Update: Scaredy Cats, Worldbuilding, ARGs & Barcelona

Hello!

Here is an update on some of the things I’ve published and will be doing shortly. πŸ™‚

  • I had a piece about (transmedia) worldbuilding published in MeanLand: Some Things I’ve Learned About Transmedia WorldbuildingΒ – I’d love to hear your experiences!
  • I had an essay published in a book for emerging writers on not taking fear-based advice. My piece opens the book and has had great reviews along with all the amazing essays in the book. It is a great one: The Emerging Writer: An Insider’s Guide to Your Writing’ Journey
  • I’m now in Barcelona to give the opening keynote on ARGs, social experiences, education and PR — rah! — at the BCN Meeting on Social Experiences. I’m also meeting up with the Transmedia Barcelona folk to chat about filmmaking, comics, gaming, and mobile experiences with wonderful experts such as Antoni Roig TeloΒ (who brought me over here!), Jordi SanchezNavarro, Carlos A. Scolari (who has just written a book on transmedia, featuring interviews with Henry Jenkins and myself!), and Montecarlo! Yay! We’re meeting today and will be sharing stuff through the hashtag #transmediabcn
  • I’ve been working on AUTHENTIC IN ALL CAPS, preparing everything for the next playtest. Wohoo! More info about the team and what we’ve been doing soon. Really. :p

Update: Emerging Writers’ Festival, MediaCity & Pervasive Gaming

Hello! Well, I’m back from Sweden. I had a great time. While there I not only jumped over to LA to speak at Transmedia Hollywood, I also flitted over to Finland to give a keynote at MediaCity. It was great catching up with Simon, and hearing more about the audience testing they do there. Good times. πŸ™‚

Shortly after arriving back in Melbourne, I gave a lecture on pervasive gaming (the things I had learned from working on alternate reality games) to the game design students at RMIT. That is great fun. πŸ™‚ (I really should share those lessons online – been meaning to for years).

Anyway, this weekend I’m excited to be a part of the Emerging Writers’ Festival in Melbourne. The “festival for writers” has asked me to be a “Town Hall Writers’ Conference Ambassador”. There are five of us, representing different writing skill sets:

  • Ali Alizadeh (poetry)
  • Christy Dena (digital storytelling)
  • Lawrence Leung (comedy)
  • Emily Maguire (novels)
  • Anita Sethi (journalism)

We have certain duties, which includes giving some talks. On Saturday 10-11am, we’ll be sharing things we wish we knew at the beginning of our “career” on the panel Seven Enviable Lines. On Sunday 12.30pm, a group of us will be talking specifically about digital writing: “Digital writing is about much more than whacking up a blog post every so often. It requires diligence, a consideration of audience and aesthetics. These writers discuss how they create and publish in the online space.” And then on Tuesday, my pre-recorded video on building an online audience will be streamed for the EWF Digital. I’ll be at all the evening functions, and around during the day for Q&As. I look forward to seeing you there and talking about writing! Yay! πŸ™‚

Traveling again! Off to Sweden and LA :D

Hellooo!

Just letting you know I’m traveling again, and maybe in your direction! πŸ™‚

I’ll be teaching the cross-media design course for 6 weeks at UmeΓ₯ University in Sweden. I gave some guest lectures there last Sept-Oct and had a ball. So now I’ll be back teaching an entire course where the students will create a cross-media project in teams. FUN! πŸ˜€

I’ll also whip over to be on a panel at Transmedia Hollywood.

Transmedia, Hollywood is a one-day public symposium exploring the role of transmedia franchises in today’s entertainment industries. Transmedia, Hollywood turns the spotlight on media creators, producers and executives and places them in critical dialogue with top researchers from across a wide spectrum of film, media and cultural studies to provide an interdisciplinary summit for the free interchange of insights about how transmedia works and what it means. Transmedia, Hollywood is co-hosted by Denise Mann and Henry Jenkins, from UCLA and USC, two of the most prominent film schools and media research centers in the nation.

The topic this year is Creative Relations, and Henry invited me to speak on a panel where I’ll talk about the influence of commerce on design.

Panel 2: Creative Economies: Commercial vs. State-Based Models
In the United States, transmedia production has been often coupled with issues of promotion and branding, because of the ways that production is funded in a Hollywood studio or network television models. But, around the world, in countries where there is strong state support for media production, alternative forms of transmedia are taking shape, which are governed by different imperatives (cultural, educational, artistic). How has transmedia fit within the effort of nation-states to promote and expand their creative economies? What can commercial media producers learn from these alternative models and approaches? How might these developments further expand our understanding of what transmedia is and what it can contribute to the language of storytelling? What are the advantages and disadvantages of creating transmedia content under these different kinds of creative economies?

I’m so looking forward to catching up with everyone in Stockholm, Umea and LA! Come say hi! πŸ™‚