Rafi and I checked out the "Playtech" open house at Parsons The New School for Design this afternoon, which was a lot of fun. The CDT Lab at Parsons organized "Playtech" to enable young people to check out some of the cool interactive games being developed by their grad students. Here's me playing a silly…
Category: Information Society
The Woz, Peter Norvig, Thomas Malone at “Program for the Future” at The Virtual Tech December 8-9
Really awesome in-world mural created by Eileen Legg and Valerie Landau Rob of The Tech Museum sent me the following event announcement for the "Program for the Future" on December 8-9 that sounds super cool: On Dec. 8-9, The Tech Museum in partnership with the MIT Museum will sponsor a major conference and design challenge…
Speaking about the UN, civic engagement, new media, and virtual worlds
I had the pleasure of speaking to my friend Josephine Dorado's class on "Collaboration in Networked Environments" that she is teaching at the New School this semester. The course apparently this week is exploring virtual worlds and MMOs, after delving into a range of other social media, from social networks to micro-blogging to mashup technologies. …
Metaplace has the awesome-est EULA of any virtual world
I have heard rumors that some educators have been invited to be part of the Metaplace beta testers group for this new virtual world environment created by Raph Koster. According to one of those rumored educator beta-testers, Metaplace is "one of the most powerful, user-friendly web-based / flash-driven virtual platforms out there." But of course,…
New report describes how youth hang out, mess around and “geek out” in digital spaces
I've started reading the white paper "Living and Learning with New Media," a summary of the immense, three-year, multi-study investigation of how American youth are using digital media for learning. Funded by the Digital Media & Learning initiative of the MacArthur Foundation, it incorporates the work of 23 researchers under the overall guidance of Mimi…
Swing that PhD Thesis! (video)
Some crazy outfit called Gonzo Labs is challenging PhD candidates around the country to post dance videos of themselves demonstrating what their thesis is about. I don’t even understand most of what these theses are about. But I love that some folks are doing bad ass lindy hop to demonstrate the principles these science doctoral…
Seeking speaking gigs on virtual worlds, education, non-profit tech, and civic engagement
I realized today that I’ve never mentioned on my blog that I’m available and interested in speaking engagements, either in person or virtually. Among the topics I’m particularly qualified to speak on: Immersive Learning: The potential and reality of education and virtual worlds The Activist Avatar: the Use of virtual worlds to promote non-profit causes…
Brilliant Fake New York Times from the Future: Iraq War Ends!
Big time congratulations to the team behind the fake New York Times from the future that hit the streets and the web today! The combination of great writing, design, and transmedia marketing is totally impressive. I’ve got a physical copy of the paper on my desk, courtesy of my co-worker Jay who brought in a…
President Obama and the desire for ephemera
So many people around me agree that we are living in a rare historic time in history: we are about to see the first African-american serve as President of the United States. One thing that I have found remarkable about these times is how much people are clamoring for ephemera and objects to mark this…
“Appleseed: Ex Machinima” mini-review
This weekend, I watched on Netflix-on-Demand "Appleseed: Ex Machina," (2007) an action-packed anime scifi adventure based on the manga series by Masamune Shirow and produced by John Woo. A definite improvement in both technical achievement and plot than the previous "Appleseed" movie from 2004, it’s still a fairly pedestrian story with some amazing visuals and…