Social Gaming Gets Funded
After virtual worlds and casual gaming, now emerges social gaming. Over the past couple of weeks a bunch of startups have come into some money by way of venture capital. So, what is this social gaming, who's building it, and who's funding it?
The term 'social gaming' seems somewhat superfluous: a game is inherently social because it either involves more than one person to play, or a larger socio-cultural context informs its game mechanics. But, whatever. This is not a philosophical explication of a definition: social gaming refers to games played on social networking platforms, like Facebook. — read on
Strongbad Classic
Cancer update (woo hoo!)
Today I visited my doctors again and they're telling me all is well. W00t! After last week's CT scan, everything looks normal. Or, as they call it, "stabile." Well anyway, it means that at the next scan in November, it will already have been a solid year since I finished that gruesome chemo. Ninjas:1, Cancer:0, indeed. Memorable pic after the jump. — read on
Imagining the Real World through Mods, Maps and Message Boards
The graph that is part of the paper I submitted to IADIS '08 is after the jump. — read on
Timely Erection
It seems that setting up DiGRA NY came very soon after a report made its way around the usual news outlets. I had no idea. — read on
Wordle Helping Out
Having reached the threshold of 1,250 coded .txt files, I'm getting excited about the imminent analysis. Particularly the host of wow-inducing applets strewn around teh Interwebs look promising. — read on
Noun-Phrase Analysis. Huh?
As I'm building the theoretical framework for my methodology, I'm going over some worthwhile texts that look at data mining online communities. In other words, how do we, as social scientists, make use of all that 'stuff' that's going on online? One elementary text is "A Noun Phrase Analysis Tool for Mining Online Community Conversations," by the mouthful Haythronthwaite and Gruzd (H&G). — read on
DiGRA NY approved
It's done. Today I received the e-mail from Tanya Krzywink saying it's a go. I'm looking fwd to the first panel this fall. Official press release after the jump. — read on
User-Created Maps (prelim data)
According to data from my dissertation research, user-created content (maps) extends a title's shelf life by approximately two years before it sharply declines. A subsequent release of a new installment reinvigorates the franchise. What follows is a brief summary of some preliminary numbers.
One of the happy observations that both academics and analysts like to make is that user-created content for a video game extends the title's shelf life. But not nearly often enough is this accompanied by any type of empirically derived argument. Enter data. — read on
Half of the work in getting a Ph.D is purely logistical. This is my attempt to create a degree of coherence in the influx of game-related news, data, tidbits, announcements, CFPs, book reviews, commentary and nonsense that finds its way onto my screen every day.
Game Theory Resources
Command & Conquer Mod Resource List
- As part of a project I'm doing with Nielsen Online (previously Nielsen BuzzMetrics), I've created a collection of online chatter surrounding Command & Conquer. I haven't signed the NDA yet, but what follows is publicly available anyway.Open Source Gaming
- I'm not sure exactly where this part goes: it's really part mod, part community gaming (if you allow 'collaborative construction of technological space' as a sec reading of say Big Games and Urban Terror 4.0). Nonetheless, forwards I gather the linkies.Big Games
- This section summarizes some of the online sites and information I collected whilst working on my paper 'City, Games & Media' in May, 2007. In no particular order:
Game Event Information
Game-related CFPs (updated 05/28)
- What follows is a listing of the calls-for-papers (CFPs) and other requests for publication and paper presentation that have some focus on video games.Big Ol’ List of 2008 Virtual World Conferences
- What follows is a list of 2008 conferences that have something to do with virtual worlds. Think of all the frequent flyer miles…Event dates
- In an attempt to organize the logistics of commercial and academic networking, this page will list events. Categorized by an overarching theme, I will update these as I go along. They are primarily based on the endless mailing lists that find their way into my inbox every day.