Blog posts

There are no general regulations that permit volunteering of services to an employer in the private sector. All hours worked must be paid.

Most for-profit organizations cannot accept volunteer, unpaid labor without running afoul of the FLSA.

Even interns must be paid in most circumstances—if they’re performing tasks that benefit the employer (as opposed to just learning and observing), they’re completing work that is entitled to pay. This is true even if the intern <em>offers</em> his or her services for free just to get started with the organization.

Rounded corners are easier on the eyes. When we align cards in a row, it’s easier to count the total number of cards when they have rounded corners.

<mark class="xl xm if">Fully rounded buttons are excellent in interfaces that have adequate space.</mark>

<p class="" style="white-space:pre-wrap;">In a Mastery Loop, every time you make a poor decision, you see the poor consequence play out, then you automatically get to make the decision again. Once you make the right decision, the story continues. There’s really only one way to get to the ending, and it’s always the best ending.</p><p class="" style="white-space:pre-wrap;">Some people discourage the use of Mastery Loops because they feel it’s overly controlling to “force” people to eventually choose the right path.&nbsp;</p><p class="" style="white-space:pre-wrap;">But if your business problem is relatively simple, and doesn’t require a lot of nuanced decisions, a Mastery Loop might be the best format to use.&nbsp;</p>

The most important aspect of branching scenarios and interactive stories are the choices presented to the player/learner. Choices are what make interactive stories different from other creative writing outputs such as novels, plays and movies.

Choices can feel totally different to a player depending on how they are written, even if they seem to have the same outcome.

Finally, version with dialogue-based choices (see screenshot above) was perceived as more personal and engaging, “lively” and helpful for making a selection (“made me feel like I was talking out loud in my head”).

The findings from this pilot questionnaire seem to indicate that providing framing in the options themselves has more effect on the learner than providing it in an introductory text.

Additionally, options written as dialogue were experienced as more personal and elicited higher emotional reactions of the learner towards the characters. This may be of use in courses about soft skills.