Taking the notion of institutionalised rewards maybe a little bit too far, Microsoft has begun awarding achievements to developers.
Earlier today the company unveiled a beta plug-in for the Microsoft’s Visual Studio development environment, which offers 32 achievements for developers based on how well they’re coding. There are even leaderboards, and the achievements can be linked to a Facebook page.
Visual Studio Achievements Program Brings Gamification to Development [Microsoft]
I love it!
The world needs more gamification
haha awesome!
Achievement Unlocked: Programmed a Bullion
I think you mean Boolean.
What's the problem? Why can't people have a bit of fun at work? Don't think they're honestly expecting it to make employees achievement whores or anything.
Imagine the productivity if they did though
nah great idea. We've been doing them at work too.
1,000,000 iterations of an infinite loop #achievementunlocked
I dream of a day when everything is gamified.
What a sweet, sweet, ocd filled time that will be.
This is a brilliant move for MS, and a great way to encourage programmers, especially the younger crows, to test out all of the new frameworks they keep releasing. Make an achievement or two based on each feature of the new framework/SDK, and you create a massive incentive to experiment.
Plus, it'll make sure things get coded in the same manner... if everyone wants those cheevos they'll write their code in such a way as to get them.