my overall grasp of play theories. I have started to identify some ways in which work can be approached playfully in my own life. This project aims also to share these discoveries with others who are looking for ways to incorporate more playfulness into their workflow.
I plan to approach work tasks commonly accomplished across a wide array of work situations through a more playful lens. With complaints of poor work-life balance in the United States coming to the forefront as an issue that needs attention, playful activities are being compromised for longer work days and an “always on” expectancy. By providing users with the toys/tools to accomplish these tasks in a more playful way, a playful attitude may positively impact one’s attitude towards work, as well as spread to other aspects of one’s life more easily. Work and play have often only ever been talked about in opposition. It is my argument that work and play can be intertwined in some way that allows modern sentiments about “work” to shift more towards fun and joy, and less towards obligation and resent.
The goal of this project is to develop a digital environment designed to help today’s workers find playfulness in their work. This environment will be crafted based on my own “rhetoric” of play and an exploration of what methods individuals are currently using to make their work more playful. While many existing methods seem to focus on playful distractions from work, my aim here is to design a toy/tool that helps individuals incorporate playful tendencies into their productivity routines. Rather than taking a break from work to play a game, the work becomes the “game.”
Each toy/tool in the environment will have a few common threads. One common thread of each of the “toys” will be their voluntary nature. When play is forced or imposed, it looses some of its qualities of “play-ness.” By creating what I refer to as “environments” with playful elements, users are provided with the opportunity to interact playfully with tools that are also used for productive purposes. This project’s toys/tools will also attempt to find a suitable balance between structure and un-structure. Ideally, play has the opportunity to exist relatively unstructured, allowing for organic spontaneity and genuine “outside the box” thinking. However, unstructured activities aren’t always perceived to be wise investments by organizational stakeholders, so they can often be excluded from a company’s culture. Finding a balance that caters both to the productivity associated with structure and the creative thinking associated with un-structure may allow this toy box to survive in organizational cultures that are unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the idea of play.
I feel it necessary to specify my intent with this project. My intent is not to develop a tool whose only operative is to cater to the bottom line. Instead, my intent is to develop a toy/tool that helps individuals reframe their thoughts about work. I aim to serve the well being of the modern worker by encouraging playful, imaginative behavior in their work. When innovation is fostered appropriately, everyone wins. When the individuals within an organization feel satisfied and fulfilled, their attitudes are sure to spread throughout the organization.
The Digital Toy box
I refer to the environments I plan to develop through this project as a digital toy box for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, growing up, I was fortunate to know my fair share of toy boxes. I used my toy boxes as a sort of gateway to another world – my play world. Many of the objects in my toy boxes weren’t even what most people would have considered toys. One box, my “school” play box, contained things like grade books, transparencies, and white board markers. My dress-up box was full of my parents old clothes, hats, bags – to my parents, the boxes just contained old stuff, but to me, opening the boxes was a way of unleashing my imagination.
I’m also fond of the idea that a toy box can grow with a person. As a person grows up, the toys in the box might change, and maybe even the box changes, but what’s important is that we keep the box around in some capacity or another. We might not open in up every day, or every week, or even every month, like we used to when we were younger, but it’s still our toy box is waiting to unleash your imagination when you decide to open it up again. I think many grown ups have been encouraged to discard their toy boxes in adulthood.
The word “toolkit” may also be a somewhat appropriate description, but I have chosen not to use it as the primary descriptor because I don’t think “toolkit” carries enough implication of fun and play- again, the goal is to help reframe thoughts about work activities.
A browser-based play environment
Developing a browser-based play environment caters to the flexible nature of today’s workforce. Making the toy/tool browser-based allows for easier distribution across multiple types of devices and operating systems, as opposed to a desktop application or phone/tablet application that would have to be downloaded. It is also important to consider that some company issued devices may have restrictions for downloading and installing unapproved applications. A browser-based solution circumvents the need for additional permissions, greatly increasing accessibility.
For the execution of this concept, I plan to explore the programming languages HTML5, JavaScript and the p5.js library. While I’ve become familiar with coding in Processing, I’ve had difficulty incorporating code developed in Processing onto a website before. While simple, low-processing power sketches seemed to work without too much trouble, more complicated code (particularly animation) repeatedly crashed my browser. The p5.js library offers similar creative freedoms to Processing, however p5.js was created with the intention of creating interactive, generative environments that translate well to the web. p5.js is a Processing-like library for JavaScript. The syntax and logic are very similar (although not identical by any means) which makes for an easy transition from Processing to a more web-compatible programming language. P5.js allows you to layer a drawing/interactive “canvas” on top of existing html body elements. P5.js offers me the opportunity to get some introductory experience with html5, as well as build off of my foundational Processing knowledge base.
In addition to acting as a bridge between Processing and HTML, p5.js was only introduced a few months ago, providing me the opportunity to participate in and contribute to an active and emerging development community. If I am able to excel at coding in p5.js, I can position myself at the forefront of a new technologic trend.