Calvinball!

Image courtesy User FlameDarkfire on Photobucket

I have recently been shocked by the incredibly high percentage of the population who looks at my like a mad man upon the mention of Calvinball. Apparently some poor under privileged youngsters out there were raised without even the merest mention of the sport. So for those of you out there who are lacking in Calvinball experience come and get your knowledge.


Beginning on November 18, 1985 and running until December 31, 1995 Bill Watterson published his phenomenally successful comic Calvin and Hobbes in syndication across the world. The star characters were an imaginative 6 year old boy named Calvin and his pet "stuffed" tiger Hobbes. It is no stretch to say that even discounting Calvinball that the comic strip has inspired more people to play than maybe any other piece of mas media. The comics unabashedly promotes the importance of childhood activities and emphasizes that children must and will be free to be children,but all of this is worth another post all together at a later date.

Calvinball is a game unlike any other namely because it contains only one immutable rule,

"You cannot use the same rule twice"

Other than this anything goes. What makes Calvinball unique is that it is an innately physical game that places equal importance on creativity as on physical prowess and requires an inherent good sportsmanship that is lacking in many rule based games. Since rules can be made up by any player at any time, even contradicting preexisting rules, the players must learn to take creative loss in stride. This feature makes the game excellent for both children and well adjusted adults. Children can learn creativity and constructive argument skills as well as fair play in an environment that also keeps them physically active it also fosters the cliched "outside the box" thinking. As or adults it allows an excellent release from a society that is already governed by thousands of unquestionable rules.

In closing I'd like to leave you with The Calvinball theme song

Other kids' games are all such a bore!
They've gotta have rules and they gotta keep score!
Calvinball is better by far!
It's never the same! It's always bizarre!
You don't need a team or a referee!
You know that it's great, 'cause it's named after me!

What is Play? Enhancement

From the Wikimedia Commons Image Pool : Taken from http://www.flickr.com/photos/sookie/17464614/ Licensed under CC 2.0

In the first of what will likely be many thoughts on this topic from a the standpoint of pure unprofessional conjecture I would like to submit the idea that, contrary to what some may believe, we are not playing unless in some way we are improving. Since we as intelligent animals need certain skills to survive we have developed ways to impart the knowledge of these skills onto otherwise ignorant youngsters. Being that we are pretty hedonistic beings in our youth and unlikely to just sit and listen to whatever our elders have to say it seems that we've developed another way to learn, which is of course play. Play inherently improves us in some way all the time. As children we develop the skills required to survive through play, often times initiated by an older family member or mentor. We are hardwired to be learning skills quickly and enjoying learning these skills through play. This obviously begs the question why play as adults? Simply put, we don't stop learning and we enjoy using the skills we learned as children and developing new ones. We can see the issues of a loss of play in the common complaint "I'm just not challenged at work" when we stop growing and pushing the use of our skills work, which can be enjoyable and even considered play, becomes drudgery.

Lets look for example at something that would almost immediately be considered mind numbing monotony at any time. Sitting for hours in front of a computer monitor entering data, testing and retesting results, this continual work would usually be something to be dreaded, not anticipated eagerly. However for thousands of North Americans such as a myriad of independent game and software developers this is a hobby, this is play. It is play because they enjoy it and I would venture an educated guess that it is most enjoyable from the challenge that comes from creating it and the exhilarating pride that comes from its completion. This same logic can be applied to dozens of common hobbies, woodworking, gardening, even general exercise is enjoyed because it stimulates and improves us. It is a holdover from our enjoyment of improvement as children which we develop through play.

Pure Play

Boys playing (Petrov-Vodkin) -Wikimedia Commons Picture Archives

I spoke yesterday with a man I respect immensely named Bob Appleton, he's a professor at Ryerson and a graphic designer of note but more importantly I view him as sort of a mentoring figure, which is odd since I have had him as my professor twice and neither class focused on learning but more doing. I digress what I find wonderful about Bob is that I can't stop talking to him once I start and when I'm speaking to him my thoughts seems to work themselves out as they fly from my mouth.

So yesterday after a long hiatus we spoke, notably about the importance of play and how it pertains to both art and society. During this conversation I came to reflect upon my previous statements and some notes and conversations about the idea of "perfect play"or "pure play", a sort of childish innocent play that was free of the seemingly guilty facets of adult play. So I suppose this post is some kind of retraction, or more of a re imagining for the sake of understanding my field better, I'm changing my notions of play or at least expanding on them. While it was fun to look at play as though it was some kind of universal mathematical constant, as was necessary for the project, I can't continue to look at it as a Psychologist or a Mathematician becasue I am neither of these, which also for my means giving up the search for "Pure Play" for the sake of actually understanding play better. I liken this to a musician who had the erroneous idea that some how he could make a song that every single person on the planet would enjoy, its a pleasant Lennonesque notion but I've come to the realization that I was dismissing the real play in favor of finding this single and ultimately elusive type. So I'm fondly waving goodbye to my Unified Play Theory, it will remain here on the site as documentation but in the name of knowing more about play I think I'll be putting it out to pasture.

Old News

This is likely old news for anyone with anyone with any interest in the field but it seems like a solid way to ease back into updating this joint regularly. First off let me say that this man Doctor Stuart Brown is everything I have come to admire about the modern thoughts on a society at play, not only is he a psychiatrist but he's an avid zoologist as well. His work on the brain functions of murderers brought him to the field of play and his work is part of a growing mountain of evidence that the removal of play in society may be a bigger erosive force in our society than we might otherwise have thought.

Linked below is his 26 minute TED talk in which he covers both animal and human play as well as his own findings in researching play for his play advocacy foundation the National Institute for Play. Of particular note in this video are his excellent ideas on getting the most out of employees in the creative economy. His students at the D school (at Stanford) study the impacts of play within the work place and I will concede its a place I would really like to attend. In summary watch the video linked below and be inspired by someone who has the foresight and credibility to see that its imperative to reintegrate play into a society beleaguered by depression, anxiety and other preventable issues.


Stuart Brown @ TED

National Institute for Play

Stuart Brown TED profile

Reboot

When this little blog began it was used exclusively academically to report on and to promote my 4th year New Media final project named Playspace. What started out as an art project that I was doing because I needed a university degree has been firmly planted in my mind for over a year and now seems to be the thing I feel most passionately about and that links all of my other thoughts and interests together. What has happened is that I have discovered that Play is my calling. Some people are passionate about music others about business but it seems like for Craig Herbert my life's work is going to be Play.

So on that note I would like to announce (mostly to myself) that Playspace the blog is officially reopened.

However since the project of the same name is over and done with the blog will be switching directions, or rebooting as the current vernacular trends seem to indicate. So we will from now on be focusing on the decidedly abstract notion of Play. To clarify this decision, because Play is a very broad and well represented field on the Internet, here at Playspace the focus will not be on video games, board games, sports or Internet and new media social media trends (although they will likely be discussed) but on how and why we as human beings incorporate play into our lives. It will be heavy on personal theory and might not jive with the way you experience the world but I do hope you will come away happy. There will be links to others discussing play around the Internet as well as those engaging in it, there will be personal experiences, and there will be critical analysis.

Thank you for reading and I hope you come back.
-Craig

Finalization

Well Its all over and done with and it seems time to complete this blog and finally with the video from the gallery ready I will submit the documentation of Playspace to the history books enjoy these documentation shots and check of the video of the whole show courtesy of Adam Video">

Thanks to everyone who participated and keep Playing

Beta 1: Handout update

Below is the handout I will be distributing for the Thursday Feb 5th beta presentation of Playspace.


Playspace Update.


Finalized aesthetic.
A palette of red to yellow the colors that, according to my polls and research, are most likely to evoke the type of play we are searching for (creative and exciting)
Additionally after testing the iconography and taking the results of the polls into account I've have commissioned a series of icon based graphic pieces, also in the preferred colors,Of which the first 2 can be seen here, more will come after the beta and after further poll analysis.

Familiarity vs Instruction
While struggling to understand why it was difficult for participants to play under the circumstances I had laid out for them and after reading the polls and personal opinions,I began to toy with concepts of instructions. This goes against the entire goal of the project and so I have decided to go with familiarity in lieu of rules. As opposed to being told explicitly what to do, the audience is now confronted with a series of objects and settings that they are familiar with and are thus more predisposed to understand how to interact with them. This familiarity makes the project more user friendly without compromising the integrity with instructions.

Finalised Equation
CF = CM + SP +PE + DI

Where CF= Total Creative Force
CM = Cultural Merit (where the audience values what they are doing)
SP= Space Positivity (lack of judgement etc...)
PE = Psychological Effect(psychological stimulants)
DI = Direction (When faced with an over whelming amount of options people don't react well so they must be directed)

With the addition of DI my goal of 4 play conditions is fulfilled and I feel like I can get on with finishing the final project out of the research stage. Direction is the missing link the takes the work from a theoretical frame work to a viable experience.