ARK

I might have blogged about this before. I can’t remember. Which proves a point. It’s an important one. Keep reading. 

ARK

Let me tell you about a video game. It’s called Ark. Basically it’s a building and dinosaur fighting/taming survival game. It’s difficult. It’s multiplayer on internet which means you can team up with random strangers indeed this is intended as necessary for survival to encompass required skill sets. 

For six months to a year American and European gamers enjoyed it, some of them eventually attaining the games equivalent to relative god status by beating everything possible in the game. Most players never got remotely close to that. 

The game was opened up to China. Within two weeks China had beat the game, doing more, getting further, faster, than American and Europeans had achieved in a year. 

Why? 

Because of the notable difference in the Chinese approach to problem solving. 

Wave one: Explore and identify dynamics. Communicate the data lucidly and succinctly to all (processes in bullet point).

Wave two: People fell naturally into roles to achieve goals. People not stop until they had achieved their personal target as quickly and efficiently as possible. 

The difference between Chinese method and USA/Europe is attitude. 

In the West, exploring and identifying dynamics was not done methodically it was done sporadically and randomly. It took a long time to learn the dynamics with a lot of trial and error. 

The data was not communicated to all even where this would have helped the other players in their own team. Competitiveness between individuals inhibited progress. 

Failure to communicate lucidly and succinctly inhibited progress. Ability to assimilate lessons (processes in bullet point) was proven lacking. 

Westerners did not fall naturally into roles. No structure is innately a part of the western psyche. It was revealed the opposite to be true; more individuals fought against that structure even when it cost their lives. 

The exception being during commerce where fair trade was interrupted in equal measure by raids. No holistic cohesion with equality respect for others in the same team battling the same hostile environment. 

Westerners took time out from their assigned mission and then quit when it got too hard because of deviation from the bullet-point process. 

China’s ARK players recognised all this about Western mindset faster than Western ARK players recognised this about China. 

Now USA wants to go to war against China. In future, we will all be learning Mandarin.