Abstract

Funware is an incentive strategy that uses the rewards systems typical of games in online nonentertainment contexts, to increase community participation. This strategy motivates users to act constructively in order to obtain recognition in the form of symbolic distinctions, like points or badges, and has been successfully applied by a large number of platforms including Foursquare, TripAdvisor, and the Google Local Guides program. This paper identifies the incentive elements that underpin gamification, analyzes its use on the main review sites, considers the key features in effective funware design, and examines the drawbacks and dangers it can involve.