Actually seeing Monique, Jak, Jane, Jill & Lisbeth

Although not everyone realises it, I am actually based in Australia. I spend alot of time online checking out what is happening around the world. The Net is great for this, but at the same time I hardly ever get to meet my colleages in person. This year I’ve travelled to five countries and meet many researchers & designers who have come to Oz from OS. Here are some pics of me (in order of meeting) with some colleagues who share my research interest (I’ve met others but don’t have the pics): 

CMID07

Photo by ?, uploaded by Eric Voight on flickr

This motley crew is the group shot from the First International Conference on Cross-Media Interaction Design held in Sweden in March. Wohoo! It was great meeting lots of people, including my fellow keynoter Liam Bannon. But in particular I was thrilled to meet Monique de Haas and Jak Boumans. In the pic: bottom right in the blue jacket is Monique, behind her is Liam, beside Liam is me, beside me (to the left) is Jak, and below Jak is Charlotte Wiberg who with Mikael Wiberg (the first guy to the left of Charlotte) are the conference organisers. 

Monique and I have been championing cross media for years now. We were discussing this stuff via emails and through our blogs long before it became a pervasive economic imperative. I got to spend lots of time with Monique as I stayed with her in Amsterdam and then Monique, Jak and I gave an impromptu panel session at Noordelijke Hogeschool where I was asked to give a lecture (organised by Eric Voight who is also in the pic). It was a delight meeting Jak — whose years of experience with the area has given him a balanced wisdom and generous spirit.

CJ

Photo by a lovely lady from AMP, on Jane’s flickr

This is myself and Jane McGonigal (right). Jane is of course the first major researcher of alternate reality games, she has lots of presentations and articles and a dissertation on the topic. It was especially great chatting with Jane because we got to talk about ARGs but also because she works in industry and academia. It was so good to share stories with someone who understands what it is like.

LCJ

Photo by Tama Leaver, on flickr

This is Lisbeth Klastrup (left), myself and Jill Walker (right), both of whom I met for the first time at perthDAC 2007. Lisbeth co-wrote a paper with Susana Tosca on ‘Transmedial Worlds: Rethinking Cyberworld Design’, which I have referred to here and in my papers and is in my chapter on World Creation in my thesis. The paper is available for download on Lisbeth’s articles site. Jill has written on ‘distributed narratives’ which I’ve referred to here many times, in many of my presentations and of course is in my thesis too. Check out her dedicated minisite  and here is a snippet:

Distributed narratives don’t bring media together to make a total artwork. Distributed narratives explode the work altogether, sending fragments and shards across media, through the network and sometimes into the physical spaces that we live in. This project explores this new narrative trend, looking at how narrative is spun across the network and into our lives.

Now actually meeting people who share your research interest may not be exciting to you, but to someone who doesn’t get to meet people who work in this emerging area (and so not many looking at it) it is an absolute delight.

I’m off to Perth: DAC & FTI

Tomorrow I’ll flying to Perth:

Perth DAC: The Future of Digital Media Culture:

The Future of Digital Media Culture
In the early 1990s, the very term digital was new and novel. However, it has taken only fifteen years for e-mail, the Internet, mobile phones, the power of searchable databases, games, film and TV special effects and workplace software tools to become a common and essential part of modern life. Research has not only described the arrival of these new forms, but is increasingly addressing the unexpected social and cultural uses of digital communications and virtual work/play environments.

In the same historically brief time, popular attention has turned to the potentials and problems of the newer new technologies, bio and nano. In addition, the global phenomenon of terrorism, super-epidemics and climate change have developed from distant concerns to everyday realities. Thus the context for digitally mediated processes is also very different.

perthDAC 2007 will explore the complex interaction of human behaviour and new technologies that will be The Future of Digital Media Culture.

I’ll be presenting a paper in which I argue that the future of digital media doesn’t just include digital media.

On Monday 17th, I’ll be presenting on Filmmaking in the Age of Cross-Media Production for the Film and TV Institute.

I look foward to seeing some colleagues and family I haven’t seen in a while, and meeting people for the first time.

ARG designed to teach new literacies

In May 2007 my keyword alerts informed me of an ARG being developed to teach new literacies. The project was briefly described at Research Quest:

During the fall term of 2007, a team of faculty, librarians, instructional designers and student volunteers will be hosting an internet-based alternate-reality game (or ARG) designed to teach critical thinking and information literacy skill. The game will be targeted to college students, yet will be freely open and promoted in order to attract a broad range of participants.

After speaking to John Farquhar (with help from Perplex City puzzle-maker Peter Blake — thanks Peter!), I now know the project is well underway. Farquhar says he was inspired by the project after attending a lecture by Bryan Alexander. Although only online, it appears the project will draw on many elements of ARGs. It will commence on the 21st September 2007. So far, the only info is this paragraph on the trailhead:

William Lewis has a mystery to solve. He found a volume of a 1933 World Book Encyclopedia among his own books. Inside the book was a note with some mysterious and cryptic messages. How did it get there? What does it mean? And, where will all of this lead? Join William’s mystery here on September 21 and expect to uncover new mysteries and puzzles throughout the fall. Participate in the online forum or create your own blog of your experience. Use the online tools to: 1) describe search strategies that successfully locate additional clues, 2) critically examine the clues, documents and other sources information, and 3) guide other participants to successfully search for and critically examine information. Perhaps you’ll make new friends and learn new things.

I asked Farquhar whether he was OK with non-schools participating and he is definitely keen:

Our ARG will be open to anyone and I am encouraging participation outside of the academic community. In fact, I am particularly interested in seeing the collaboration between those participating for college credit and those who happen upon the experience for other reasons. The game is being designed to teach information literacy and critical thinking skills which I think all good ARG players seem to have.

Check it out: http://helpmesolveamystery.com/