Kind, Gehringer, Klein, Edmonds

Kind, Gehringer, Klein, Edmonds

Capstone Research Paper

9 May 2012

Project REBOOT

Executive summary

Project REBOOT has been an ever-evolving learning experience for our capstone team, largely due to the fact that there were so many moving parts to it. The original idea for the capstone project was to document the MU Sustainability Office as a resource to the Columbia community, including the slight possibility of helping promote their new project, REBOOT, via multimedia. As time went on, REBOOT’s vision changed and the role of the capstone team became to document the 10-week mobile-based game designed to engage the public in a fun way about the environment. There was already a REBOOT staff in place, equipped with a marketing, game development and game design team. However, as the game’s purpose evolved, it became more evident where the convergence team was needed. So we set clear goals to document the weekly challenges and players from the teams participating using multimedia, interview the REBOOT staff for a how-to documentary to explain the game’s successes and failures and assist in social media efforts to propel the game through the 10 weeks. Our team also would conduct surveys, in the form of questionnaires and focus groups. Ultimately, once our role in this new experimental mobile-based game became clear, we were eager to get started.

Research Findings: Surveys

One of the methods we used to gage REBOOT’s success halfway through the game was a questionnaire via SurveyMonkey. We found this method very helpful in collecting information from the players to dictate changes for the remainder of the game.Short survey at REBOOT Wrap up revealing favorite challenges, overall thoughts of the game and if Ava was successful. Some of the questions included were:

• How did you hear about REBOOT?

The majority of people who took the survey said they found out about Reboot through word of mouth (13 of 19). Nobody heard about the game from the news. The next to most popular ways of finding out about Reboot was from MU Info and from signs or handouts from the Student Center. The Student Center was not one of our options, but three people wrote it in, which was interesting.

• Are you a student, faculty, staff or community member?

When it comes to the make-up of our participants, 18 of the 19 are students. Only one of our respondents is a community member.

• Why did you join REBOOT?

The biggest reason for people joining the game was for money and prizes 100% of the respondents selected this answer. Another popular reason, 15 of 16, was to have fun.

• How did you receive your information about REBOOT weekly?

Email was the main way people get their information about Reboot (14 of 17). The second most popular reason, 6 of 16, was through community.rebootmizzou.com where the contestants log in.

• How would you like to see the games divided next year?

> Nobody said they play Reboot seven or more times a week. Only three people said they play four to six times a week. The top response was only one to three times each week (14 of 17).

• Would you play REBOOT again next year?

Of the 16 people who answered the question, 14 said they would play Reboot next year if given the chance.

• Do you own a smart phone?

Around 60 to 75% of team members have smart phones. One participant commented that the game might discriminate against people who are not able to afford this type of technology. But no other person made this complaint.

• How much did you learn throughout the game?

The responses were all very high across the board for what people have learned. Most people (11 of 17) have learned about ways to live environmentally friendly while nobody has learned nothing.

• How easy was it to communicate with REBOOT staff?

Everyone thought it was at least moderately easy to interact with Reboot staff, and 13 of the 16 respondents rated the game at least 4 on a scale of 5.

• What would you do to improve the game?

When people were asked what they could do to improve the game, a couple of responses were mentioned a couple times. The thing mentioned most often was the leader board. People wanted it to be updated more often, and they wanted to see what challenges they have completed as well as other teams. Another popular response was to have fewer games, and to have a few games that are a little more complicated.

Research Findings: Focus Group

We organized a focus group at the end of the game with five players from three different teams to determine successes and failures of REBOOT. This allowed us to get a deeper look at players and their attitudes toward the game from start to finish. We filmed the focus group and included it in our documentary. This conversational tactic was extremely effective in regard to the thorough feedback the game needed. For instance, the group of players unanimously agreed that Ava’s weekly transmissions were an unnecessary component of the game. Players also revealed which games were most enlightening and what problems they had with the technology aspect of the game. Overall, the focus group enabled us to really connect with the actual participants of REBOOT and record the evidence to invoke changes.

Social Media

Initially we were eager to implement social media tools for REBOOT; however, as time went on, we realized players and the general public were not using Facebook and Twitter the way we anticipated them to. This was a surprising part of the process for us convergence students because, well, we are fluent in social media.

Mark Yount, a part of the REBOOT staff marketing team, utilized Facebook before our involvement in the game. He handled Facebook advertisements, using strategic tactics to target college students in particular. When we came on board, we were given full permission to handle the Facebook account and began using it to publish weekly content of events, ultimately to show the faces of REBOOT. It was important for us to have a weekly visual presence to remind players that others were participating in the game. This could foster competition and overall communicate how others were engaging and having fun with the game. We also posted signs of REBOOT in the news; KBIA, Paul Pepper and KOMU’s U_News all covered REBOOT in their newscasts. In the end, the Facebook page was not as interactive as we had hoped. Players did not use it to interact with the REBOOT staff, nor did it generate interest from prospective players.

As is evident above, the overall interaction on Facebook interaction peaked in February, slowly declined through the duration of the gameand then was almost nonexistent by April. In the end, we realized that the only people truly engaging with Facebook were REBOOT staff. For instance, members of REBOOT staff would ‘like’an upcoming event, which would skew data when trying to decipher player involvement. For what it’s worth, REBOOT received a total of 99 ‘likes’on its page.

When we were given the Twitter account, we promoted weekly challengesto encourage involvement andcompetition. With a bit of a convergence bias, we assumed the general public would have some inclination to use the REBOOTMizzouhashtag we had so carefully advertised. We also live tweeted events like the REBOOT Kick-Off to generate interest and tweeted weekly reminders of challenges for players. However, Twitter was not a platform for interaction with players (although we tried to engage them), nor did players acknowledge it in the end. The only potential redeeming quality of Twitter for REBOOT was the amount of campus organizations and sponsors that followed along to see what the game was all about. The Twitter account’s account began its engagement by following these kinds of organizations to generate a buzz for the word REBOOT. These kinds of institutions made up most of the @REBOOTMizzou followers, coming to a total of 360 followers.

Other Data

Throughout the game, we collected some useful data that contributed to our overall understanding of REBOOT’s role in the community. Peter Meng, an RJI fellow who co-directed the game, provided us with a chart outlining REBOOT’s budget. This allowed us to understand the broader context of the game and its priorities.

Project Costs / Total
Costs /
SCVNGR Software License (1 year user license) / $2,000.00
Software Integration by CS Students (3 students for 4 months)
(– 4 months @ $1500, per month / $6,000.00
Software License (augmented reality) / $900.00
Software License (4 months – Student Life Network (4 X $1650) / $6,600.00
SUSTAIN! Game promotion and prize expenses. / $3,000.00
Project Management Expense
(4 months @ $1500 per month) / $6,000.00
Total / $24,500.00

As far as the community website ( where we posted stories weekly, we did not see a significant interest from players consuming our content. Because of logistical barriers within the site’s internal database, we do not know how frequently players viewed our content. However, because we uploaded most of our media to YouTube, we can view the number of views. The hope was that players would watch the content and reflect on their involvement as well as the overarching concepts of the game. Ultimately, the content we created was more useful for our documentary b-roll.

Challenges

There were a series of challenges throughout the REBOOT experience, both between REBOOT staff members and within the convergence team. The biggest problem for the staff was the amount of people on staff. While collaborating across disciplines is an extremely beneficial process that mixes creative ideas and specialties, it can also be counterproductive. As in any project setting, miscommunication is a certainty, but it’s navigating around that miscommunication that determines the strength of the end result. There were many occasions where one team’s tasks overlapped with another team’s, or one staff member simply did not know who should be held accountable for which task. In addition, deadlines were difficult to communicate because there were always at least three different organizations involved (MU Sustainability Office, Campus Facilities and the Department of Information Technology). Thus, miscommunication was non uncommon; however, in terms of communicating with the team players, REBOOT staff did a comprehensive job. All interaction and commentary was hosted on a social networking website (community.rebootmizzou.com e-mail: ; password: kjg91990). There, teams could ask questions, post photos and videos, and see other teams’ progress.

Other communication issues ensued when a plethora of ideas were involved in making one decision. REBOOT was often plagued with the ‘too many cooks in one kitchen’ syndrome. All parties were well aware of this and adjusted over time, which proved difficult because of the time sensitive element of the game itself. The debate over Ava Sims, the fictional character staff created to give the game a story arc, is a perfect example of trying to incorporate too many ideas at once. Ava’s personality was supposed to be a fun and engaging way to intrigue players – a mysterious researcher from the future trying to communicate that REBOOT players could change the future’s past if they made small lifestyle changes. REBOOT introduced Ava at the kickoff in The Shack and prospective players did not seem to really grasp the story arc or its relevance to the game as a whole. The plan was to release a YouTube video of Ava’s transmission from the future every week when the challenges were announced. Staff did this successfully, however Ava’s story was very vague and the staff members who initially conceptualized her were not the ones writing the scripts for the weekly transmissions. There was also general disagreement regarding the level of importance Ava had in the game. Overall, working on an interdisciplinary project comes with challenges in communication that need to be understood, compromised and solved in a productive manner.

The capstone group faced other challenges of our own. Every week we had to decide which activities of the weekly events was the most visually stimulating. We knew we needed to create compelling content to prove to the public that REBOOT was a worthwhile pursuit. Conceptualizing, planning and executing compelling weekly stories were our biggest challenges. We had to go back to our convergence fundamentals, which called for visual storytelling. Depending on the nature of the event, we had to decide the best method to convey how REBOOT teams were actively participating in games exploring sustainability topics and actually learning from them. We also wanted to give faces to the REBOOT experience. This involved a blend of photography, audio recording and videotaping. We challenged ourselves to explore a variety of media opportunities to create the best content. One of our favorite pieces to come out of this is from the week full of Re-Hydrate challenges. Three teams talked to a Columbia Stormwater expert and cleaned up the litter in Flat Branch Creek. Because this was one of the more physically active challenges, we decided to use video as a medium to capture the event. We added music to the video for aesthetic reasons and were pretty happy with the result. Ultimately, the idea was to encourage prospective players that they should join in, or communicate to existing players that they should participate in the events that their competitors are winning prizes for completing.

Opportunities for Future Convergence Projects

There is definitely ample opportunity to develop EBOOT into a capstone project in future semesters. Because it was the first of its kind and there was a significant amount of insight after its trial, REBOOT staff would like to explore the prospects of the game again next year. With the help of both player and staff input throughout the making of the REBOOT documentary, there is enough feedback to make improvements and expand upon parts of the game. Both parties were very candid in their constructive commentary about the game’s victories and downfalls. Our team learned the importance of following up with those involved in the game to make it better. Documenting reflections and ideas that may have seemed trivial or off-handed throughout the 10 weeks became crucial to the quality of the documentary. There were so many questions; What if we tried this? How would we do that? Will people care? Do we have enough time? In the end, the documentary not only answers some of those questions, but it provides an analytical look at all angles of the game.

Multimedia Projects

Every week, we produced multimedia content and uploaded it to YouTube, and ultimately the REBOOT community website for players to see. This helped solidify the environmental themes and raised awareness of Columbia’s resources and opportunities for residents to simply live better. It was important to us to convey the players and events accurately, in a way that encompassed the themes. The diversity of media platforms was also a priority, as we experimented with video, audio slideshows and photo albums. We began by covering the REBOOT Kick-Off in January and interviewed the prospective players that attended. We also took pictures of the event to document interest. We also posted an audio piece to the website highlighting different teams like Cat’s Tail, H. Badgers and People’s Republic of Delicious Food. This helped convey the diverse amount of interest in the game.

Throughout the first week we covered the REBOOT beer Float event in the dining halls that was supposed to generate interest among freshmen. During the first game, we took video of the event as students learned how to sign up for the game online. The second week’s theme was recycle. We began by deciding which events had the most visual opportunities. One of the challenges for that week was the Sustainability Office’s Recycle Audit on Lowry Mall, where players sorted through aluminum, glass, plastic and trash, learning more about the recycling process in Columbia. At events like this, we established a rapport with teams like the Greenola Bars and the Good Fellows because we knew a long-term relationship was in our future.

The following week’s theme was community awareness, for which we attended the Sustainahouse potluck that engaged a variety of community members and players. We decided the best format for this event was photo slideshow accompanied by audio to communicate the fun aspect of REBOOT challenges.The following week was RE-Route, which focused on transportation. We attended the Bike Resource Center’s Bike Tuneup on Lowry Mall. Next, during Re-Hydrateweek, teams gathered at Flat Branch Creek to do a cleanup. We captured the cleanup on video and added music to vary our approach to the content, making it less journalistic.