I remember attending a session at the recent UPA/DC conference on ” Gamification as a Method for User Engagement?” by Theresa Smith ( see http://upadc.org/Resources/Documents/conference/2011/Presentations/SmithTheresa-UserFocus1011.pdf ) and was intrigued about her application of games to productive user experiences. My son is addicted to angry birds and we often spend time singing the theme song to each other. if someone knows more about what makes games interesting, that can be applied to web-based application design.