Hero selected!

I select Jane McGonigal for my hero.

I almost didn't, because although she is very hero-worthy, she's also involved with creating EVOKE, and I thought that might be a little weird. But then I realized that that's another great reason to pick her as a hero, since EVOKE is exactly the kind of thing I want to be creating.

Jane gave a talk at SXSW 2008. I was there. I saw her do the Soulja boy dance after giving a kick-ass talk on the importance of play, and I thought, here is someone who knows how to teach and who knows how to play and who knows that teaching and play and learning are all bound up together and are at the essence of being human.

I want to change the world with games. I want to help make games that engage people and that let learning happen. More than that, I want to make games that make it easier to learn. Paper and pencil, dice, pixels, whatever -- I'll use whatever tools I can, whatever tools players have access to. I want to deeply change education, from the youngest ages all the way up to lifelong learners, through games.

I'm blown away by EVOKE already. It's true that we're changing the world while we play, because it's about changing ourselves. Because of this mission I'm going to contact Jane and tell her she's my hero. Then I'm going to award myself +1 courage because it's scary to reach out to famous, busy people!

I'm also following her on Twitter and reading her blog, and I'm going to see if I can find and friend her on Facebook.