Fun Theory Contest - Volkswagan 2009

When I was little and had to clean up my room I thought it was the worst possible chore in the world. But one day my mom made things different, first she set up the laundry basket all the way at the far end of the room and told me I had to throw my clothes into the basket from where I stood at the other end. Then she set up clock and timed to see how many of my clothes could I get into the basket in 15 minutes. Just by doing that I don't I complained about cleaning my room. It's odd to think that when we are suppose to do something like cleaning our rooms it seems like it is such a annoying task, but when we make it fun, then the task isn't so annoying any more. Well one major car company has taken this idea to new levels to encourage people to change their behaviors for the better. It's called FunTheory.

In 2009 Volkwagen launched it's FunTheory contest in the United Kingdom and Sweden. The award was a prize of 2500 Euros, which is the equivalent of about 3420 U.S. Dollars, and the goal was easy, come up with an idea that can change people behavior for the better rather it for yourself, for the enviroment, or for something entirely different. The only thing that mattered is that it's change for the better.

The four finalists in 2009, were what drew me to FunTheory and are worth discussion. They each thought of a fun way to do things that made people change their behavior without even realizing it. The first was called "The World's Deepest Bin". The finalist asked the question "Can we get more people to throw their trash away into a trash bin by making it fun to do?" They placed a motion detector into a trashcan that when something was thrown into it, it made the noise of an item falling into a bottomless pit. They place this trashcan in a park a few feet away from other normal bins. Can adding a noise of something dropping really change people behavior to throw something away properly into a trash bin instead of littering? Turns out it can. During one day the trash bin with sound effects colleted 72Kg (158.4 lbs) of trash while the near by normal bin only collected 31 Kg (68.2 lbs). It was also noticed