AR(e) we ready : a study of the phygital practice of playing Pokémon Go

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UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM

AR(E) We Ready

A study of the phygital practice of playing Pokémon Go

Harshavardhan Sushant, 12136352

Master thesis Cultural and Social Anthropology

Applied Anthropology track

GSSS department

Supervisor: Dr. Alex Strating

Committee: Drs. Alex Strating, Tina Harris, and Yatun Sastramidjaja

21.06.2019

harsh_sushant@outlook.com

Amsterdam

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Page | 2 Declaration: I have read and understood the University of Amsterdam plagiarism policy [http://student.uva.nl/mcsa/az/item/plagiarism-and-fraud.html]. I declare that this assignment is entirely my own work, all sources have been properly acknowledged, and that I have not previously submitted this work, or any version of it, for assessment in any other paper.

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Abstract

Augmented Reality (AR) is a technology that integrates digital information into physical surroundings. Considering the way we use our smartphones, we do the same in our daily lives; in fact, we do it without using AR. The resulting question is, how does AR impact its users’ interrelated digital and physical realities? I explored this question in the thesis by examining Pokemon Go (or, simply, Go), which is a smartphone AR game and app. My objective was to study the interplay of Go and users, particularly the impact of Go on users’ interrelated digital and physical realities. This objective resulted, empirically, in a study of actual interactions between Go and users. It further meant theorizing the technologies involved in playing Go (both hardware and software) as material culture. Drawing upon Reckwitz’s practice theory, playing Go was theorized as a practice. In doing so, I connected interactions with the Go app to their contexts. Methodologically, interactions between Go and users were studied through a combination of visual methods, semi-structured interviews, and participant observation. Ultimately, I found that Go players merged their digital and physical realities to such a degree that these realities were inseparably fused, that is, they were

phygital. This finding led me to examine how players constructed phygital realities while playing Go. I further proposed two factors that enabled this phenomenon: Go is designed to encourage easy integration of the app into daily routines, and players, themselves, integrate Go into their routines. Finally, my findings and analysis indicate that players live phygital realities not only while playing Go, but also during their daily lives.

Key words: design anthropology; practice theory; material culture; human-technology relationships; visual methods

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Acknowledgements

Many people were integral to this thesis. My deepest gratitude goes to all the Go players who readily welcomed me and gave me their time. I sincerely thank James, Engelbart, and Easton (names anonymised) for taking time out for my interviews and offering all their support. My heartfelt thanks also goes to my supervisor, Dr. Alex Strating, for his constant

encouragement, care, and guidance.

I thank my classmates in the applied track of the programme for always being ready to listen to my ideas and offer feedback. I particularly thank Rosa who opened my heart to my own story. If my writing style has at least some passion and fire, then I have succeeded in being authentic to myself, and it is truly thanks to Rosa’s faith in me.

Above all, I thank my family for their undying love. Writing a thesis can be mentally and emotionally exhausting. So, with all my heart, I thank my family for flying to Amsterdam and supporting me in this process. They somehow always managed to keep my spirits high. Hence, I owe this thesis entirely to their love and support. I also thank my Guru for being there for me through thick and thin. In challenging times, it was always his words that energized me.

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Prologue

Before reading this thesis, please note that it was part of a larger study on AR technologies, specifically, AR headsets and smartphones. I conducted fieldwork in Amsterdam from January-March 2019 for 11 weeks through an internship with a digital design agency called Mirabeau. I wished to investigate the impact of AR technologies on their users’ interrelated digital and physical realities by studying actual interactions.

I chose to study both headsets and smartphones because I wanted to comment on the present state of AR in the Netherlands. Mirabeau also expressed that it would benefit them if I could compare users’ experiences with these two devices. However, I encountered various practical and ethical dilemmas which prevented me from studying interactions with headsets. I further learnt that though AR headsets were largely designed for enterprises, they were hardly used because actual experiences of using them did not match prior expectations. Given the above situation, I interviewed five employees of Mirabeau who had recently used, or were actively using, AR headsets to further investigate this ground-reality. Simultaneously, I studied interactions between Pokemon Go and players.

For this thesis, I have only analysed data concerning Pokemon Go because it fulfilled my theoretical and personal interests. By analysing actual interactions, I wished to emphasize that technology and users are involved in human-technology relationships; they both play equally important roles in impacting users. As for the applied inputs to Mirabeau, I shall compare data concerning both smartphone and headset users to recommend relevant improvements to designing AR experiences.

Finally, I wish to thank few individuals who were involved in the applied part of my study. I thank my internship supervisor Henk Haaima for his constant support. I extend my gratitude to my informants, and to my fellow interns, Cinzia and Katoo, for brainstorming solutions with me for the various dilemmas I faced during fieldwork.

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Introduction

I can never forget my earliest memory of using the internet. The year was 2001. I was a five-year old living in a two-bedroom apartment in the bustling city of Mumbai. Like in all middle-class families, my father decided that two things were going to be important for his children’s future: a good education, and a computer. I assure you, the computer we had in our house looked nothing like the ones today. It had a bulging round screen on a fat monitor, running the Windows 1996 operating system. But, back then, it was nothing short of high-end. The internet used an all-but-forgotten technology called dial-up. To date, I remember the beeps and the flashing lights of the modem. My brother and I would sit next to each other, staring intently at the lights. More like waiting because dial-up was slow. To put it in

perspective, the highest speeds we used to get were in the range of kilobytes per second. Yet, there was something about technology opening up whole new worlds that always fascinated me. Those flashing lights seemed to symbolize the gateway to a world where I could obtain all kinds of information, about any topic, in a matter of a second. Or, maybe a few.

As I grew up, I not only wondered at the technology around me, but also the way in which it mediated our physical world. Particularly with regard to relationships, whether it was time spent with my brother, or playing video games with friends, I cherish many shared moments of togetherness with friends and family which were facilitated by technology.

However, 18 years later, the world has changed in many ways. We no longer have to be stationary and use a personal computer (PC) to connect to the digital world. Today, we can connect anytime, anywhere, on-the-go. Instead of using PCs or laptops to access the internet, we use our smartphones. The rapid adoption of smartphones is a remarkable story in itself. Currently, the number of smartphone users in the world is estimated to be around 2.5 billion.1 The same source states that in 2011, roughly 700 million people owned a smartphone. That is approximately a 257% increase in eight years! In this short while, consider the way in which our behaviour has been altered.

Whether inside a supermarket, or simply walking down the road, we tend to reach for our phones. We are constantly using our phones, to the point where it often affects the

quantity and quality of our social interactions. Smartphones have become our gateways to the digital world that satisfy our every desire, from communication to finding directions. It has

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Page | 8 thus become common, even mundane, to use our smartphones throughout the day while doing various activities in the physical world.

However, in true anthropological fashion, we must prod the mundane. For, it is the mundane that disguises powerful meanings. In the case of smartphones, without consciously realizing it, we combine digital and physical information with each other. When viewed from a broad perspective, we combine not only information but also our digital & physical

sensibilities and realities with each other.

So, in light of all the above, what if I were to describe a technology that literally brings digital information into our physical environment? This technology exists and is called augmented reality (AR). To me, it is extremely interesting that the technology does what we, as a society, already do, namely merge digital and physical worlds. In December 2018, as I wrote my research proposal, I asked myself, how do such technologies impact the digital and physical realities of their users? I hoped to find out how willing users were to accept the technology. Four months later, after fieldwork, I came upon the fascinating conclusion that we may be more ready and willing than we think to adopt AR technologies.

Science fiction becomes science fact

Azuma et al. have defined augmented reality (AR) as follows, “An AR system

supplements the real world with virtual (computer-generated) objects that appear to coexist in the same space as the real world”.2_{There are many kinds of technologies that allow an}

experience of AR; for instance, head-mounted displays, handheld devices (like smartphones), projection displays etc. (Azuma et al., 2001:34).

IMG 1 (left): 3D pipe model and 2D shop floor plans superimposed on an industrial pipeline IMG 2 (right): AR in sports broadcasting through the example of NASCAR racing (both

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Page | 9 As seen in IMG 1, AR allows digital objects to be superimposed on the physical

world. Commonly, such a view can be obtained by using headsets (like IMG 3) or

smartphones. Further, as IMG 2 clarifies, AR can also be produced by augmenting digital objects on live video. The floating markers mentioning names of the second and third position drivers are digital objects which were placed in real-time on the video broadcast. This

technique is also used in broadcasts of football and cricket matches to project scores on the field or pitch. In fact, this same principle allows certain apps on smartphones to be called AR apps. These apps use video from smartphone cameras to act as the real environment on which digital objects are superimposed, allowing users to interact with these digital objects in real-time. Pokémon Go (or, in short, Go) is a well-known example of an AR game app (IMG 4).

IMG 3 (left): Me testing the Microsoft HoloLens AR headset at Mirabeau (internship agency) IMG 4 (right): Demonstration of AR+ mode of Pokémon Go

During fieldwork, I examined AR headsets and Go while interning at a digital design agency in Amsterdam called Mirabeau. IMG 4 showcases me using an AR feature called ‘AR+’ in Go, which was considered an iconic feature of the game (Webster, 2019). As seen in IMG 4, it appears almost as if the fictitious creature (called pokémon) is resting on my

fingers. Technologically, this is an example of smartphone AR and has used the same

technique as seen in IMG 2, that is, insert digital objects within real-time video. On the other hand, IMG 3 depicts my first time wearing an AR headset, the Microsoft HoloLens. I

obtained access to it at my internship organization, Mirabeau, which owns few of these headsets.

I chose to examine AR headsets and smartphone apps for my larger study on AR technologies because they were the only technologies I could practically access. Presently,

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Page | 10 sophisticated AR technologies like headsets and other eyewear are niche; they are only used in specialized settings like design studios, architecture agencies, research labs etc. Given that Mirabeau is a design agency that experiments with AR, they owned few HoloLens headsets.

My first experience testing the HoloLens was simply breath-taking. As a technology enthusiast, I was excited to finally have an opportunity to use it. I remember I was fascinated by the fact that I could anchor various icons and apps on my physical surroundings. Indeed, the resulting effect felt like I was interacting with holograms. Fittingly, then, Microsoft calls their device a “holographic computer”.3

This phrase is very interesting, given that holograms and AR technologies have been continually dreamt of in science-fiction, for instance in recent movies like Minority Report and the Iron Man series (Maddox, 2016). Playing on the desirability of this technology, Microsoft has coined the motto for HoloLens as, “Science fiction becomes science fact”.3

Based on my description, and the allure of holograms in popular imagination, it may be

expected that this technology is creating a revolution. Yet, fieldwork revealed that science fact (the HoloLens) is a far cry from science fiction. I learnt that the HoloLens is only a prototype with several critical setbacks. Moreover, I could not study actual usage of the HoloLens for various reasons, which I elaborate below.

Dilemmas surrounding AR headsets

Let me begin by addressing the technological issues surrounding the HoloLens. From experience and small talk, I noted that its battery drained quickly; the device heated up greatly; it was heavy, and its weight fell squarely on the nose, thus causing pain. For these, and other usability issues, the HoloLens could not be worn for long. I further learnt from the designers at Mirabeau that the same issues extended to other AR eyewear, which, I was told, were all prototypes; the manufacturers of these AR eyewear released them as enterprise editions, developer editions etc. with the intention of collecting feedback for improvement.

The above challenges resulted in two major practical issues. Firstly, although I could use the headsets at Mirabeau, it was very hard to find regular users of those headsets. Given that the headsets could not be used for extended sessions, most projects involving them were short-term in duration. Secondly, influenced by the above, there were hardly any active AR projects happening in the Netherlands during my fieldwork.

Additionally, Mirabeau had placed a condition on my study. During pre-fieldwork discussions, they announced that they were not interested in any information surrounding

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Page | 11 their own employees. Instead, they wanted me to study interactions between AR technologies and users outside their company.

Despite these technological, practical, and applied dilemmas, I managed to find two design firms in Amsterdam that, like Mirabeau, provided AR solutions to their clients. They even had active AR projects at the time. Yet, I could not study them due to an ethical dilemma.

Ethical dilemma

I tracked down two design firms, called Digitas and CapitolaVR, that had active AR projects. In fact, I went in person to meet the developers at CapitolaVR. After we exchanged introductions, the developers gave me a broad overview of their work. The minute one of the developers motioned to the computer opposite him, another developer sitting next to him stopped him, and told him it was under NDA.

NDA is an abbreviation for non-disclosure agreement. It is signed by companies collaborating with each other – in this case, Capitola and their clients. Once these agreements are signed, all project-material becomes confidential. The intention behind signing NDAs is to protect certain information from parties not covered under those NDAs in order to prevent abuse and consequent financial losses.

NDAs proved to be a major ethical issue in my study on AR technologies. If few individuals had chosen to share some confidential information, then, both they and I would have indulged in unethical practices. On the other hand, not having access to project details, meant that I could not study actual interactions with any AR eyewear. The same dilemma cropped up while communicating with Digitas over email.

Ultimately, I was forced to abandon my original intention of studying interactions between AR eyewear (including headsets) and users. I resolved all the dilemmas above by pursuing an alternative approach. Thanks to small talk with Mirabeau employees and fellow interns, I realized that the lack of AR projects was, itself, an interesting problem to

investigate.

With respect to AR headsets, I wondered, why are AR headsets not being actively used

in the professional sector when they are specifically designed for enterprise applications?

From small talk with Mirabeau employees, I soon learnt that there were stark disparities between expectations and actual experiences of using the headsets. Further, by this time, I had extensively discussed all the above research dilemmas with my internship supervisor at Mirabeau. He understood that there was no option but for me to study Mirabeau’s employees.

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Page | 12 Therefore, I decided to investigate the disparities between expectations and experiences of using AR headsets by interviewing Mirabeau employees who were either actively or recently involved with AR projects. In this manner, I resolved all the dilemmas preventing me from studying AR eyewear.

I still wished to study actual interactions between AR technologies and users. I thus started searching for suitable smartphone AR apps, and finally selected Go because it was the app that popularized the notion of AR apps on smartphones. Moreover, it arguably remains the most popular AR app to date.

Pokemon Go: Fantasy becomes reality

Go was launched in July 2016 and instantly became a viral success; it was

downloaded over 650 million times by 2017 and over 800 million times by 2018.4_{From Go}

alone, its developers, Niantic, have reportedly gained over $2.2 billion lifetime revenue so far, and are projected to accrue a staggering total of $3 billion by the end of 2019 (Fogel, 2019).4 Hence, some explanation is warranted into the popularity of the app. In this section, I hope to achieve three goals: firstly, provide a short background to Go; secondly, explain why it became popular, and finally, account for why it is still being played three years after the game was released.

Before moving forward, I wish to clarify a matter of terminology. The word Pokémon is officially written as so. However, it is common to replace it by the non-accented, lower-case word, pokemon. Thus, I will stick to the non-accented form unless I refer to the Pokémon franchise or company

Go is fundamentally both a game and an AR app that was developed by Niantic Labs in collaboration with Nintendo and The Pokémon Company.4 It is based on the Pokémon franchise, the history of which dates back to 1996 when the first Pokemon games, Red and Green, were released in Japan (Madnani, 2016).5 The franchise is very much alive; although more than 20 years old, the eighth generation of Pokemon was announced earlier in 2019, with the launch of two new games, Pokemon Sword and Shield.5

Leading from the above, an important underlying reason for the explosive popularity of Go is nostalgia. Most Go players, including myself, were part of a generation that grew up with the franchise. For many players, it reminded them of their childhood memories watching the pokemon TV series and playing various pokemon games. As children, many of them had dreamt of being pokemon players, or ‘trainers’, in real life like in the TV series and the

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Page | 13 games. The same subject was discussed by a Nintendo sales representative and me during fieldwork. In order to respect my informants’ privacy, I have anonymised all their names. I shall thus call this person Kelly.

I met Kelly at Vondelpark during an in-game Go event called ‘community day’. She was a sales representative hired by a contracting firm in Amsterdam on behalf of Nintendo (a partner firm of Niantic, the developers of Go). Her job was to advertise Nintendo’s video game consoles and other products at certain designated public events. Once we started talking, Kelly soon touched upon the topic of Go’s popularity.

that's why they [Nintendo] want to add this extra thing because you want to be — or when you were younger —you wanted to become this pokemon player. Now you have a ball, and if you connect it with the game, it vibrates whenever a pokemon's nearby, and you can push this button and catch it. So it kind of becomes real

The “extra thing” Kelly mentioned, was an accessory called the pokeball plus. As she described, the ball added a layer of verisimilitude to the gameplay that helped bring the

fantasy of Go to life. There are also other reasons why the game became popular: for instance, its novel AR feature, and its emphasis on physical activity and meeting new people (Yang & Liu, 2017). As for why people continue playing the game in 2019, based on the responses of most of my informants during small talk and interviews, the three factors just mentioned along with nostalgia play a huge role.

What remains to be addressed is how I studied Go, what I chose to investigate, where I conducted the study etc. Thus, I have provided few basic details of my thesis below.

Practical details

RQ: What do interactions between Pokemon Go and its users indicate about the nature of the users' interrelated digital and physical realities?

This research question (RQ) was undertaken specifically for the thesis. With respect to the applied inputs, I examined disparities between expectations and actual experiences of using AR headsets. For the thesis, I chose to examine only Go because of my research objective.

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Page | 14 My objective was to study the impact of AR technologies on their users. Given that AR merges digital and physical information, unlike any other technology presently available, I wished to study the impact of AR on users’ interrelated digital and physical realities. Yet, I simultaneously acknowledged that I could not study AR’s impact without accounting for the manners in which individuals use AR. Hence, I decided to empirically investigate my objective by studying interactions between AR technologies and users.

Among AR technologies, I chose AR headsets and smartphone apps because they were the only ones I could access. I have already detailed the various dilemmas that prevented me from studying interactions with AR headsets. Therefore, I decided to examine interactions between Go and users for this thesis, in the hopes of studying how Go impacted its users’ interrelated digital and physical realities.

The RQ outlined above was part of a larger study on AR technologies, which I conducted through an internship with Mirabeau, a digital design agency in Amsterdam. Mirabeau was very interested in this research because they wanted to learn more about AR use-cases outside their organization, particularly among smartphone users. I was told by my internship supervisor, Henk Haaima, that my research on smartphone AR users’ experiences would be very valuable to Mirabeau because smartphones would continue to be the most popular AR device in the near future. Mirabeau now expects me to contribute to the organization by composing two deliverables: an article for their in-house magazine, and another paper that they hope to publish in external marketing magazines.

I conducted fieldwork from January-March 2019 for 11 weeks. My fieldwork was conducted in Amsterdam by way of the internship with Mirabeau. I collected data from two groups of people: AR headset users at Mirabeau, and Go players. I studied these disparate groups because I wanted to collect the most representative data in order to comment on the present state of AR in the Netherlands.

Having earlier stated why I chose to study AR headsets and smartphone apps, let me briefly explain why I chose to study Go. It popularized the concept of AR apps on

smartphones, and is arguably the most popular AR app to date. The numbers say it all. Go was launched in July 2016 in limited markets, and by the end of the year, it had generated more than $1 billion in revenue; according to Niantic, the game set a record for the fastest revenue growth in the history of smartphone apps.4_{Go continues to be very profitable,}

reportedly generating $795 million worldwide in 2018 (Fogel, 2019). Moreover, though the app is three years old, I found there were huge numbers of regular players across the world.

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Background literature

To some readers, AR and Go may sound technical, complex, and far from

anthropology. Yet, the truth is quite the opposite, which is why I have specified below the relevant anthropological literature, the research gaps present therein, and the position of this thesis in the existing literature.

Several works have been published on the anthropology of technology (Coleman, 2010; Glaskin, 2012; Larkin, 2013; Wilson & Peterson, 2002) Yet, there are two huge gaps in the literature. Firstly, although research exists on virtual worlds and online gaming

(Boellstorff, 2008; Golub, 2010; Nardi, 2015), there is no accessible anthropological work on augmented reality. Secondly, there has been a dire lack of attention on technology itself and how it interacts with individuals. My thesis contributes to both these gaps. I have particularly addressed the second point through the theme of material culture, and by grounding my work in the growing field of design anthropology.

Design anthropology is the collaborative product of two different disciplines, design and anthropology. To do design is to think of an idea, plan it out, and “give form, structure and function to that idea” before executing it in the world (Nelson and Stolterman, 2003:1; cited in Otto & Smith, 2013). While anthropology is a study of humans, by this definition, design is a universal human activity. It can thus be observed how anthropology is inevitably a study of human creativity and design.

As academic disciplines, the two are quite different from each other. While

anthropology aims to understand society, design seeks to transform it (p.131). Further, design is future-oriented; its goal is to create solutions (products and services) that improve certain situations or existing products and services (Singh, 2019:130-131).

Yet, there are also various similarities that have helped bring these disciplines

together. Firstly, both are processes of inquiry and discovery; secondly, they rely on methods of observation; thirdly, both emphasize reflexivity either on the part of researchers or

designers; lastly, both are interested in human behaviour and practices (Otto & Smith, 2013:2-3; Singh, 2019:131).

As a result of these similarities and differences, the resulting discipline of design anthropology counters each other’s weaknesses. It is much more interventional and desirous of changing social reality than traditional anthropology. Unlike traditional design, it seeks a deeper understanding of individual values and subjectivities.

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Page | 16 I am drawing upon design anthropology for its particular emphasis on material culture. In the convergence of design and anthropology, their individual emphasis on engaging with things has grown stronger; Kjærsgaard et al. (2016) have stated that there has been a recent 'material turn' in anthropological literature, which has emphasized agency of objects,

affordances of materials, and the interaction between humans and non-humans (Henare et al., 2007; Ingold, 2013; Miller, 2005). Kjærsgaard et al. have added that, similarly, in design research, there has been growing attention on the nature of design practices and the status of artefacts made through such practices. Moreover, design research and anthropology share a common interest in the non-anthropocentric (Callon, 2004; Kohn, 2013; Tsing, 2015; cited in Kjærsgaard et al., 2016).

In this light, let me add the specific position of this thesis within design anthropology. There are many configurations within the two disciplines, broadly broken down into

anthropology of, for, and with design. Of design treats design as an object of analysis,

studying the whole design process, including the end-product; for design is a configuration where anthropology and its methods are used for the benefit of design; with design is a collaborative approach wherein anthropologists and designers work together on research projects, thus exchanging theories, methods, and tools (Drazin, 2013:46; Singh, 2019:131-134).6

My thesis is positioned under anthropology of design because my primary goal is to reveal larger meanings associated with the practice of playing Go. Thus, Go is treated as a design object, and as I will argue later, as material culture. For the applied inputs, the

configuration will change to anthropology for design as the goal there will be to recommend improvements to designing AR experiences.

Theoretical themes

As a trend, anthropology has predominantly focussed on human subjectivities and agency. This is a problem because anthropology is considered the study of human beings, meaning everything related to being human. Of the many things that are involved in being human are the objects we use in day-to-day life. Scholars like Latour (2005) with his Actor-Network Theory (ANT) and many others (Carstensen, 2015; Navaro-Yashin, 2009) have questioned this myopic focus. Importantly, Latour (2000, 2005) argued that actors are engaged in networks of activity that involve various non-human actors, especially objects.

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Page | 17 Latour and the authors cited above have repeatedly remarked that though objects have their own agency, it has largely been ignored in prior research.

Addressing this gap, recent work on material culture has emphasized agency of objects, affordances of materials, and the interaction between humans and non-humans (Henare et al., 2007; Ingold, 2013; Miller, 2005). Recent work in the area has further teased larger meanings out of non-descript, non-human actors; for instance, the threads of capitalism and multispecies survival underlying the commodity chain of the Matsutake mushroom (Tsing, 2015). Similarly, Kohn (2013) has captured the ways in which Amazonians interact with the multiple other creatures that exist in their ecosystem in order to question central assumptions we hold of what is distinctly human.

Inspired by such scholarly work on non-human actors, I wished to study both

technology and users. While analysing my data, I want to particularly emphasize the impact of technology on users. Thus, I theorize AR technology as a material object that affects users’ actions in distinct ways (Carstensen, 2015; Henare et al., 2007). It is not only the form factor (smartphone, headset etc.) of AR that influences users’ actions, but also the digital

environment of the technology (such as icons, graphics etc.). Hence, I wish to extend the concept of materiality to include this digital environment. I shall elaborate this theorization in my framework in chapter two.

Apart from the above, I am motivated by the debate about anthropologists’ effect in the field. Traditionally anthropologists have taken the conservative stance that they must only study ‘the other’, but not intervene in informants’ lives or change social reality in any way (Bennett, 1996). On the other hand, applied anthropologists have argued that anthropology needs to use the knowledge it generates to intervene in reality; they have pointed out that anthropologists have a responsibility to their informants to act and improve their lives. One famous instance of this argument was the school of action anthropology that was advocated by Sol Tax and his students in the 1950s in USA (Mertens, 2004). Further, the recurring theme of such arguments has been that anthropologists have conventionally only produced knowledge for their own selfish purposes without benefitting their informants in any way whatsoever (Bennett, 1996; Mertens, 2004).

I could not agree more with this agenda of applied anthropology. I believe there is an urgent need for anthropologists to contribute in every domain of work, particularly

technology. As I have elaborated in the next section, there are multiple concerns among the public regarding technology. Anthropologists have the power to not only produce necessary

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Page | 18 knowledge about interactions with technology, but also improve technology so that our highly technologized world is safe, healthy, and fulfilling for future generations.

Public debates

Other than theoretical debates this thesis particularly addresses many debates that recur in the press and media. The major, overarching one concerns establishing healthy human-technology relationships. The more we use technology, the stronger our relationships with technology become. I define these relationships as positive/healthy when interactions with technology leave the user feeling mentally, emotionally, and physically healthy. These relationships are defined as negative/unhealthy when the reverse is true.

This is similar to the definition raised in a BBC Click podcast, Our Changing

Relationship with Tech.7_{Interestingly, the panel members in the episode commented that the}

overall relationship in society is changing from technology worship to technology fear. They further discussed the need to go on a “tech detox”, that is, abandon or, at least, pare down unnecessary applications and services. Essentially, the panel members implied that following a tech detox would result in a healthier human-technology relationship. As a whole, the debate of healthy/unhealthy human-technology relationships is central to my thesis because my research question concerns the ways in which people deal with their digital and physical realities while interacting with Go.

Within this larger debate, there are four specific debates that my thesis addresses: trust, control, and technology’s effect on social behaviour and physical activity respectively. All four debates keep recurring in mass media. Regarding trust and control, consider the public lecture series called Boyer Lecture. In October 2017, Dr. Genevieve Bell, an

anthropologist who has worked extensively in Silicon Valley, invited various members of the Australian public to voice their hopes and fears regarding technology.8 It is remarkable to hear how many times the notions of trust and control are vocalized by the public in this voice recording.8 Additionally, trust is of crucial importance in adopting emerging technologies (Bahmanziari, Pearson, & Crosby, 2003). Hence, it is a highly relevant debate for my thesis because it allows me to speculate whether society is ready to trust the still-emerging

technology of AR.

With regards to the control debate, an insightful example is the effect of technology on children. Rosin (2013), being both a journalist and a mother, has neatly explained how

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Page | 19 questions such as, should parents impose strict restrictions on their children’s use of

technology? Or, instead, given the increasingly technologized nature of the world, should parents freely allow their children to use all technologies? I believe that questions like these highlight a larger question, namely, who controls technology – the user, or the technology & its designers? Whether the user is a child or an adult, we do often feel that technology robs our attention, and takes too much of our time and energy. This feeling is evidenced simply through different headlines like, Addicted to your Smartphone? (Stolzoff, 2018).

There is also concrete factual evidence to buttress the claim that smartphones are manipulating our attention. For instance, Stolzoff (2018) has written about ‘Fogg's Behavioral Model’, a set of psychological principles that answers a common question in the technology industry: how can users be attracted to keep coming back? Product designers use the model to design apps in ways that persuade users to keep using the apps for prolonged periods of time (Stolzoff, 2018). In fact, there is tangible evidence to show that this kind of ‘persuasive design’ is used by all the technology giants, including Google and Facebook (Stolzoff, 2018).9

Thus, the feeling of control, or lack thereof, regarding technology usage is a vital dimension of human-technology relationships. It is especially relevant for my thesis because AR is a technology that is designed to merge digital and physical environments. Are we as a society ready to accept a tighter integration between digital and physical worlds? Are we going to feel in control while interacting with such technologies? These are questions that will be

addressed through my findings and conclusion.

Then, there is the equally pervasive issue of social behaviour being affected by technology, the clearest instances of which emerge from social media. In a series of letters to the editor, published in The New York Times, there are strong concerns voiced out, ranging from comparisons of the past with the present to anxieties about a future inseparable from social media (The New York Times, 25 April 2012). Taken together, the public’s multifarious voices reflect the irony of social media encouraging a certain sense of sociality (mediated through technology), yet often resulting in decreasing face-to-face interactions. Another article in The New York Times earnestly describes ways in which our smartphones decrease both quality and quantity of face-to-face interactions (Gonchar, 2016). How do AR

technologies handle the issue? Many present AR technologies, like Go and the HoloLens headset, are designed to encourage mobility. Yet, as Gonchar (2016) ponders, what is the quality of the social interactions that occur, if any? My thesis centrally deals with such questions by examining interactions with Go.

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Page | 20 Lastly, there is the debate of technology’s effect on physical activity. Often the first thought that comes to mind is video games and the increasingly sedentary nature of our interactions with technology. Even work life is criticized to be extremely sedentary, to the point of negatively impacting our physical health; some research suggests that exercising may not be enough to undo the effects of sitting all day long (BBC News, 16 October 2013). The insidiousness of sedentary work is reflected through contraptions like the treadmill desk (BBC

News, 30 January 2013). Despite AR allowing people to be mobile and out in the open, does it

impact physical activity? I hope to address the question by analysing interactions with Go.

Value of thesis

So far, I have provided various strands of information that hinted at the value of this thesis. As value is a subjective term, I shall concretize the value for three different audiences: academia (particularly the discipline of anthropology), industry, and society.

I hope to contribute to anthropology by addressing two major research gaps: the lack of anthropological work (that is publicly accessible) on augmented reality, and the dire lack of attention on the workings of various technologies. Expanding the second gap, more attention needs to be paid to the topics of material culture, non-human agency, and interactions

between humans and things. Recall the points mentioned in the theoretical debate section; there has, indeed, been inordinate emphasis on human subjectivities compared to objects and humans’ interaction with them. In this light, I aim to generate value by adding literature to the domains of material culture and non-human actors – domains that require more focus in anthropology. Hopefully, applied anthropology will also benefit from the thesis, especially from the empirical approach and methodology used to study augmented reality.

Outside academia, my internship organization, Mirabeau, will directly benefit from the thesis. They decided to hire me as an intern because they are very interested in the different ways in which AR is used, especially outside their own company. Moreover, they wish to save any central theories and concepts that I use in my applied inputs for the future, which will help them improve the way they design their AR services.

The technology industry (or, tech industry) can certainly benefit from my thesis. Firstly, AR is a hot topic. As one of my informants who was then involved in an AR project at Mirabeau remarked, every company wants to stay up-to-date with the latest technological advances. If not for any other reason, at least for the sake of competitiveness, various companies will keep abreast of the latest updates and try exploring how AR can help their

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Page | 21 workflow. In his opinion, companies like Mirabeau (digital design agencies) were hence often contacted by different ‘clients’ (different organizations) to provide ‘demos’ of AR. Thus, a deeper understanding of AR experiences from a user-centric perspective, something that my thesis provides, can be very valuable for the tech industry.

As for society, debates about healthy/unhealthy human-technology relationships are vital. As we step into a future that is ever more technologized, it is inevitable that digital and physical environments will merge more closely. AR is one of the first such technologies designed to do just that. Thus, we need to debate how we want to foster healthy relationships with our technologies. For the sake of both present and future generations, we must hold designers and the tech industry accountable. Yet, without relying on the tech industry, the government, or any external institution to resolve our issues, we must constructively debate and try finding solutions ourselves. My reflections and findings in this thesis supplement these points and address the debate of healthy/unhealthy human-technology relationships through four related debates: trust, control, and the effect of technology on physical activity and social behaviour respectively.

Methodology

RQ: What do interactions between Pokemon Go and its users indicate about the nature of the users' interrelated digital and physical realities?

After finalising this research question (RQ), I asked myself how I could empirically study it. My decision was based on my research objective, to study the interplay of

technology and users. I particularly wished to study how Go impacted its users’ interrelated digital and physical realities.

I was inspired by Carstensen (2015) because she had similar interests as me; she too theorized technology as material culture and as coplayers in social actions. She conducted her study by using software-based recording and analysing on-screen interactions.

After reading Carstensen’s (2015) work, I realized that visual methods would fit my research topic, objective and theoretical interests well. Hence, I visually documented interactions between Go and users in the following ways: I video-recorded on-screen interactions using my smartphone. I further used my smartphone to capture pictures and videos of contexts of those interactions; for example, the different technologies used to play Go, and types of conversations during raids. My smartphone camera was valuable because I

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Page | 22 had to go outdoors to capture my data; Go can only be played outdoors. Thus, it helped me be mobile, and also aided me in blending into my research setting. After all, Go players were using their smartphones too.

My approach differed from Carstensen’s (2015) in the way I engaged with my informants. She had studied human-internet interactions in a controlled, laboratory environment. On the other hand, I was in different outdoor locations, ranging from train stations and bicycle sheds to public parks. Hence, I modified her approach. She had instructed her informants to speak aloud their thoughts as they interacted with AR. Instead, I initiated the conversation; I spoke to my informants informally and, in the process, prompted them to share their thoughts. My aim was to learn not only about users’ actions, but also their thoughts and intentions.

I further pursued this aim by conducting three semi-structured, open-ended interviews among Go players. I captured the data through audio recordings and written notes. The interviews allowed me to learn about individuals’

motivations of playing the game, and thus provided an additional layer of context of users’ interactions with Go.

Let me here note that out of respect for my informants’ privacy, I have anonymised all their names. Moreover, using their real names does not benefit my thesis whatsoever.

Lastly, I conducted participant observation. I aimed to attentively observe interactions between Go and players. Further, I registered a user-profile on Go with the player-name,

GhostWave173. Hence, importantly, I was not only an

anthropologist but also a Go player during fieldwork.

IMG 5: My Go user-profile

Having provided the background to my thesis, I now wish to give a broad overview of the following chapters. Chapter one is intended to provide more details about Go. I have not only explained the aim of the app, but also described the motivations of both Niantic (the developers) and the players. I have further provided a visual description, akin to a basic guide, to important features of the app. Finally, I have detailed the theoretical framework, using which I have analysed actual interactions with Go.

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Page | 23 Chapter two is where my ethnographic material has been presented and analysed. As I primarily relied on visual methods and observation, I have pasted relevant photos of

interactions with Go. In this manner, I have connected theory, ethnographic material, and analysis to answer my research question.

The concluding chapter sums up the content of the thesis. After summarizing the analysis, theory, and methods, I have emphasized my contributions to both theoretical and public debates.

Lastly, I have provided a glossary in the appendices which covers the terminology found in Go. I strongly urge readers to refer to the glossary if they seek clarifications, or want more information, for any terms related to the game.

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Chapter One

Primer to Pokemon Go

Pokemon Go (or, simply, Go) is a milestone game and app in so many regards. After it was launched, it was such a runaway success that only 6 months later, it had crossed more than $1 billion in revenue.4_{This was reportedly the most explosive revenue growth among all}

apps until then.4_{It was also the first game that bridged spatial, temporal, and social}

dimensions (Clark & Clark, 2016). Thus, only fittingly, Go has received many awards, including Best Mobile and Handheld Game at the British Academy of Film, Television and Arts (BAFTA) Game Awards, Best Mobile/Handheld Game & Best Family Game by The Game Awards, Mobile Game of the Year by IGN etc.10

Pokemon Go, explained

Go is an augmented reality (AR) mobile game which was released in July 2016 through a collaboration between Niantic (the game developer), Nintendo, and The Pokémon Company.4 It uses location tracking technology (GPS) on smartphones as its primary medium of interaction. Thus, to move their avatars and play the game, players have to go around the real world.

The aim of the game, if there is any, follows the motto of the Pokémon franchise, namely Gotta Catch 'Em All.5 What is to be caught? Pokémon – fictional creatures that reside in different environments. To catch pokemon, players must throw pokeballs at them. Based on their environment, pokemon have certain types (rock, steel, fighting, water, fire, grass, wind etc.). An imaginary device called the pokedex keeps track of all the pokemon caught. Thus, the aim is to fill up the pokedex by catching all the pokemon out there.

The developers of Go (Niantic) have their own motivations, which they have described in their blog as so: “Our games are designed to inspire movement, face-to-face

social interactions, and exploration of public spaces” (my emphasis).11_{So, their motivations}

can be listed in two different categories: social, and personal wellbeing. Among the social drivers, Niantic wants to encourage people to engage with their communities, explore public spaces, and interact with others; regarding personal well-being, Niantic strongly encourages physical activity.11

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Page | 25 Since Go is an app, I have chosen to provide below a basic guide to the visual

interface as it existed during my fieldwork. Hopefully, this guide will acquaint readers with the digital materiality of Go, namely the icons, graphics etc.

Welcome to Pokemon Go

IMG 6: Loading screen (left) and common warning messages (centre, right)

The loading screen (IMG 6) was the one that all players encountered every time they opened the app. There was no way to go past it. After a few seconds, a cautionary message would pop up - the ones in the above picture were the most common. Once the “ok” button was pressed, the latest news and notifications related to Go were shown. Then, finally, players arrived at the ‘action screen’. I have called it the action screen because all in-game actions were initiated from this screen.

Action screen

The heart of the action rested here. When the umbrella icon (IMG 7, top right) was tapped, a weather card would pop up, showing a range of conditions from sunny to rainy and windy. In my experience, weather reported often matched surrounding weather.

The icons at the bottom triggered other cards. The right-corner one prompted a ‘nearby’ card, which allowed players to preview the pokemon near them, look at ongoing & upcoming raid battles, and battle other players.

The icon in the bottom centre was a pokeball icon. Tapping it led to many menus, namely settings, tips, news, pokedex, shop, items, and pokemon.

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Page | 26 IMG 7 (left): Action screen

IMG 8 (right): Menu containing my avatar

Lastly, the avatar icon in the bottom left-corner (IMG 7) indicated the level of the player. When tapped, it led to details about the player’s virtual avatar – in this case, my own avatar (IMG 8).

The style of the avatar could be variously customized – making him/her wear different apparel, accessories etc. Next to the style icon was the journal, which recorded various

activities that players did in the game. Then, there was the buddy icon, which gave players the option of choosing a specific pokemon to stand by their avatar.

Lastly, the same avatar card (IMG 8) gave access to a menu called friends where players could see their in-game friends.

Moving the player around

In order to play the game, players had to actually physically move. As they walked, their avatars also walked. Tapping the pokemon near them would take them to a different screen where they could catch them.

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Page | 27 In IMG 9, the blue objects with white rings were called pokestops. When players were in the vicinity of a pokestop, it would transform to a circular pokeball symbol. Players had to swipe on them to ‘spin’ them; in return, they received various items – pokeballs, potions, revives etc. After they spun a pokestop, there was a ‘cooldown’ time – a certain amount of time for which they could not spin the same stop. Thus, players utilized their daily commutes and routines to their advantage by spinning multiple pokestops as they went about their lives.

Shop

Technically, all items, whether common ones that could be obtained from pokestops, or exclusive ones like reward boxes, could be purchased using coins. These coins (virtual currency) had to typically be bought with real-world currency. However, there was another way to obtain coins; players had to defend ‘gyms’ by placing their pokemon inside the gyms (refer gym, glossary). Although it involved a great deal of time and effort, all my informants used this approach. None of the players I observed used real-world money in the game. Besides, players also had the ability to stock up essential items by exchanging gifts with their in-game friends.

IMG 10: The shop menu

Friends

One of the most successful elements of Go is its social aspect (Clark & Clark, 2016). In fact, all my informants mentioned that sociality was a pivotal motivation for playing Go. One of my informants said that he kept playing Go three years after it was launched because he had made many friends through the game who came together just to play the game. Hence, only fittingly, Go had a separate menu for in-game friends.

Players had to go to this menu (IMG 11) to add new friends and see a list of existing friends. They could also use this menu to perform certain social actions with friends, namely sending gifts, trading, and battling. There was, in fact, a friendship system that encouraged people IMG 11: The friends menu

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Page | 28 to do such activities by rewarding them. The more that people did activities like trading and battling with their friends, the more progress they made as in-game friends. This progress was categorized under good, great, ultra, and best friend. Each category provided progressively higher rewards every time friends performed social actions like gifting, trading, and battling.

About the Go community

Any knowledge about Go is incomplete without a deep knowledge of its users. Thus, I have provided some observations about the kinds of players that I came across during

fieldwork.

I found that most players were middle aged (around 30-50 years old). They organized themselves through social media. There were multiple WhatsApp groups (12 major ones and innumerable ones for smaller areas of Amsterdam). Further, there were groups on other channels such as Facebook, Discord, and Telegram. On a daily basis, WhatsApp and Telegram received the most attention; typically, a single group chat in these apps could witness 50-100 messages a day.

The players were of different backgrounds and ethnicities. As Amsterdam is a multicultural city, many players had settled from other parts of Europe and the world. For instance, I remember speaking to a South-East Asian family that regularly travelled from Apeldoorn to Amsterdam (a distance of 90-100 km) to play Go during special in-game events called Community Days. It is valid, then, to wonder, why do people play Go?

My informants gave various, overlapping responses. One of them called James narrated the following,

not only did I watch Pokemon as a kid and also play the Game Boy games, but we as friends […] we also played Pokemon when we were like way too old to I guess like, and that was like one of our things that we did just as a group of friends like we went out and bought the new Pokemon game all the time and just like squandered hundreds of dollars buying Pokemon. So in that sense I was I never really stopped being

interested - I started being more, ironically, interested

Some themes stood out for James: watching the TV series, playing the games, and also playing with friends. His response hence combined social and nostalgic factors. It should be noted that the social was a recurring motivation among all my informants. Engelbart said he had been playing ever since the game launched because of friends he had made through the

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Page | 29 game. In fact, he mentioned that they not only played Go, but would also spend time with each other by going out for drinks.

On a similar note, Easton said there was a period of time, two years ago, when he was bored, and may have given up playing. He stuck to the game because a social feature called raiding was soon released. In his own words, “raiding brought a whole new dimension to the game”. I have explained more about raids in the next chapter. For now, it can be seen that the social factor recurred across small talk and interviews. Apart from nostalgia and sociality, physical movement was another motivation among players.

It should be noted that there is a close link between Niantic’s motivations, and the players’ motivations. Nostalgia, sociality, and physical movement coincided closely to both groups’ motivations. In a sense, this observation illustrates that the app developers’, Niantic’s, intentions had an impact on players through Go. I have explained this point by citing relevant theory in the next section. I have also explained the theoretical approach using which I studied Go in the subsequent section.

Theoretical framework

My objective in conducting fieldwork was to study the interactions of technology and users. I particularly wished to study how Go impacted its users’ interrelated digital and physical realities. Hence, in this framework, I have theorized two things: technology and interactions. Below, I have explained the central elements of my framework which are later used to analyse my field observations.

Practice theory

Reckwitz (2002) has propounded a certain version of practice theory which is central to this theoretical framework. I call it ‘a version’ because many authors before Reckwitz have written about practices, and each has meant something different. Reckwitz’s version is a collation of the different strands of social theory regarding practices. Specifically, Reckwitz has drawn upon common elements from the works of Pierre Bourdeau, Anthony Giddens, Michel Foucault, Harold Garfinkel, and Judith Butler. Ultimately, and essential for this thesis, Reckwitz has explained how practice theory reconceptualizes the body, mind, things,

knowledge and the agent/individual as components of practice and as loci of sociality. Regarding the body, practices are routinized bodily activities, which include

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Page | 30 the locus of sociality. Thus, since practices are the site of the social, and practices are

routinized bodily activities, these bodily activities are essentially sites of the social (ibid). At the same time, practices are not only bodily performances, but also mental activities. Hence, Reckwitz explained that practices are connected to the mind because they imply certain routinized ways of understanding the world.

In addition to body and mind, practices necessarily implicate things. As Reckwitz (2002:252) described, “Carrying out a practice very often means using particular things in a certain way”. Further, things “enable and limit certain bodily and mental activities, certain knowledge and understanding as elements of practices” (ibid:253).

With regards to knowledge, every social practice involves specific forms of

knowledge, which includes ways of understanding, specific know-hows tied to the practice, and ways of wanting and feeling (Reckwitz, 2002:253-254). In a sense, it is argued that knowledge related to practice is a way of understanding, and interpreting, the world. Further, like all the components of practice, knowledge is a locus of sociality; in this manner,

Reckwitz has argued that the knowledge related to practices is a collective, shared knowledge. His essential point is that practice consists of knowledge, which is simultaneously collective and individual; after all, different know-how, wants, emotions, and ways of understanding are enacted by individuals.

Leading from the above, in practice theory, there is a clear distinction between individuals and agents. It is argued that agents are only acting-points; all practices must be enacted by them. While every agent enacts multiple social practices in daily life, an individual is the unique intersection of all his/her practices or bodily-mental routines (Reckwitz,

2002:256-257).

What is both interesting and innovative is applying practice theory to technology. Suddenly, technology can be understood as a ‘thing’ that is connected to the body, mind, and knowledge of the individual who interacts with technology. Further, I have grounded my thesis in practice theory because it has helped me theorize interactions. Using practice theory, Go can be viewed, simultaneously, as a series of interactions and a practice.

However, if playing Go is a practice, analysing Go should reveal interconnections among body, mind, knowledge, individual, and the technologies involved in playing Go. Indeed, while analysing Go in the next chapter, I have explored this theoretical implication.

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Material culture

Something important has not yet been addressed: What are the technologies involved in playing Go? To answer this question, it is necessary to consider how we come to

understand objects. The strange truth about all objects, not just technologies, is its ordinary, taken-for-granted status in social life. Miller (2010), described this as the “humility of things (p.50)”. He meant that things are not tangible & firm; counter-intuitively, they are invisible, and are made invisible by being so familiar as to be taken for granted. He then continued,

Such a perspective seems properly described as material culture since it implies that much of what makes us what we are exists, not through our consciousness or body, but as an exterior environment that habituates and prompts us (Miller, 2010:50-51)

The ‘humility of things’ phrase is comprehensible. At the same time, Miller appears to be stating that material culture makes us. Later in his work, Miller (2010:50) reasoned that things are part of our environment while we grow up; even before we make things, we grow up being influenced by them. Yet, I must disagree with the fact that things make us because humans designed the things that we grow up with. Thus, it would only be correct to state that the human intentions behind designed objects influence us.

Let it not be mistaken that I am denying Miller’s whole argument. I only deny the scope of his statement that things make us, and instead state that things influence us because of the intentions involved while they were being designed. Recall the close link between Niantic’s motivations while creating Go and the players’ own motivations. In light of the above, Go is a medium through which Niantic’s motivations influence the players’ desires. Hence, there are more complex, intricate relationships between humans and things than what Miller portrayed.

Human-technology relationships

It is precisely the theme of relationships that ties together this theoretical framework because technology involves interactions and thereby facilitates relationships between humans and technology. Verbeek (2012), a professor of the philosophy of technology at University of Twente, summed it up well: “On the one hand, material artefacts are the product of processes of human design. At the same time, though, these artefacts play an important role in how we interact […] Humans shape things, and things shape humans” (p.163)

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Page | 32 Drawing upon both philosophical anthropology and philosophy of technology,

Verbeek (2012) formulated three models of human-thing relationships: dialectical, hybrid, and mediated. The first, dialectical, describes a relationship of tension between humans and things. The subject-object dichotomy fully exists and the human subject reigns supreme. The second, hybrid, refers to a collapse between subject and object. Hence, the concepts of agency, instrumentality, and intentionality are attributed to both human and non-human actors. Lastly, mediated, is the middle ground between the previous two relationships. It neither symbolizes concrete opposition nor complete collapse between humans and things. Rather, things act as a medium between humans and their world, helping give shape to the nature of humans’ activities. As Verbeek (2012:170-171) illustrated, there are plenty of examples from daily life: phones mediate our contacts, cars mediate our mobility and movement etc.

What follows from Verbeek’s concept of mediation is that things mediate human desires. Given the nature of desires, some desires may be for individual benefit, while others are intended to impact humans or non-humans. With respect to Go, the app mediates players’ desires for sociality, physical movement etc. At the same time, it also mediates Niantic’s motivations. The concept of mediation can thus describe the close link between Niantic’s motivations and the players’ own motivations.

Armed with all the above knowledge, let me return to the question of what constitutes technologies involved in playing Go. A thing need not only be tangible. As Miller (2010:50) affirmed, the truth is they are invisible in our daily lives by being over-familiar. It is probably obvious that the smartphones used to play Go are the primary technologies involved in the practice of playing Go. Yet, the taken-for-granted user-interface, icons, and graphics of Go are also vital elements. Thus, I theorize the smartphones used to play Go, and the digital objects (icons, graphics etc.) in the Go app, as material culture and as things that are enmeshed in the practice of playing Go.

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Page | 33 IMG 12: Both the digital objects (icons, graphics etc.) within the Go app and the smartphone

are theorized as material culture

In sum, playing Go can be theorized as a practice, which implies that the body, mind, and knowledge of individuals are interlinked with the technologies involved in playing Go. This theoretical implication has been examined in the next chapter. Additionally, the technologies involved in playing Go are concretized as material culture. They include both hardware and software, that is, the smartphones used to play Go, and the digital objects present in the Go app. The perspective of material culture connotes that things (in this case, Go) influence individuals. I have extended the point to state that, all things, especially technologies like Go, are involved in interactions and thus relationships with humans. Thus, in the following chapter, I have also used the concept of mediation to describe how humans use things to influence each other and express their desires.

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Chapter Two

Interactions with Pokemon Go

IMG 13: AR pictures posted on social media

(left) A husband clicked this picture of his pregnant wife in the hospital. In the Pokémon franchise, Chancey (the pink creature) is a symbol of fertility12 (right) A photo of a water-type pokemon called Lapras on a real beach.13

As a technology, AR is designed to literally integrate digital information into the physical surroundings of users. In this regard, Go is not only a game, but fundamentally an AR app for the smartphone. In fact, it is advertised everywhere as an AR app, ranging from the app developer’s, Niantic’s, website to media reports.4, 14 Yet, ironically, none of the players I observed used the AR features of Go while playing. This paradox thus requires some explanation.

Firstly, it should be noted that Go had two AR features during my fieldwork. The oldest of the two was called AR+. It seemingly placed pokemon into real surroundings by using real-time video from players’ smartphone cameras. It also allowed players to click AR pictures of pokemon before catching them. The other feature was called Go Snapshot. Unlike AR+, it did not let players catch pokemon or click pictures of new pokemon. Instead, it allowed players to click AR pictures of any of the pokemon they had previously caught (IMG 13)

Through small talk and interviews, I learnt why people who played Go regularly found the AR+ mode cumbersome. Firstly, they found it inefficient. It was simply harder to aim and catch a pokemon with AR+ than without – a deal breaker for serious gamers who wanted to catch pokemon as fast as possible. Another major reason why regulars did not use AR+ was because it guzzled up battery. I can vouch for that, having used it myself.

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Page | 35 Based on observation, AR+ was being used for the same purpose as Go Snapshot, that is, clicking AR pictures of pokemon in order to upload them on social media. Although this paradox has now been resolved, a bigger one emerged during fieldwork.

I noticed that though players were not using the AR features of Go while playing the game, they still merged their digital and physical worlds. They, essentially, did what AR technologies were designed for – without using those technologies whatsoever. How did this occur? Here, then, is a paradox that requires explanation. Raiding was one particular activity that was characteristic of this paradox because every act in a raid exemplified this behaviour of merging digital and physical worlds.

What is a raid

The most common group activity of Go was raiding. Raids were special events in Go that featured bosses, exceptionally strong pokemon that were hard to find outside raids. The goal of every raid was to defeat the boss, for which players were well rewarded – in

proportion to the difficulty of the raid (for more details, see raids, glossary).

Every raid fell into one of five tiers of difficulty, with five being the highest. Raid difficulty also determined the size of the group; until tier three, raids could be done either solo or in groups of 2-3. Higher-tier raids could only be completed in larger groups; usually 4-5 individuals were sufficient if they were high-levelled. Since there was no limit to group sizes, occasionally groups could have ten or more individuals.

Structural analysis of raids

During fieldwork, I participated in seven major raids and few smaller ones. I myself played only in two of them; in the others, I focussed on observing. I also video-recorded player interactions and engaged in small talk. In my experience, like any good story, every raid had a structure. It could be broken into distinct phases.

Phase #1: Broadcast

Every raid began through mobilization. Using social media messenger apps like Telegram and WhatsApp, players announced any upcoming raid they wanted to play. On Telegram, the announcements were more refined. Players could subscribe to group chats called ‘raid groups’ where they could see real-time updates concerning upcoming raids, including scheduled time of the raid, location, number of players signed up etc. (IMG 14).