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West Town Resident's Instagram Game Leads Players to 'Tag' Public Spots

By Alisa Hauser | July 22, 2014 2:38pm
 A West Town resident has developed a new game called Cartagram.
A West Town resident has developed a new game called Cartagram.
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Kickstarter

WEST TOWN —  A West Town resident has developed a new game that sets players off on urban adventures and encourages them to "tag" signs, buildings or other objects across the city — and share photos of what they did on Instagram.

But players needn't worry about damaging anything — the tags are actually stickers made from wood chips, soy and corn that disintegrate after one rainfall, said Len Kendall, the creator of Cartegram.

"I wanted to make a game that makes you cognizant of what's around you and offer a low barrier entryway for people that want to leave their mark around the city," said Kendall, who bills himself as an "Internet experimenter."

 Len Kendall's Cartegram game has far exceeded its Kickstarter goal of raising $1,500 and will be delivered to backers this fall.
Len Kendall's Cartegram game has far exceeded its Kickstarter goal of raising $1,500 and will be delivered to backers this fall.
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Peter Thompson Photo (Kendall); Cartegram (upper left)

Kendall has launched a Kickstarter campaign — scheduled to end Tuesday night at 9:30 p.m. — to fund the game that has exceeded its goal by more than 300 percent, with nearly 200 backers contributing more than $5,000 as of Tuesday.

The game gives players a pocketbook with a series of 13 tasks, such as finding a place to put a sticker with a heart on it to "to make something a bit less unsightly" or taking a sticker with an "X" on it to "make a statement out on the streets. Use the X to change the meaning of something you find. A word, a wall, an ad?”

The game was inspired by a comment Kendall's father made in April about how while he was walking through the city "everyone had their heads down looking at screens" as they used smartphones to play games like Candy Crush or do other tasks.

With his father's comment in mind, Kendall, 30, developed Cartegram based around his own interest in exploring Chicago and photography and wanting to "put structure around that."

He tested the idea in May with a volunteer group of 10 players located around the world before launching the Kickstarter campaign in June.

Kendall said players told him the game gave them "the motivation to go out and explore" and take photos.

Kendall said "one unexpected downside" from the test group was that some people felt reluctant to put the icons on public outdoor spaces, even though they knew the icon would wash away.

"Not everyone who might see someone playing the game would know that it disappears," Kendall said of the icons, which he partnered with a vendor in California to create.

Indeed, that could be a problem if police caught you in the act, said Officer Jose Estrada, a Chicago Police Department spokesman.

"Anything which alters the original appearance of any property public or private" could be considered as criminal defacement to property, he said.

Estrada said anyone who was thinking about participating in the game should do so with caution, especially if applying stickers to private property. But he admitted it's unlikely that a complaint over a sticker would hold up if it had already faded before any action was taken.

Kendall said the plan was to charge $20 per pocketbook or "season," with anyone who backed at least $15 in his Kickstarter campaign receiving a discounted version of Cartegram's first season when it is published this fall.

Though initially just available to Kickstarter backers or for sale on Cartegram.com, Kendell has approached some local shops such as Paperish Mess at 1955 W. Chicago Ave. about selling Cartegram.

While Cartegram is Kendall's first entry into the gaming world, he admits to "doing a lot of things on the side" including what has recently become his main gig: a funding widget for online publishers called Centup.com, which allows readers to give money to a website after reading a piece of content they enjoyed while also supporting a charitable organization.

Learn more about Cartegram at cartegram.com