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Bipartisan commission has reportedly contacted Steve Ballmer about making a game that could let any US citizen suggest ways to deflate ballooning national debt.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6258115.html?tag=latestheadlines%3Btitle%3B5
Interesting, lets get an army of gamers to work on testing out ideas to reducing our deficit. On the plus side I can see this potentially getting people involved who would otherwise be apathetic to it, but I can also see the game coming under a lot of heat when peoples methodologies fail to provide the expected results.
How do you design such a game and model all the variables involved accurately? Also how do you remove potential bias surrounding the game and give it credibility? whether inadvertently biased because of in game handling of variables, or even just confirmation bias when peoples ideals do not yield the intended or expected results. Even if the game came up with the holy grail of deficit busting, I could see this generating a TON of controversy, and would question whether such a solution were it to be found would actually get implemented.
Welcome to the future.. governance by video game here we come!